June 2010
44 posts
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“There are two countries in the world who do not deserve to exist: Iran and...”
– Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah
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WSJ: Iranian Diplomat in U.S. Opens Window on... →
A former lead Iranian nuclear negotiator has taken up residence at Princeton University, marking the highest-ranking member of Tehran’s political elite to relocate to the U.S. since last year’s political uprising against Ahmadinejad.
U.S. and European officials view Hossein Mousavian as particularly important, as he has spent more than two decades working on foreign-policy issues...
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US Welcomes Businesses Around World for Cutting... →
A top U.S. official, Stuart Levey of the Treasury Department, told a Senate panel on Tuesday that an “unprecedented effort” has been taken to share information with firms all over the world about Iran’s activities. He says that because of the effort, firms worldwide have decided to change the way they do business. “Virtually all major financial institutions have either...
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BP's Other Gifts to America—and to the World →
azspot:
BP originated in 1908 as the Anglo-Persian Oil Company—a British corporation whose name was changed to the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company two decades later. With exclusive rights to extract, refine, export, and sell Iran’s rich oil resources, the company reaped enormous profits. Meanwhile, it shared only a tiny fraction of the proceeds with the Iranian government. Similarly, although the...
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WatchA Revolution Silenced in Iran
ABC’s Jim Sciutto meets w/ protesters in Tehran and reports on the Green Movement a year later.
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Telegraph: Iranian police issue 'badly veiled'... →
Colonel Khorasani, the provincial police chief, said police had also confiscated around 100 cars for carrying improperly dressed women and said that “encouraging such relaxations are among the objectives of the enemy.”
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WatchHanged for teaching “Sunday School” | See Persecution of Bahá’ís in Iran
It’s noteworthy to remember that these crimes committed by the Islamic Republic, are the very same crimes they accused the Shah of committing.
This, is the history of the Islamic revolution.
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Guardian: EU must forgo commercial interests to... →
Yesterday, European Union leaders gathered in Brussels and approved a new round of sanctions targeting Iran’s financial and energy sectors, with a special focus on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the paramilitary organisation that dominates most of Iran’s business and brutally suppresses the country’s democratic opposition. The IRGC is said by experts to control as...
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Fear For Iranian Woman Facing Death By Stoning →
Women’s rights activist Soheila Vahdati spoke to Radio Farda on June 17 about the case of Sakineh Ashtiani, an Iranian woman convicted of adultery who may soon be stoned to death. Ashtiani, who has two children, has been imprisoned since 2005. According to Article 83 of the Laws of Islamic Punishment in Iran, the penalty for adultery is death by stoning. However, murder is not...
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NYT: Iran Says West Backs Terrorists →
Iran accused Britain, France, Sweden and other Western nations on Wednesday of supporting an exiled group that Iranian officials say planned terrorist acts in the country. Iran said it had arrested members of the opposition group, the Mujahedeen Khalq, and accused them of having planned to carry out “terrorist activities” in Tehran on Saturday. In an e-mail message on Wednesday, the...
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“Suppose that in the days following last year’s fraudulent election in...”
– WSJ: Requiem for a Revolution: The Iranian Green movement is dead
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I'm watching HBO's "For Neda"
and I have to tell you: I’m bursting with pride and so in love with my Persian countrymen and women. I’m also crying and shaking with anger.
Watch this film.
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Telegraph: Iran's Revolutionary Guards cash in... →
In return for standing by him in the bloody crackdown that saw thousands arrested and up to 100 people killed, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has awarded a series of lucrative oil and gas deals to Guards-owned front companies. The deal will hugely boost the power of the group, a paramilitary outfit that sees itself as the ultimate defenders of the country’s Islamic revolution,...
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WatchFareed Zakaria on HBO’s new documentary, For Neda
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“There is no guarantee that categorical American support would have altered the...”
– Iran A Year Later
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NYT: Across Iran, Anger Lies Behind Face of Calm →
One year after Iran’s disputed presidential election, the familiar rhythms of life have returned here. Through a widespread, sustained and at times brutal crackdown, the government has succeeded in suppressing a protest movement that shook the nation for months after the re-election of Ahmadinejad. But the veneer of calm masks what many here call the “fire under the ashes,” a low-grade burn...
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CNN: Sporadic skirmishes reported in Iran on... →
The first skirmishes were reported at about 6 p.m. as uniformed riot police and plain-clothes security forces, many on motorcycles, chased away growing crowds along the sidewalks of Tehran’s Vali Asr Square. Witnesses told CNN they saw several people struck by batons as they were running away. They said at least five people were arrested, blindfolded, handcuffed and swept away by...
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WSJ: Iran and the 'Freedom Recession' →
Three decades ago, before his final flight to exile, the Shah of Iran had drawn a line: He would not fire on his people. He was a king, he said, and not a dictator. The army had not yet cracked; there were loyalists keen to make a stand against the revolutionary upheaval. But the man at the center of the storm had boarded a plane, with his immediate family, in search of a country that would...
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NYT: Remember When Iran Won? →
Despite its no-show in South Africa this year, the Iranian team has enjoyed some success in World Cups past. Its first World Cup victory came in dramatic fashion, in a much-hyped and politically charged match against the United States in 1998. Iran’s 2-1 victory was sealed when Mehdi Mahdavikia, the country’s most accomplished international player, streaked down the field for a stunning...
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Washington Post: Iran blames U.S. for 'bullying'... →
Ahmadinejad on Friday brushed off as “worthless paper” a new U.N. Security Council sanctions resolution against his country, and he seemed to blame the United States for “bullying” his ally, China, into joining the sanctions push. Visiting Shanghai just two days after the fourth round of sanctions, Ahmadinejad aimed most of his wrath at the Obama administration and ...
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“It is not only regrettable that the opposition canceled demonstrations…...”
– Hillary Clinton
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NYT: Iranian Opposition Leaders Call Off Protest →
Iranian opposition leaders Moussavi and Karroubi issued a joint statement on Thursday calling off plans for protests on Saturday, the anniversary of the disputed presidential election that they claim was rigged. While the two men were the reformist candidates in the 2009 election and insist that Ahmadinejad was not the rightful winner of the contest, they often seemed not to be in control of...
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“Iran’s government is crippled beyond repair and for that we can thank the...”
– Reza Aslan for The Daily Beast
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Iran is losing Russia, China, and all those... →
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UN Set to Vote on Iran Sanctions →
The United Nations Security Council has agreed on a final package of economic sanctions against Iran, paving the way for a vote as early as Wednesday. The five permanent members of the Security Council: US, Britain, France, China and Russia have reached an agreement on a list of companies and individuals subject to a travel ban and an asset freeze. In addition to the blacklist, it expands an...
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Amnesty International: Release Iranian prisoners... →
Hundreds of Iranians have been detained as the authorities’ crackdown on dissent has intensified throughout the year since Ahmadinejad won the disputed June 2009 election.
Journalists, students, rights activists, lawyers, academics, former political prisoners and members of Iran’s ethnic and religious minorities have all been targeted by the government in waves of repression over the...
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Guardian: Iran election anniversary protests face... →
The contrast could not be more striking. A year ago they rallied in their millions, a display of people power draped in green that stunned the world, rattled Iran’s theocratic leadership and promised to jolt the entire region.
But this Saturday, on the first anniversary of the disputed elections that gave rise to the biggest challenge to the Islamic republic’s authority in its ...
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Guardian: The UN must try Iran's 1988 murderers →
The mass murderers of 1988 now hold power in Tehran. The world must make them face justice.
This weekend marks the first anniversary of the death of democracy in Iran – the rigged election which the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei declared lost by reform candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi. Afterwards protesters were shot dead in the street and taken for torture to Tehran’s notorious...
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Iran Opens First Women-Only Bank →
With the aim of protecting “women’s virtue in the social sphere.”
Iran’s biggest bank, state-owned Bank Melli, opened its first branch in the country that will exclusively serve women, in the northeastern city of Mashhad, 46 miles from the border with Afghanistan.
Iran has set aside $1.5 billion to promote “moral conduct,” including enforcement of its dress...
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The Unguided Sanctions: A misguided U.S. effort... →
Although recent U.N. Security Council moves to impose new sanctions against Iran make all the headlines, such measures are mainly for show. Given how adept Iran’s ruling hardliners and commanders of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps have been at skirting sanctions, targeting a few more state-owned businesses does little more than create some paperwork for Tehran. The real game changer is...
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“Iranians have a word, ‘roozmaregi’, which means in essence “to live...”
– Maziar Bahari, on the future of the Green Movement (via newsweek)
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Iran offers escort for Gaza ships →
Iran would be willing to send its Revolutionary Guard members to accompany further aid ships to Gaza, Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Sunday. “The naval wing of the Revolutionary Guard is ready to assist the peace flotilla to Gaza with all its effort and capabilities”.
Last week, Ahmadinejad termed the IDF raid on the Gaza-bound Mavi Marmara as...
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BBC: Iranian leaders issue warning to opposition... →
Tens of thousands gathered at a shrine to mark the death 21 years ago of revolution leader Ayatollah Khomeini in Tehran where Ahmadinejad said opposition groups who worked against the regime would be “banished by the people”. Supreme Leader Khamenei said Iran was in a position to “see off any conspiracies,” and that people would be judged by their current actions, not ...
