Iranian Elections: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Wins by Landslide

[turbo]

It gets worse. Iranian security has ordered the prosecution of Dr Arash Hejazi, a physician who tried to save her life. He is now in the publishing business and lives in England, but had returned to Iran on business, and witnessed Ms Soltan's death, and tried to staunch the flow of blood. His crime is "progagandizing", apparently because he gave this BBC interview, and Interpol has been asked to arrest him for prosecution.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/news/2009/06/090626_hejazi_wt_sl.shtml

 

[MATLABdude]

It gets worse. Iranian security has ordered the prosecution of Dr Arash Hejazi, a physician who tried to save her life. He is now in the publishing business and lives in England, but had returned to Iran on business, and witnessed Ms Soltan's death, and tried to staunch the flow of blood. His crime is "progagandizing", apparently because he gave this BBC interview, and Interpol has been asked to arrest him for prosecution.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/news/2009/06/090626_hejazi_wt_sl.shtml

I thought Interpol doesn't touch "Political" stuff with a 20-foot pole? I'd hope that whatever Interpol direction council that reviews the overall course / mission of the agency puts the kibosh on this nonsense.

 

[turbo]

I thought Interpol doesn't touch "Political" stuff with a 20-foot pole? I'd hope that whatever Interpol direction council that reviews the overall course / mission of the agency puts the kibosh on this nonsense.

I expect that the next step might be the issuance of a fatwa condemning Dr Hejazi. We'll see. The clerics seem to be pursuing a hard-line policy denouncing all violence as provocation by Western meddlers and collaborators.

 

[LowlyPion]

I thought Interpol doesn't touch "Political" stuff with a 20-foot pole? I'd hope that whatever Interpol direction council that reviews the overall course / mission of the agency puts the kibosh on this nonsense.

Interpol doesn't currently list Hejazi as wanted, fwiw.

http://www.interpol.int/Public/Wanted/Search/ResultListNew.asp?EntityName=Hejazi&EntityForename=&EntityNationality=&EntityAgeBetween=15&EntityAgeAnd=95&EntitySex=&EntityEyeColor=&EntityHairColor=&EntityOffence=&ArrestWarrantIssuedBy=IRAN+(ISLAMIC+REPUBLIC+OF)&EntityFullText=&cboNbHitsPerPage=8&cboNbPages=20&Search=Search

 

[LowlyPion]

And now for the rest of the story:

... , a spokesperson for Interpol flatly denied any involvement whatsoever in an investigation into Sultan's death.

"We've not received any request for information or for assistance on the death of that lady," spokesperson Rachel Billington said.

"We've received nothing from Iran," she emphasized.

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/07/02/world/worldwatch/entry5129152.shtml

 

[MATLABdude]

All this has happened before. All this will happen again.

AP Reports that some of the staff of the British Embassy in Tehran will be tried for their roles in instigating the recent protests (based on their 'confessions'):
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31722550/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa/

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Delusional thinking is why they do it, they believe that the Iranian people and the world will believe them if they put on this unbelievable sham of a democracy. They are hurting themselves when they blame the West for interference, it sounds so far fetched for everyone except the die hard supporters of the regime. It is a joke that the Guardian Council, vehemently opposed to the reformist movement and whose members are picked by Ayatollah Khamenei based on their undying loyalty, actually were the ones in charge of supervising the elections and doing the recount.

To add insult to injury, Ahmadinejad has ordered an inquiry into the death of Neda Soltan calling it a propaganda mission by foreign media while the state media has called it a staged event. The Iranian government never ceases to amaze the world with its paranoid and evil statements.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6601570.ece

Indeed! When I said that the current regime has been discredited, I meant not only in the eyes of the world, but also in the eyes of the Iranian people. So now the regime is forced to act as a police state and make ridiculous claims, but the Iranian people are too smart to be fooled by such absurdities for very long.

Of course I guess we could have snuck in tens of thousands of secret agents, and those are the people we saw protesting. By the same logic, pigs can fly, so I'm going bird hunting and having bacon tonight.

 

[Count Iblis]

There is still a part of the Iranian population who swallow these nonsensical statements as gospel. Because Iran is not a real democracy, all that the regime needs is some sizeable fraction of the population who will back them and the support of the army and security forces.

 

[Cyrus]

Good video

http://www.c-span.org/Watch/Media/2009/06/30/HP/A/20323/Heritage+Foundation+Discussion+on+Irans+Nuclear+Weapons+Program.aspx

 

[LowlyPion]

Mousavi details accusations of fraud. I found this allegation particularly interesting.

The committee also asked why the Interior Ministry had printed 14 million more ballots than the total registered electorate of some 46 million.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=99873&sectionid=351020101

I guess they were expecting a heavier turn out than usual.

 

[math_04]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6644817.ece

Well, the largest clerical association in Iran has declared the election invalid. It should be interesting to hear the reaction from Ayatollah Khamenei and the ruling government. According to Fareed Zakaria, the power of the clerics has waned in recent times and been replaced by the Revolutionary Guard along with the Basij.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/30/iran-khamenei-rafsanjani-clerics

 

[LowlyPion]

Ahmadinejad says his reelection gave him a mandate
The Iranian president says vote, despite being derided by critics, was the 'freest and the healthiest election the world has ever seen' and that ' the path people are taking is clearer than before.'

... "People put their seal of approval to [my] four years in office," he said.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iran8-2009jul08,0,2316972.story

The election is a mandate? Or the election result was mandated?

 

[Cyrus]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iran8-2009jul08,0,2316972.story

The election is a mandate? Or the election result was mandated?

I don't understand your question, as it was clearly answered in the first paragraph of the article on what he meant by mandate.

 

[mheslep]

This is a bit tangential. The consequences of the current Iraqi republic versus a Saddam Hussein on Iran's border have not been addressed here. It is arguable that the rebellion in Iran is connected to the outcome in Iraq in two ways. First, Iranians see the real thing right on their border: vigorous Iraqi elections at local and national levels open to all comers, no weeding out by some mysterious supreme council, and all under comment by a rampaging free Iraqi press. (And they do know what's going on, they've been making pilgrimages to historic Iraqi sites since the Bathists fell). Second, a serious and known threat on the border in the form of a Saddam Hussein still in power and who previously killed or wounded 1 million Iranians would tend to chill internal dissent. It is an entirely different thing to take the streets in open rebellion when your country is under threat. Ahmadinejad uses the ruse of external threats now against his own regarding the US/UK; when Saddam was around it was the real thing. So it is arguable that absent the US intervention in 2003, Iran has no rebellion.

Hitchens today on this theme:
http://www.slate.com/id/2222254/"

Which brings me to a question that I think deserves to be asked: Did the overthrow of the Saddam Hussein regime, and the subsequent holding of competitive elections in which many rival Iraqi Shiite parties took part, have any germinal influence on the astonishing events in Iran? Certainly when I interviewed Sayeed Khomeini in Qum some years ago, where he spoke openly about "the liberation of Iraq," he seemed to hope and believe that the example would spread. One swallow does not make a summer. But consider this: Many Iranians go as religious pilgrims to the holy sites of Najaf and Kerbala in southern Iraq. They have seen the way in which national and local elections have been held, more or less fairly and openly, with different Iraqi Shiite parties having to bid for votes (and with those parties aligned with Iran's regime doing less and less well). They have seen an often turbulent Iraqi Parliament holding genuine debates that are reported with reasonable fairness in the Iraqi media. Meanwhile, an Iranian mullah caste that classifies its own people as children who are mere wards of the state puts on a "let's pretend" election and even then tries to fix the outcome. Iranians by no means like to take their tune from Arabs—perhaps least of all from Iraqis—but watching something like the real thing next door may well have increased the appetite for the genuine article in Iran itself.

There was a documentary 1-2 years ago on Iranians taking pilgrimages to Najaf. He concludes:

...Every Iranian I know is now convinced that if this is not the end for the Khamenei system, it is at least the harbinger of the beginning of the end.

I hope that's true, but I think history shows this to be naive. That kind of talk circulated after the Soviets squashed Prague, and instead of a fall of the communists another generation or two of Czechs were held captive.

 

[Cyrus]

Hitchens today on this theme:
http://www.slate.com/id/2222254/"

There was a documentary 1-2 years ago on Iranians taking pilgrimages to Najaf. He concludes:
I hope that's true, but I think history shows this to be naive. That kind of talk circulated after the Soviets squashed Prague, and instead of a fall of the communists another generation or two of Czechs were held captive.

You should watch the video I posted from CSPAN. Answers these questions by experts who work for congress and have studied Iran for over 30 years. A much more informative view than Hitchens, IMO. (Though I do love hitchens - he's great).

 

[mheslep]

You should watch the video I posted from CSPAN. Answers these questions by experts who work for congress and have studied Iran for over 30 years. A much more informative view than Hitchens, IMO. (Though I do love hitchens - he's great).

Yes I tried, the video player time out the other day. Will retry.

 

[Astronuc]

I hope that's true, but I think history shows this to be naive. That kind of talk circulated after the Soviets squashed Prague, and instead of a fall of the communists another generation or two of Czechs were held captive.

They Iranians will have to work it out and perhaps there are signs that may be beginning.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/08/world/middleeast/08clerics.html

In postelection Iran, there is growing unease among many of the nation’s political and clerical elite that the very system of governance they rely on for power and privilege has been stripped of its religious and electoral legitimacy, creating a virtual dictatorship enforced by an emboldened security apparatus, analysts said.

. . . .

Most telling, and arguably most damning, is that many influential religious leaders have not spoken out in support of the beleaguered president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, or the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Indeed, even among those who traditionally have supported the government, many have remained quiet or even offered faint but unmistakable criticisms.

According to Iranian news reports, only two of the most senior clerics have congratulated Mr. Ahmadinejad on his re-election, which amounts to a public rebuke in a state based on religion. A conservative prayer leader in the holy city of Qum, Ayatollah Ibrahim Amini, referred to demonstrators as “people” instead of rioters, and a hard-line cleric, Grand Ayatollah Nasser Makarem-Shirazi, called for national reconciliation.

. . . .

It seems to be shaping up as a struggle between democrats (those interested in the 'people') and the autocrats (those egotists interested in their own power and wealth). I would expect there are many who can see the parallels between Khameini/Ahmadinejad and the Shah and his regime.

 

[gravenewworld]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/29/AR2008062901881.html

U.S. Is Said to Expand Covert Operations in Iran
Plan Allows Up to $400 Million for Activities Aimed at Destabilizing Government

Operation Ajax part deux.

 

[mheslep]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/06/29/AR2008062901881.html

Operation Ajax part deux.

That's a strange comment given the story.

...for activities ranging from spying on Iran's nuclear program...

I hope somebody is, though I'd take anything reported by Hirsch with a grain of salt.

 

[Astronuc]

Ahmadinejad: Iran will "bring down" Western foes
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090716/wl_nm/us_iran_ahmadinejad

What a nut!

 

[MATLABdude]

Ahmadinejad: Iran will "bring down" Western foes
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090716/wl_nm/us_iran_ahmadinejad

What a nut!

Increased confrontation to gain the respect abroad which he lacks at home? Shocking.

TNR further prognosticates on what you can expect in his second at-bat:
http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=82fc3d09-a037-48be-b4e1-957aece9de6b

 

[mbisCool]

Rafsanjani inspires more political protest after speaking at Tehran University. Dissent appears to be as great as ever.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iran-prayer18-2009jul18,0,6890660.story

 

[MATLABdude]

Here's an interesting side bar from about a week ago...

Ahmadinejad's Vice Presidential choice kaiboshed due to moderate stance towards Israel (their kids are married to each other, for a possible nepotistic angle to the appointment):
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iran-resign20-2009jul20,0,6965373.story

The hardliners, and Khamenei himself, opposed this move and threatened to withdraw their support over the matter (so it's interesting to see that Ahmadinejad hasn't pulled an Enabling Act, and still has to act in accordance to the wishes of his supporters).