FIRE WITH FIRE

By designating Iran's Revolutionary Guards as terrorists, the Bush administration may be creating a monster instead of beheading one.

Formed by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Revolutionary Guards function as a national army numbering about 125,000. The Guards are a tightly organized, well-trained, well-armed, well-equipped state military unit. We're not talking about shadows in the night like al-Qaida, Hamas or Hezbollah, other designated terrorists. This is tantamount to putting the US Rangers on a terrorist list. It's the first time the army of a sovereign nation has been called a terrorist by the US.

Because the Guards own and control many of the front companies involved in Iran's nuclear efforts, Bush may be trying to go in the back door. Attacking the Guards may be another way of putting pressure on Iran's nuclear ambitions, said Middle East analyst Georgie Anne Geyer in a recent column. (Geyer writes for United Press Syndicate.) Read Geyer's column here.

But Bush may be putting too much pressure on Iran. "All of us want to back Iran into a corner," said nuclear proliferation expert Joseph Cirincione, "but we want to give them a way out, too." The terrorist designation "will convince many in Iran's elite that there's no point in talking with us and that the only thing that will satisfy us is a regime change."

From recent remarks he has made, it seems that Bush is trying to foment rebellion in Iran. During a recent news conference he said, "My message to the Iranian people is, you can do better than this current government. You don't have to be isolated. You don't have to be in a position where you can't realize your full economic potential."

Bush's attacks on Iran are bound to backfire. Rather than driving apart traditional and liberal elements as he hopes, his efforts will only bind these adversaries in a nationalist movement to protect their country from the US foreign devil.

Labels: foreign policy, Iran, terrorists, US

Posted by The Watcher at Friday, August 24, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Iran finally released an Iranian-American academic scholar from prison, but they won't let her come home. Haleh Esfandiari, 67, who has dual US-Iran citizenship, had been imprisoned in Tehran's notorious Evin prison since May. Read the full story here.

Head of the Middle East program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington DC, Esfandiari was in Tehran to visit family when she was accosted by armed masked men, stripped of her passports and thrown in jail. She was accused of revolutionary activity by the Iranian Intelligence Ministry, a charge the scholar, her family, her employer and the US State Department have vehemently denied.

Esfandiari may be out of jail, but her passports remain confiscated. She will not be allowed to leave Iran until she faces charges of endangering national security. Her 93-year-0ld mother used the deed to her Tehran apartment to post the $330,000 bail necessary to gain Esfandiari's release.

Esfandiari is one of four Iranian-Americans jailed last spring on national security charges. The other three remain in jail and have been allowed no contact with their families.

Labels: arrests, Haleh Esfandiari, Iran, US-Iran citizens

Posted by The Watcher at Wednesday, August 22, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

During their recent Camp David summit, US President Bush and Afghan President Hamid Karzai seemed in tune about everything except Iran's future role in Afghanistan. Their vastly different opinions about Iran struck a glaringly discordant note that may disrupt future harmony between the two nations.

Karzai characterized Afghanistan's powerful neighbor as "a helper and a solution."

Bush disagreed, saying, "I would be very cautious about whether the Iranian influence in Afghanistan is a positive force."

Bush and the US believe Iran to be a destabilizing force in the Middle East, bent on achieving its own expansionist goals to reestablish a Persian empire. Barely a week after the summit, US military commanders in Iraq accused Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps of operating in that war-torn country. While no member of the elite Iranian military unit had been captured, weapons caches bearing Iranian markings were found during a military sweep south of Baghdad. US commanders cited "military intelligence" in naming the Guard Corps as the source of the weapons.

Bush and US military leaders have repeatedly accused Iran of supplying weapons to Iraqi insurgents loyal to anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. Several times Iranian-marked weapons have been discovered during US clashes with al-Sadr's Mahdi Army. The US has also accused Iran of actively supporting Shiite attacks against Sunnis in Iraq. The only Shiite Muslim state in the Middle East, Iran has made no secret of its support for development of a Shiite-controlled state in Iraq.

Labels: Afghanistan, arms traffic, Iran, Iraq, President Bush, US

Posted by The Watcher at Saturday, August 18, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Iran is flexing its biceps. Joining with the leaders of Russia and China, Tehran warned the US that interference in central Asia would not be tolerated. The three Asian powerhouses issued a statement that central Asia should be left alone to manage its own affairs:

"Stability and security in central Asia are best ensured primarily through efforts taken by the nations of the region on the basis of the existing regional associations."

Issued at a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the thinly veiled threat appeared to be directed at the US. Although he did not specifically name the US, Russian President Vladimir Puttin took an oblique swing at American involvement in Iraq, saying "any attempts to solve global and regional problems unilaterally are hopeless."

The stability of strategic, resource-rich central Asia has been of concern in western quarters. Iran has increasingly aligned itself with Russia and China against the US. Is Iran lining up allies before it makes its own play on Iraq?

Labels: Iran, Iraq, US

Posted by The Watcher at Thursday, August 16, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

The accusations are flying hot and heavy between the US and Iran. Yesterday President Bush warned Iran to stop meddling in Iraq. Today Iran told Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that only a US pullout will stabilize Iraq.

Patting the poor boy on the head, Iran assured the Iraqi PM that big brother Iran will take care of him and is doing everything possible to bring peace to his war-torn country. If that bully President Bush and his nasty US military gang will just get out and go home, everything will be fine.

What a nice family picture. Makes your heart soar to see such love between brothers. It's time President Bush realizes that you can't buy love. Iraq will never be grateful for the millions of dollars and thousands of lives the US has invested in Iraq. We forced our way in uninvited and plunged their country into chaos (a view shared by many Americans). We will always be the bully, the outsider. We will never be part of the family. Americans, our culture, our view of the world are just too different. Iraq will never see the monster slithering slowly through its sands, quietly wrapping its tentacles around every aspect of Iraqi life until the day it snuffs that life out.

Iran is familiar, the Shiite big brother who would never harm his smaller sibling. The US will always be the hated foreign interloper, the infidel. Arabs are notorious for failing to learn from the lessons of history. Iraq will find that the price is high.

Labels: foreign policy, Iran, Iraq, US

Posted by The Watcher at Saturday, August 11, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

President Bush warned off Iran -- again. At a news conference the President again charged Iran with training and arming Iraqi insurgents bent on killing US soldiers. He, again, threatened nebulous "consequences" if Iran does not cease and desist immediately.

Though the news media is treating this as news, it is not. We've heard this song and dance routine before. The US accuses. Iran hotly denies. The US threatens. Iran blusters. The cycle repeats. It's an international pas de deux in which both dancers are out of step.

How many times will US forces have to find active Quds units (Iranian special forces) operating in Iraq before we do something to stop it? Obviously political chit chat isn't going to solve the problem. Iran has shown time and again that it will say anything to appease international censure, then go blithely on its way and do whatever it wants to. And what it wants to do is reestablish the Persian empire in all its glory and might with Iran at the helm. Iraq is the first stepping stone toward the realization of future Iranian might; Afghanistan, the second.

If Iran truly sought peace in the Middle East, it would back its high level meeting palaver with action. Instead of arming Shiites and setting them against Sunnis and US soldiers, Iran would be leading them to the bargaining table, bringing its considerable pressure to bear to force Iraqis to peace. How can America fail to notice that this is not what Iran is doing. Iran continues to foment rebellion in Iraq.

Iran actively encourages attacks against Sunnis and Americans because Iran wants peace in Iraq to fail. Iran is making every effort to force Iraq further into civil war. Only when Iraq is in total chaos (and it doesn't seem like that will take long), can Iran race in, the conquering hero, and restore peace in the guise of protecting its own borders and helping its neighbor. Unfortunately for Iraq and the rest of the Middle East, Iran seems to define peace like Saddam Hussein, not George Bush.

Labels: dissidents, foreign policy, Iran, Iraq

Posted by The Watcher at Friday, August 10, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Striking another blow to freedom, Iran shut down its leading reformist newspaper this week. The doors were slammed on the daily Shargh (East) after it published an interview calling for greater gender equality. This is the second time in the past 12 months that the government has forced the paper to stop publication. The first time was in September 2006 after it printed a cartoon poking fun of Iranian leaders. The Shargh was finally allowed to reopen in June. Read the full article here.

Founded in 2003, the Shargh published an interview with opposition poet Saghi Qahraman who argued for less restrictive gender roles. Qahraman, a woman, encouraged men to take a greater role in household and childcare activities. Her views were deemed "anti-morality" by the government and counter to Islam.

Pro-reform journalists have been targeted by the hardline judiciary. More than 100 publications have been shut down and dozens of editors and writers jailed since 2005 in this "democratic" country.

Labels: Iran, journalists, newspaper ban, reformists

Posted by The Watcher at Tuesday, August 07, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Today Iran convicted two Kurdish journalists of crimes against Islam and the state and sentenced them to death. Click here to read the full story.

The two journalists were convicted of moharebeh, Arabic for fighting, according to judiciary spokesman Ali Reza Jamshidi. In Iran the term is used to describe major crimes against Islam and the state. The men's crimes and details about how their sentences will be carried out have not been disclosed. However, the journalists were arrested as activists during the 2005 Kurdish protests in Sanandaj, the capital of Kurdistan, an Iranian province on the Iran-Iraq border.

Despite Tehran's constant pressure on journalists and news media to tow the party line, imprisonment and conviction, much less a death sentence, are rare. Tehran likes to flaunt its tolerance and freedom of speech to the outside world, even if the reality inside its borders is more myth than fact.

Analysts wonder if the incident signals the beginning of a new crackdown against rebellious Kurds inside Iran. The Kurds, whose domain straddles Iran, Iraq and Turkey, have long sought autonomy and national unity. Concerned Turks are massing military units along Turkey's Kurdish border with Iraq. While Turkey says its goal is to prevent Kurdish rebels from slipping across Iraqi borders into Turkey, some analysts believe Turkey is positioning itself to invade Iraq and solve its problem with the Kurds by subjugating them under iron Turkish rule.

Whatever the truth, the killing of Kurdish journalists for nebulous political crimes is sure to fan the flames of Kurdish rebellion.

Labels: Iran, Iran judiciary, Iraq, Islam, journalists, Kurdistan, Kurds, Turkey

Posted by The Watcher at Tuesday, July 31, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Despite recent talks on the future of Iraq that were dubbed a "success," the US and Iran continue to ratchet up the accusations and charges against each other. Call me naive, but I don't see a "meeting of the minds" happening at the bargaining table any time soon.

Days after the joint talks, the US tightened its squeeze on Iran, escalating financial sanctions against Iranian companies that are suspected of supporting their country's nuclear ambitions. The US has blacklisted or frozen the assets of 15 Iranian companies this year, prohibiting American companies and individuals from doing business with them. Click here to read the full article.

"We believe that there is a real potential that these sanctions will have the effect of changing the government of Iran's mind about the defiant policy it is currently pursuing," said US Treasury undersecretary Stuart Levey.

I doubt it. In the face of stringent United Nations and US economic sanctions, Iran hasn't backed down yet. And few Iranian experts believe the country ever will.

"I don't think if the assets of a few Iranian officials are frozen or if the state of California and the state of New York decide to divest from Iran, suddenly the regime will buckle and say 'we're going to change our nuclear approach'," said Karim Sadjadpour, an Iranian researcher for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Sadjadpour pointed to Cuba's success in weathering even more stringent US sanctions and with a far weaker economy. He suggested only "a more robust international coalition" would make a dent in Iran's stubborn nationalism. With volatile President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at Iran's helm, it's unlikely that even that would change Iran's nuclear policy.

Labels: economy, Iran, nuclear, sanctions, United Nations, US, US-Iran talks

Posted by The Watcher at Saturday, July 28, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Despite the kindergarten squabbling, talks between American and Iranian ambassadors to Iraq seemed to go well today. Both parties agreed to establish a security subcommittee to discuss restoring stability to Iraq. Iraqi leaders have been pushing for talks between the two countries which exert the greatest influence over Iraq's future.

Iran seemed to be pushing for higher level talks in the future. "The issue of negotiations between Iran and the U.S. about Iraq at the level of deputy foreign ministers is reviewable," said Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki. U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack seemed to put the brakes on that idea, however, saying, "I don't see that happening. We have an established channel with [U.S. Ambassador] Ryan Crocker and we are taking a look at establishing a subcommittee, but that group would actually be lower-level officials." Click here to read the full article.

Despite the agreement to continue talks and establish a joint committee, sniping between the two powers continued unabated. The U.S. charged Iran with arming and training Iraqi Shiite militias. Iran demanded that the U.S. release five Iranians detained for just that reason. Iran accused the U.S. of fomenting dissent. The U.S. demanded the release of American-Iranian activists charged with threatening Iran's security. Not exactly a meeting of the minds.

While the talks are supposed to focus on Iraq and not Iran-U.S. tensions, it seems likely that those tensions will derail any peaceful negotiations between the two powers. In the coming weeks and months the diplomats will dance around a host of issues on how best to create a secure Iraq. But it seems that Iran's goal might actually be to create a subjugated Iraq, one they can more easily control.

Labels: foreign policy, Iran, Iraq security, Shiite, US, US-Iran citizens, US-Iran talks

Posted by The Watcher at Tuesday, July 24, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Iran and the US have scheduled a new round of high-level talks, the first since May. If news headlines are to be believed, instead of peace it looks like a showdown is in the offing. Ambassadors will meet in Baghdad this coming Tuesday, July 24, 2007, but with all the sniping going on a successful outcome doesn't look too promising. Just look at this week's news headlines:

• US, Iran trade barbs ahead of Iraq talks (Associated Press)
• Showing jailed Americans, Iran TV cites confessions (Washington Post)
• Under fire from US, Iran reacts by cracking down at home (Christian Science Monitor)

Hardly looks like cooperative behavior, does it? Looks more like each side is posturing to increase its power at the bargaining table. Both sides appear to be going out of their way to annoy each other. Allegations and complaints on both sides have been escalating all week.

No one would ever accuse Iran and the US of being best buddies, but the current level of dialog doesn't even appear to be coldly courteous. Words like appalled, alarming and outrageous are being used by both parties -- not the conciliatory speech one would expect before a discussion aimed at resolving differences and solving problems.

Under the circumstances, it is hard to believe the sincerity of either party or their ability to compromise. Tuesday's scheduled talks look like another exercise in futility for America and another crafty delaying tactic on the part of Iran.

Labels: foreign policy, Iran, peace talks, US

Posted by The Watcher at Saturday, July 21, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Are educated Iranians finally getting fed up with President Ahmadinejad's inflammatory, emotional rhetoric and near total avoidance of fact? In an unprecedented move, more than 50 Iranian economists met with the president to tell him his economic policies are "inexpert" and lacked "any basis in science." Read the full story here.

Condemning the president's economic policies, the economists told Ahmadinejad,
"In your government, economic policies are adopted without any basis in science
or the directives of the fourth development plan."

Iran's leading economists and financial leaders bluntly criticized Ahmadinejad for mismanaging Iran's oil wealth and failing to reign in the rampant inflation that has proved devastating to Iran's poor. In 2005 Ahmadinejad was elected largely on the strength of his promise to spread Iran's oil wealth to the country's poor, but it is the poor who have been most hurt by his capricious economic policies. In OPEC's second largest oil producer the rate of inflation is expected to rise to 17% by next March. The price of basic foods and services has risen sharply over the past few months.

With money supply growth running at a whopping 40%, economists charged that Ahmadinejad is emptying Iran's coffers without regard for the needs of future generations. Fulfilling rashly made campaign promises, the president is using Iran's wealth to fund a flood of infrastructure projects in the country's 30 provinces.

Seen as particularly dangerous by the country's economists was Ahmadinejad's decision made earlier this year to lower interest rates. Financial leaders lambasted the president for failing to consult either the central bank chief or economy minister.

"Such decisions are harmful and inexpert. The most sensitive financial institutions of the country will be weakened and in the not too distant future we will see the negative outcomes of these decisions," the economists said.

In past encounters, President Ahmadinejad has vehemently rejected criticism of his economic policies, denying charges that inflation is out of control and pointing to his pet building projects as evidence of Iran's technological progress. It will be interesting to see if the combined weight of the country's top economists and financial leaders can reign in the president or whether he will continue to plunder Iran's wealth for his own political gain.

Labels: banks, dissidents, economy, inflation, infrastructure, Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

Posted by The Watcher at Saturday, July 14, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

The US Congress is a step closer to passing legislation that would punish foreign energy companies that do business with Iran. The House's foreign affairs panel passed the proposed law 37:1 with representatives on both sides of the aisle accusing Iran of trading energy for terror. Click here to read the full story.

"Foreign investment in Iran equals money for terrorism and attacks on Americans," said Democrat Gary Ackerman. "Investment in Iran's petroleum sector enables that country to pursue nuclear weapons, to arm insurgents fighting American troops, and to underwrite Hezbollah and Hamas."

Since the 1979 Islamic revolution, both the US and UN have imposed economic sanctions against Iran with little effect. The US Congress is changing tactics, threatening to impose penalties against countries that ignore those sanctions and choose to trade with Iran for their own economic benefit.

"Pressuring companies to cut their financial ties with Iran is critical to ensuring that sanctions have their intended result," said Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama.

Many European and Japanese companies have profited from lucrative oil and natural gas contracts with Iran. By bolstering Iran's economy despite international censure, they have negated the sting of levied sanctions. Perhaps if they have to pay a price themselves, they will be more willing to forgo personal profit for the international good.

Labels: foreign policy, Iran, nuclear, sanctions, United Nations

Posted by The Watcher at Thursday, June 28, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

From AP wire service: "Acting on a request from Iran, the International Atomic Energy Agency said yesterday that it will send a team to Tehran to work jointly on a plan meant to clear up suspicions about the Islamic republic's nuclear activities."

Iran issued the invitation to the UN agency on Sunday which is seen by many politicians as a positive step. However, a number of politicos felt this was one more in a long list of delaying tactics.

"I don't think Iran's track record is particularly noteworthy or particularly likely to give me or anyone else confidence that anything will come of these discussions," said State Department spokesman Tom Casey.

For more than two decades Iran has stonewalled the UN agency's attempt to ascertain its nuclear capability. It's hard to believe that Iran is beginning a new era of international cooperation. With no change in regime and new UN sanctions being threatened, it's more likely that Iran is just trying to wriggle out from under yet again.

Labels: Iran, nuclear, United Nations

Posted by The Watcher at Tuesday, June 26, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Despite President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's claims that reformists are free to speak their mind in Iran, students who protested against his visit to their university this spring are being quietly arrested.

At least eight of Amir Kabir University's leading reformists have been arrested since May, according to their lawyers and activists inside and outside Iran. Hundred more have been rounded up and questioned. Read the full article here.

Reformists have been increasingly targeted during Ahmadinejad's regime. Within the President's circle, there is growing concern that reformists will exploit US-Iran tensions, using them as a catalyst for revolt.

Teachers, feminists, union leaders, journalists, students and Iranian-Americans are being targeted and increasingly arrested over the past six months. While most have been freed, they have often spent weeks or months behind bars with no outside contact and no recourse to the courts.

"The new government has increased pressures on the nation -- students, laborers, intellectuals," said Ebrahim Yazdi, foreign minister after Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's 1979 revolution and now leader of the banned but tolerated Freedom Movement of Iran. "When laborers stage protest rallies, the government, instead of talking to them, takes them to jail. Women are jailed just for collecting signatures in support of women's rights."

Iran's ruling party is slowly but steadily eating away at the rights of its citizens. Books are being censored, newspaper editors told what to write, university activities abolished. Seems like the "new" regime has turned into the "old," and that Ahmadinejad's promises of freedom are as hollow as those of his predecessors.

Labels: dissidents, Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, students

Posted by The Watcher at Saturday, June 23, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Press TV, Iran's English-language satellite news network, will start broadcasting globally on July 2. The "Voice of Iran" promises "to present a new perspective to its viewers around the world," said Mohammad Sarafraz, Iran Broadcasting Deputy Director for International Affairs. Read the full article here.

Planning to provide news reports every half hour around the clock, Press TV will focus on developments in the Middle East and US and provide analysis of current events throughout the world. Rejecting criticism that Press TV will be an Iranian Aljazeera, Sarafraz said that a more balanced view of world events is needed than the biased view provided by Western news organizations.

It will be interesting to see what Press TV considers to be a balanced view of the news. While it may not turn out to be as blatantly biased as Aljazeera, given the self-serving statements of Iranian officials, I doubt that the world can expect Press TV to be a fair, dispassionate news source.

Labels: Iran, Iran TV, Press TV

Posted by The Watcher at Thursday, June 21, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

In the most direct statement to date, a senior US diplomat accused Iran of arming Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns told reporters in Paris, "Iran is now even transferring arms to the Taliban in Afghanistan." Read the full article here.

Iran has long been accused of funding insurgents throughout the Middle East, but this is the boldest accusation to date by a US official. As one of the few relatively stable countries in the Middle East, Iran stands to gain both power and real estate by fomenting rebellion among its neighbors. Iran's fiery president has repeatedly claimed Iran's divine right to rule the Middle East, envisioning the past when Persia ruled a vast empire.

In the May 31 edition of the Economist, British Prime Minister Tony Blair wrote,
"In Afghanistan it is clear that the Taliban is receiving support, including arms from ... elements of the Iranian regime."

Isn't it time the world community -- and particularly Iran's neighbors -- put a stop to this? How long will Iran be allowed to continue its disruptive policies? Don't Iran's neighbors recognize the wolf at their door?

Labels: Afghanistan, arms traffic, Iran, Taliban

Posted by The Watcher at Tuesday, June 19, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Just what we need, another war front. Senator Joe Lieberman said the US should consider a military strike against Iran to punish Tehran for its involvement in Iraq.

Appearing on CBS' Face the Nation, Lieberman said, "I think we've got to be prepared to take aggressive military action against the Iranians to stop them from killing Americans in Iraq."

What a great idea. Then they can kill Americans in Iraq AND Iran.

The independent senator from Connecticut continued, "And to me, that would include a strike over the border into Iran, where we have good evidence that they have a base at which they are training these people coming back into Iraq to kill our soldiers."

Of course, Lieberman, who's a smart man and shrewd politician, has a valid point. That Iran is training and arming Iraqis is a recognized fact. It's more than likely that Iranian undercover agents have been in Iraq for years fomenting rebellion and terrorist activities.

So why the talk of invasion now? The fear of nuclear weapons development has Washington in a tizzy. "If they don't play by the rules," Lieberman warned, "we've got to use our force, and to me, that would include taking military action to stop them from doing what they're doing."

Lieberman clarified that he prefers the bulk of military action be by air strike as opposed to a massive ground assault, but isn't that where we started in Iraq? Iran should be warned, though.

Despite lack of popular support, Congress is taking a harder line against Iran. Lieberman's words mirror growing sentiment on Capitol Hill: "They can't believe that they have immunity for training and equipping people to come in and kill Americans. We cannot let them get away with it. If we do, they'll take that as a sign of weakness on our part and we will pay for it in Iraq and throughout the region, and ultimately right here at home."

If Tehran continues to wave the red flag in the face of the American bull, they shouldn't be surprised when he starts to charge.

Labels: invade Iran, Iran, Lieberman, nuclear

Posted by The Watcher at Monday, June 11, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Are there even any political dissidents left in Iran? Hasn't the regime already killed or tortured any remaining dissidents into submission? Just today a woman, Haleh Esfandiari, who is a dual Iranian and American citizen and Smithsonian academic was sent to Evin, the prison for dissidents, for at least the second time for "discussions". Do you think she's going for tea? Read the full article here.

Iran continues to practice brutality and cowing people into accepting their political views. This is not an Islamic government, this is a brutal totalitarian government hiding behind the guise of religion. Speaking out against the problems in government should not be considered a violation of the Muslim faith. Organizing people to try to institute change should not mark one as a Muslim offender to the faith. Yet this is the brush with which the Iranian population who wants change is painted with.

These people do not last long in society, they are picked up and transported to Evin and then bullied into fingering others at the hand of torturers. Some are just simple interrogated and then killed. Some may get a mock trial, but many do not. It is no wonder that change will come very slowly in Iran the entire population lives in fear of being marked as a dissident and put in a car to the notorious Evin prison.

So the outcry needs to start for Haleh Esfandiari, she has already been forced to "confess" to some supposed sins. We need to raise the out cry to bring her out of Iran now!

Labels: Iran

Posted by The Watcher at Wednesday, May 09, 2007 | Permalink | Comments | links to this post