FDI's Weekly Newswire

The life and [troubled] times of the Islamic Republic of Iran

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FDI WEEKLY NEWSWIRE NO 21

Sept. 23, 1996

Lankarani accused the Saudi regime of having recently arrested "dozens" of leading Shiite clergymen, and warned that such actions "are closely being watched" by the Shiite clergy in Iran. "We will not let them to continue these anti-Islamic provocations," Lankarani warned. "I demand that the Saudi regime stop harassing the Shiites. I warn them to stop acting as the puppets of foreigners." If not, Lankarani went on, "every true Muslim will react."

Lankarani's "fatwa" was accompanied by a strongly anti-Saudi and anti-Israeli editorial by Jomhouri-e Islami, which criticized the governments of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt for attempting to make peace with Israel.

This is not the first time that a Tehran cleric has issued such a warning against the Saudi regime. In May, Ayatollah Ahmed Jannati warned the Saudis that a "wave of revolution is slowly taking over the land of Arabia" that would threaten "the hegemony of America and Israeli... over Islamic states." Just one month after this statement, a terrorist bombing killed 19 Americans in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. Kayhan daily called the attack "revenge" for the execution of four Saudi nationals in April.

Informed sources in Tehran believe that Lankarani's "fatwa" was similar to Jannati's statements in May. "This is how the regime issues orders to its clandestine cells operating overseas," said one former intelligence officer in Tehran. "This is the first shot in a coordinated attack against U.S. and Israeli interests in the Middle East."

The Jomhouri-e Islami editorial also made reference to a March 1996 fatwa by the pro-Iranian "Council of Foghana" in Saudi Arabia which called for terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians, "since all Israeli citizens are actually a part of the Israeli Army."

As these statements appeared in Tehran, the head of Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Ramadan Abdallah Shallah, was quoted by an Arabic newspaper in London that his group would relaunch suicide attacks against Israel starting Oct. 26. On this date last year, his predecessor, Fathi Shiqaqi, was presumably assassinated in Malta by Israeli intelligence agents. [Iranfax 9/22; Jomhouri-e Islami 9/21]

OPPOSITION GROUP SEEKS TO BAR VELAYATI SPEECH

Washington, DC, Sept. 23, 1996 - An Iranian opposition group is seeking to block Iran's Foreign Minister from addressing an anti-sanctions forum in New York this Thursday, because of the Islamic Republic's support for international terrorism.

The group, the Constitutionalists Movement of Iran, CMI, has written to the President of Columbia University and to U.S. officials in Washington, seeking to bar Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati from addressing the Caspian Sea Symposium at Columbia on Sept. 26.

In a letter to Dr. George Rupp of Columbia, the Secretary General of CMI, Dr. Khosrow Akmal, notes that Mr. Velayati "has approved the Islamic Republic's terrorist activities and the attacks against Iranian dissidents. He also supports Khomeini's death sentence against Salman Rushdie... Clearly the participation of terrorist Velayati at the Symposium will reflect adversely on Columbia University."

The symposium is being organized by the Middle East Institute of Columbia University. At the urging of pro-Tehran lobbyists, the Institute is seeking to take advantage of Mr. Velayati's presence in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, to allow him to address a forum attacking the U.S. sanctions policy.

In April 1995, Rutgers University Professor Hooshang Amirahmadi, who has worked to organize the Velayati speech, attempted to invite two Iranian officials to a similar sanctions-bashing forum in Washington. At the last minute, the State Department disbarred the officials - Iran's Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Kamal Kharazi, and the Governor of the Central Bank, Mohsen Nourbakhsh - from attending.

At a forum in Washington, DC that was financed by CONOCO, the U.S. oil firm whose $600 million contract in Iran has been taken over by CFP-Total following the imposition of sanctions, Suddarth pledged to put the resources of his Institute at the disposal of the anti-sanctions group. (CONOCO, however, made clear it would not finance such an effort unless "the full spectrum of opinion on the issue" was present.

Mr. Velayati's trip to the United States occurs only days after a senior Iranian cleric, Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Fazel Lankarani, issued a religious decree threatening the government of Saudi Arabia with terrorist attacks on the pretext it had become "the puppet of foreigners," as we reported from Tehran yesterday (Serial 2630). Lankarani's "fatwa" recalls a similar decree issued by Ayatollah Ahmed Jannati in May, that appears to have led directly to the June 27 bombing of the Khobar Towers in Dhahran.

In the event Mr. Velayati is allowed to address the forum, the CMI plans to protest the meeting and is seeking a permit from New York City authorities to picket the meeting hall. [Iranfax 9/23; The Iran Brief 6/3/96]]

Regime poisons opposition Kurds

An agent of the Islamic Republic has poisoned three leaders of the opposition KDPI, a statement released in Paris by the Party alleges.

The incident occurred on Aug. 22, when an Iranian Kurd known to Kurdish leaders in Saqez presented a box of poisoned biscuits to the KDPI Committee in charge of the affairs of the Saqez, Afshar, and Diwandareh regions, in the southern part of Iranian Kurdistan. In order to fool the KDPI officials, the infiltrator ate one of the biscuits himself, then left. A few hours later, all three KDPI officials were rushed to the hospital with symptoms of poisoning. Ata Reazapur died on Sept. 3, while Saleh Charifi died on Sept. 13 as a result of the poisoning. The third victim is still in hospital in critical condition. [KDPI statement 9/23]

KDPI activists jailed, hanged

Following the armed incursion into northern Iraq by some 3,000 Pasdaran troops in late July, the Tehran regime has launched a crackdown against Kurdish opposition leaders inside Iran as well. The KDPI says that "hundreds" of KDPI supporters have been arrested in the Iranian Kurdish towns of Naghadeh, Piranshahr, Ushnavieh, Mahabad, and Sardasht since August, "on charges of belonging to or sympathizing with the KDPI." Two KDPI supporters have been killed in detention. They were identified as Suleiman Ghaitaran, son of Kemal, who was arrested in 1996 and died under torture in the MOIS prison in Naghadeh. The second was identified only as Osman, son of Abdullah, born in Sardasht and arrested in 1995 on charges of supporting the KDPI. He was hanged in public in a prison called "the teacher's house," the KDPI said.

The KDPI has released the names of 21 Kurdish civilians arrested in the Piranshahr region since August since 1996, who remain in MOIS jails in the region and are in imminent threat of execution. FDI joins the KDPI in calling for their immediate and unconditional release. [KDPI statement 9/11]

Furor over Rafsanjani third term

The trial balloon floated recently by Rafsanjani confidant Hassan Rouhani (see last week's newswire) has generated a veritable furor among conservative and radical clerics and students associations.

On Sept. 21, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamene'i joined the fray, giving what most observers took as his "final opinion" on the subject. "Mr. Rafsanjani has delivered astonishing services in all the heavy responsibilities he has carried on his shoulders. There is no doubt that when his term of office comes to an end, it will be necessary and precious for the Islamic establishment to take advantage of his abilities in other positions and responsibilities.

Khamene'i's comment, which was delivered during a speech in Urumieh, near the fighting in Iraqi Kurdistan, was carried by all major dailies in their Sept. 21 editions. One Majlis deputy - Seyed Ahmad Rasouli-Nejad, of Damavand city, declared that Khamene'i's judgement had put an end to the discussion. "From now on everybody should obey Ayatollah Khamene'i's order and put an end to the recent challenges." [Resalat 9/21].

Khamene'i is only the latest figure to come out against a third Rafsanjani term.

Said Interior Minister Ali Mohammad Besharati: "It is not in the interest of the country and the revolution to amend the Constitution and extend the President's term of office." It was up to Khamene'i "to have the final say in this matter," Besharati said. Then he warned reporters not to raise the issue of revising the Constitution. "If the people want another term of office for Mr. Rafsanjani, they shall find other legal ways to extend his presidency... I personally think another person should be President." [Kayhan 9/8]

In a lead editorial on Sept. 17, Kayhan warned that "those who want to change the constitution to extend the presidency of Mr. Rafsanjani are acting against the rule of law... and are trying to undermine security of our society."

Hojjatol-eslam Movahedi Savoji, a leading of the Militant Clergy Association and parliamentary associate of Nateq-Nouri (Rafsanjani's main rival), piled on the next day: "The extension of Mr. Rafsanjani's presidency is against the regulations established by the late Ayatollah Khomeini." [Salam 9/18]

Perhaps the most dramatic anti-Rafsanjani move was taken in Parliament, when 120 MPs calling themselves the "Hezbollah Fraction" signed a petition calling for no third term. "There is no need to extend the presidency of Mr. Rafsanjani," they wrote. "The next president shall be a person who clearly is informed of the plots against the Islamic Republic." [Resalat 9/17].

In an implicit criticism of Rafsanjani, Majlis speaker Nateq-Nouri poured fuel on the flames. "There is a serious U.S. plot inside Iranian government institutions," he told Tehran Radio on Sept. 17. "The government must find ways to stop this plot by imperialist powers. Western cultural invasion controls our government institutions, and they are trying to destroy the Islamic Republic from the inside." [Radio Tehran 9/17]

And in what may be the ultimate of snubs, a group of twenty top Pasdaran commanders, meeting in Tehran during the commemoration of the start of the Iran-Iraq war, met first with Khamene'i, then with Nateq-Nouri, and then waited a day before paying the traditional courtesy call to Rafsanjani. [Radio Tehran 9/19]

Anxious perhaps to play down the snub, Rafsanjani made a televised speech in praise of the Pasdaran after their meeting on Thursday, in which he claimed that the Guards Corps "has played a main role in isolating the Americans in the region." [IRIB 9/20]

Was that a quiet acknowledgment of the role played by Pasdaran intelligence in the June 27 Dhahran bombing?

Talabani featured by Iranian press

Defeated Iraqi Kurdish leader Jalal Talabani is becoming a "cause celebre" among the government-run press in Tehran. Iran daily featured a long interview with Talabani in its Sept. 18 edition, which it said was conducted "somewhere inside Iraq."

While admitting he has lost on the battlefield, Talabani vowed to continue his war against the rival KDP, and said that his forces had already begun to launch "sporadic attacks" against the KDP and the Iraqi military.

These attacks will "very soon turn into large military operations," Talabani boasted. "I am sure that soon the PUK will be able to liberate Kurdistan again."

Before the Iraqi attack against Irbil on Aug. 31, Talabani said his party's sources inside the Iraqi army "had informed us there were negotiations between Saddam and the KDP, and we informed our friends... However, the Americans didn't want to interfere, and the silence of the Americans allowed Saddam to reassert control over northern Iraq." He speculated that "the Americans may have been angry for the PUK's relations with Iran."

The journalist from Iran daily then asked him if he had any military support from Tehran. "Unfortunately, no. We got no military support from the Iranian government after the Iraqi invasion. We were in great need of anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons. We asked for help, but we did not receive it." He acknowledged that the PUK "officially requested" help from Tehran after the Iraqi attack, "but we didn't receive any positive response."

For the future, he said, "Iraqi Kurdistan is moving toward civil war." [Iran 9/18]

Government newspaper threatens U.S.

Commenting the U.S. "aggression" that has led to the tragedy in Iraqi Kurdistan, the state-run English-language daily, Kayhan International, warned that if "America's traditional disrespect for Muslim civilian life [does not stop] without further delay... Muslims will be forced to find other ways to make this point clear to U.S. leaders."

The paper blamed the U.S. for the exodus of Iraqi Kurdish civilians and the factional fighting that has wracked the region. "As America's war against defenseless Iraqi civilians continues, the civilized world either remains a mute witness or prefers to rescue all its sympathies for Israel."

The editorial curiously branched out against Israel, and went on to mention that Muslims "and Arabs in particular," would strike back against the U.S.

Perhaps another harbinger of things to come, similar to the statement by Ayatollah Lankarani we cite above? [Kayhan International 9/12]

Seven more "spies" arrested

Those pesky spies are at it again... The head of the Busheir office of MOIS has announced the arrest of seven more "spies," who had been engaged in illegally gathering information in military and economic fields and passing it to unnamed foreign countries.

The official, identified only as "Eslami," did not reveal the names of the "spies," or which country or countries were involved. He only said that they were arrested by the "Unknown Soldiers of Imam Zaman," a code-word frequently used in the media to designate agents of the Ministry of Information and Security, MOIS. (Zaman is the twelve Imam, whose followers believe he is "hidden" and will reappear one day). [Salam 9/9]

Faezeh Hashemi criticizes "nudity" at Olympics

Faezeh Hashemi, the daughter of President Rafsanjani who was elected to the fifth Majlis and who accompanied him on his recent African tour (see last week's Newswire), has complained that nudity and commercialization at the Atlanta Olympics "threatened to overshadow the social goals of sports events."

She reportedly told the head of Uganda's Olympic Committee that the head of the International Olympic committee, Juan Antonio Samaranch, had himself criticized the nudity and commercialization of the games. (Samaranch has criticized the over-commercialization of the games, but this is the first we've ever heard of his complaints of "nudity"). [Kayhan International 9/9]

Avoid extravagance, Habibi says

Faced with increasing complaints, including from government workers, about rising prices and the lack of many necessities - ranging from food to pharmaceuticals, decent housing to public transport - the government is now asking people to "change their pattern of consumption."

First Vice President Hassan Habibi has led the charge, calling for an international conference on sustainable development. "The pattern of consumption in this country must change," he said recently.

"By the year 2021, the country must no longer be dependent on oil exports. To attain sustainable development, people should learn to avoid extravagance and avoid making exorbitant demands," he added. [Kayhan International 9/12]

Two men hanged on homicide charges

Two young men, both aged 18, were hanged on charges of homicide recently in the village of Tal-e Siah, near Tangestan, in southern Iran. They were accused of killing a cab driver last year. Only the first names of the two were released - Abdolkarim, and Gholamreza. As in most cases of this type, no details were released about the trial or their right to defense. [Iran, 9/12]

South Africa denies endorsing Iranian human rights

The South African Foreign Ministry has protested vigorously what it considers false reports issued by the Islamic Republic News Agency after last week's state visit to South Africa by President Rafsanjani.

The IRNA reports claimed that the two countries had signed a joint communiqué, in which South Africa praised Iran's record on human rights and demanded that foreign military forces withdraw from the Persian Gulf.

In a statement released last Tuesday, Sept. 17, the South African Foreign Ministry said, "Despite many hours of intense negotiation in respect of a joint communiqué, agreement has not been reached on wording acceptable to both sides."

The ministry quoted an IRNA report saying that South Africa had "expressed satisfaction with the state of human rights and democracy" in Iran. The ministry said that was simply untrue. Instead, South African Foreign Minister Alfred Nzo had said only that South Africa had been heartened by Iran's announced willingness to "cooperate more fully" with the UN human rights investigator. Recalling IRNA's glee that South Africa had condemned the U.S. presence in the Persian Gulf, the South African Foreign Ministry said that "no such joint statement was made - in fact, no joint communiqué was issued."[Reuters 9/17; International Iran Times 9/20]

Britain outlaws Mujahidin-related charity

The British government's Department for Charity Organizations has outlawed "Iran Aide," a charity related to the People's Mujahidin Organization of Iran run by Massoud Radjavi. The head of the British department said "Iran Aide" was extorting money from British citizens.

Last year, he said, "Iran Aide" had taken in contributions of more than $2 million, by sending its employees to the homes of British citizens in the London area seeking their support of Iranian prisoners and victims of torture.

Solicitations for charity at people's homes is against British law, the government office said. [Reuters 9/20]

Former Mujahidin announces Presidential bid

Ali Farasati, an exiled journalist who writes for Kayhan in London and works as a researcher with the Geopolitical Research Center in Paris, has announced that he is seeking to become a candidate in next year's presidential elections in Iran.

He told a press conference in Paris on Sept. 17 that he had sent a letter to the Islamic Republic's ambassador in Paris saying that he now accepts the legitimacy of the Islamic Republic and the IRI constitution, and was seeking to return to Iran with his followers to become a presidential candidate.

For many years, Farasati was as a senior official in the opposition People's Mujahidin Organization of Iran. After a brief stint from 1979-1981 as an official of the Islamic Republic (as were many PMOI members), Farasati fled Iran for France with Massoud Radjavi in June 1981, and later followed Radjavi to Iraq, where he acknowledged having fought against Iranian soldiers during the Iran-Iraq war. [Radio Sedaye Iran 9/20]

FDI's Weekly Newswire

FDI WEEKLY NEWSWIRE NO 21

Sept. 23, 1996

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