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Mir Hossein’s interview with Jamaran website, published on Monday:

Part 1 of 3

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Part 3

Some have their interests in having a divided society
Taking the fanatic approach will take the country to a dead-end

Currently spreading rumours has become very common. We have some individuals whose case, if they were reviewed by Imam Khomeini’s standards, would be considered very tainted. The regime is accusing the people’s great movement of being linked to traitors. It is in their benefit to increase divisions and cynicism in the society in order to prevent their own cases from being unveiled, while it is in everyone’s best interest to acknowledge people’s rights and create optimism.

I feel that the tendency of power to become totalitarian has led to a structured corruption of power in different branches of the establishment….

Considering Imam Khomeini’s viewpoint, unity is not achievable based on political loyalties. The union approved by the Imam is a union that relies on components like national interests and a healthy survival of the Islamic establishment, where your connections to power through family, friendship, and acquaintance do not matter.

One of the issues that was raised during the election was on whatever happened to the $300 billion [of oil revenues]. During the [Iran-Iraq] war, if an issue of financial corruption was raised, it was immediately attended to. The smallest corruptions were magnified to a great degree [due to the ongoing war]. In the past, if there was an issue of a missing $10,000, with no record of its expenditure, this could have caused the fall of the Government. Now, the issue is billions of dollars and nobody seems to care.

If it was the early years of the Revolution, this legislation to provide direction to the subsidies [referring to Ahmadinejad's legislation to remove subsidies from food and energy within 3 years] would not have been raised the way it is now. This legislation is not bad in itself. But [right now] the Government are on the one hand talking about removing all the subsidies, causing gas prices to increase, while on other hand they are refusing a budget to the underground subway system. On one side, people’s daily affairs will be interrupted under the pressure of high gas prices, and on the other there is no effort put into public transportation. This would cause serious problems for people.

If it becomes common in a system for people to see that their rights are trampled without any objection, that system will move towards violence and dictatorship.

I sincerely believe that granting multi-billion dollar contract to Sepah [the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps] is neither in the interest of the whole regime nor in the interest of Sepah.

There are individuals who live in this way. I sincerely do not know if they have faith or are religious or not….We have people who have a very corrupt record, if it is viewed with the viewpoint of the Imam. But now the regime says that this great popular movement is all connected to the MKO [Mujahedin-e-Khalq "terrorist" organisation].

The interests of the country is in defining the circle of “insiders” such that there is very little left on the outside [thus allowing almost everyone a voice]. Otherwise, we have to doubt our own behavior. We simply cannot put aside thousands of prominent managers who have served this country.

What is happening these days is that the margins have become bigger than the centre. The centre has become very small….
In these margins, we have many managers and clerics, a few marja’ a [senior clerics], a few ex-presidents, and even an ex-head of Parliament….In a situation like this, those who have remained in the main context have to rely on garrisons because they don’t have the support of such a big margin. And this is what has happened: in order to prevent lapsing into a coma, we became numb and insensitive as if suffering from leprosy.

It is in our country’s interest to agree on a fundamental and important matter: the Constitution. You and I may have differences of opinion but we have to agree on the Constitution to solve our problems. We should put aside our differences and attempt to reform.

The people who participated in the revolution didn’t come to the scene to face so many problems. They came for a better life and for freedom.

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After the private meeting between President Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday night, Tel Aviv tried to cover up a disappointing mission by focusng on the White House’s rhetoric that “the Obama Administration was strongly committed to Israel’s security”.

Small problem. Israeli officials didn’t clear the strategy with Washington, so now they face a White House counter-attack focusing on Netanyahu’s “failure”.

Let’s start from the beginning. Until Netanyahu was on his plane heading for Washington, the Obama Administration had tried to fend off a meeting, fearing that Israel’s inflexible position on settlements in the West Bank precluded any progress. When Netanyahu left the airport, he was transported in a simple van, unlike the special Government vehicles used to welcome world leaders.

The Israeli Prime Minister did not ease the situation in his speech to the Jewish Federations of North America. Instead, he displayed his “no preconditions” motto and called on unsettled Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas to start negotiations immediately with no assurances on the issues of refugees and pre-1967 borders.

The US Government could not turn away the Israeli leader without a meeting; however, it could set the rules: no video, no pictures, no press reports. Israeli officials countered, however, by leaking the “spin” that Obama had reconfirmed the US commitment to Israel’s security.

So the Administration’s counter-attack was an “exclusive”, fed to The Wall Street Journal, that Washington was disappointed that Netanyahu did not present any concrete steps: “We had an idea that he might bring something out to push the process forward. But he’s kept it in his pocket.” The same official added that senior officials inside the Obama Administration were unsettled over Netanyahu’s alleged statement that he had the power to pressure Obama, using various lobbies in the US political arena.

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On Monday we reported the curious tale that a conservative Iranian politician had claimed in an interview that President Ahmadinejad — presumably unwittingly — had met US “spies”, posing as journalists and scholars, in one of his meetings in New York. Gary Sick, the former US Government official who is now an academic at Columbia University, follows up:

In [a post] on October 26 I denounced the fact that my fellow academic Kian Tajbakhsh was sentenced to 15 years in prison in Iran, in part because he had met with me and because I was falsely accused of being a CIA agent. I commented ironically:

I have been in meetings with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on four different occasions over the past three years. I have spent at least nine hours with him, much more than I ever spent with Kian….Iranian security officials are notably lacking in any sense of irony or humor. But I do wonder whether President Ahmadinejad is being considered for indictment because of his extensive contacts with me over the past four years.

I have now discovered that my words have proved truer than I could ever have imagined.

[On 9 November] it was reported by Scott Lucas’ blog Enduring America that the Iranian Labor News Agency features an interview with conservative activist Mojtaba Shakeri, who says that some of the journalists and scholars who met with Ahmadinejad, presumably during the President’s trip to New York, were undoubtedly CIA operatives. This in turn was picked up by the opposition press, which is accusing Ahmadinejad of consorting with CIA agents.

My ironic comment seems to have been transformed into a straight-faced criticism of Mr. Ahmadinejad with an utter disregard not only for the truth but also for any appreciation of the humor of the accusation.

It is impossible to parody a system that constantly parodies itself by its actions and words.

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1800 GMT: More Posturing. The Iranian Government has taken another swipe at France, warning Paris to quiet down over the detention of lecturer Clotilde Reiss, who is under house arrest. A Foreign Ministry spokesman declared, ‘The charges against Reiss are documented and therefore there can be no acquittal on grounds of political pressure, and nobody is allowed to tell the relevant judge what to do.

1755 GMT: The Mousavi Interview. We now have the video of Mousavi’s comments on Monday, the text of which we posted earlier.

1525 GMT: More Business for the Revolutionary Guard. The BBC reports that the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps has won a $2.5 billion contract to build a railway route linking the southeastern port of Chabahar to Iran’s rail network. The Guards’ engineering wing, Khatam-ol-Anbia, has been awarded Government contracts worth billions of dollars, including the operation of Tehran’s Imam Khomeini international airport, and 50 percent of Iran’s national telecommunication company was bought by a consortium partly owned by a Revolutionary Guards affiliate fund.

1510 GMT: Crippling the Opposition. In a sign of the effect of Government detentions and intimidation, the reformist Mojahedin of Islamic Revolution Organisation party has postponed its annual convention because of restrictions on members. The party’s senior members Behzad Nabavi, Feizollah Arab-Sorkhi, and Mostafa Tajzadeh have been detained since June. (English summary)

1500 GMT: We’ve posted an entry on how a comment in a US blog became the story of how “Mahmoud Ahmadinejad met US spies”.

1245 GMT: The “Neda Plot”. As part of the ongoing campaign to portray the death of Neda Agha Soltan as a “premeditated scenario” to discredit the Iranian regime, Basij members are being summoned to gather in front of the British Embassy in Tehran to call for the extradition of Arash Hejazi, the doctor who tried to assist Neda after she was shot on 30 June. “Female Basij members are scheduled to congregate in front of the British Embassy on Wednesday at 2 p.m. local time,” Fars News reports.1050 GMT: We awoke to reports of the hanging of Ehsan Fattahian, sentenced to death for “acting against national security with arms”and “war against God”, but refrained from posting pending confirmation. That confirmation has now come from Fars News.

0900 GMT: We have posted the speech of activist Shadi Sadr accepting the “Human Rights Defenders Award” in The Netherlands: “Before the eyes of the people who are now fighting for freedom, democracy and human rights in Iran, one cannot sit at a negotiation table with a dictatorial government to speak about nuclear energy or economic contracts and talk about concrete conditions and at the same time, criticise the state of human rights in Iran through political statements which have no actual guarantee to be put into action.”

0840 GMT: Not quite sure what to make of this, amidst stories of Iran’s reorganisation of control over its security forces. Press TV reports, “The Leader of the Islamic Revolution has appointed Iran’s interior minister as deputy commander of the country’s Armed Forces in charge of police forces. In a decree issued by Commander-in-Chief of Iran’s Armed Forces Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei on Tuesday, Mostafa Mohammad-Najjar was handed the post of deputy commander.”

0800 GMT: A slow-ish start to the day, so EA correspondents have taken the opportunity to make some important political connections in a series of videos.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s put-down of a BBC Persian correspondent, who asked about the rumoured $18.5 billion in gold shifted from Iran to Turkey, may not add much beyond a bit of drama. However, the impassioned speech of former President Hashemi Rafsanjani’s son Mohsen at a 17 June meeting offers important insight into the Rafsanjani-Ahmadinejad relationship.

And the footage of the Supreme Leader meeting an American hostage (now the highest-level official ever devoted specifically to Iran affairs in the US State Department) is far more than a nostalgic clip. It may point to the emerging, and special, political “engagement” between Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the Obama Administration.

Of course, none of this should eclipse the significance, on the opposition side, of the discussion of Mir Hossein Mousavi’s interview with the Khomeini-owned Jamaran website, covering the failings of the Government and the need to restore unity through a return to the Constitution. More than 36 hours after the interview was posted, we have the English translation.

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On Tuesday, President Obama’s chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, spoke at the Jewish Federation of North America’s annual general assembly .He shared his Jewish roots with the audience and reiterated the rhetoric of the Obama Administration on the “significance of Israel’s security to United States”, “Palestinian responsibilities for stabilization”, and “the rights of Palestinians on settlements and final borders [on] pre-1967 lines” Then he called on both parties to the negotiation table.

Click here to view the embedded video.

It is only through dialogue that we can achieve the lasting peace that Israel seeks.

Make no mistake, the path toward peace is not one that Israel should be asked to walk alone. That is why the U.S. will remain actively engaged, and Israel’s one true friend. The Palestinians must come to the table, recognize Israel’s right to exist and reject violence.

As the president has said many times, as the president said in Cairo, the bond between the Israel and the U.S. is unbreakable. It’s a bond rooted in shared interests and shared values.

Emananuel reassured Israelis that Washington’s engagement with the Muslim world was not at the expense of Israel’s interests:

There are those who have questioned that, as this administration has sought to be engaged in the region. There are some who suggest this implies a diminished level of support for Israel… That is not the intent and that is not the case, and never will be.

At the end of the speech, Emanuel touched the Iranian question, “Today thanks to the work of the president there is strong and growing international consensus against a nuclear armed Iran. Israel has been “a beacon of democracy in a region too often defined by strife.”

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Leaving Washington for Paris, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu praised his meeting with President Obama:

I think this visit will turn out to have been very important.

It was a very focused and very positive conversation. This conversation dealt with the range of subjects that are important for the security of Israel, and for our joint efforts to advance peace.

Now Netanyahu has to prepare himself for an unexpected difficulty as he meets French President Nicholas Sarkozy on Wednesday. Before the Prime Minister’s arrival, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner harshly criticized Israel. Kouchner, who canceled his visit to Israel last month, declared that Israel was not the side demanding peace since there has been no advance on the settlement issue:

What really hurts me, and this shocks us, is that before there used to be a great peace movement in Israel. There was a left that made itself heard and a real desire for peace.

It seems to me, and I hope that I am completely wrong, that this desire has completely vanished, as though people no longer believe in it.

The criticism is undoubtedly linked to Kouchner’s announcement that he will visit the region in coming days to persuade Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas to run for re-election.

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Lawyer, journalist, and human rights activist Shadi Sadr accepting the 2009 Human Rights Defenders Tulip at The Hague:

Jury of the Human Rights Tulip Award,
Your Excellency Foreign Minister of Holland
Ladies and Gentlemen

I am greatly honoured that the jury of the Human Rights Tulip Award has found me worth of receiving this year’s award and given me the opportunity to speak about the situation of women’s rights in Iran, the dire needs of people in Iran and also their expectations from the international community. You have all seen pictures and videos of people’s protests in the aftermath of this year’s presidential elections. You have seen how women, particularly young girls, have been at the forefront of all protests. They challenged the stereotype image of Iranian woman which was often imagined in veil or passive around the world. Neda, the young girl who was shot and murdered in demonstrations, quickly became a symbol for the struggles of Iranian people for freedom and democracy. To me, however, the active and determining role of women was not shaped only through images and videos. I had seen the leadership of women on the streets and the most lasting images I have in mind go back to the 9th of July this year.

On this day, large crowds of people took to the streets of Tehran on the 10th anniversary of the suppression of student protests of 1989. Demonstrations were about to end and as usual, violence and attacks were increasing by the minute. Along with a number of the demonstrators, to get away from pepper gas which was thrown into the crowd by security forces, I had to run into a city bus, while I was badly coughing from the effects of tear gas. A few stops away from there, when coughs were less disturbing, a political debate began among the people on the bus. Young women, who had broken the gender segregation rule on public buses and had found seats in the male area of the bus, were leading the debate. I asked loudly and with suprise, “Anyone from the gentlemen? They are all quiet!” Instead of someone from among men, a young girl who was dressed in black said, “Men had better be quiet now. Thirty years ago, they made this revolution and we have now seen its result. They had better be quiet now and let us do our job! This revolution is our revolution, women’s revolution!”

Here, I would like to pose this question: who are these women, who simply speak about a revolution of women, those whose images you have seen and I hope you have not forgotten? Who are they? And why do they fight so bravely for freedom and democracy?

Many of these young women have been born after the 1979 revolution or they have been young kids in the early days of the revolutions; they are completely products of an ideological system, which has had the monopoly of power in Iran for thirty years. Apart from having to suffer the lack of political freedoms and democracy like men, they also have to accept rules of compulsory veil, live with family laws which put them under the guardianship of men, seek the consent of their fathers for marriage, the right of getting a divorce and they are often deprived of the guardianship of their children. These are the same women who will be flogged in they have relationships other than in a marriage and if they are married women, an extra-marital relationship may lead to being stoned. These are the same women that Ahmadinejad’s government wants to minimise their role in universities and the labour market and make them stay at home and be isolated with fundamentalist policies which is now even more restrictive than the past 30 years.

In the past thirty years, Iranian women have gone through the highest level of suppression and pressure in their personal and social lives and have sustained the most damage of all from the ruling system. Under such circumstances, it is obvious that they are the unhappiest and the angriest citizens who do not have much to lose. If they are arrested today because of attending demonstrations for democracy, they have been arrested before for attending gatherings in defence of women’s rights and they have gone to prison for it. If they are raped today by security forces, they have felt this rape on their body and their soul for thirty years in the violation of their rights and their human dignity. Given all these facts, do we still have to ask why, today, women are at the forefront of the struggles of Iranian people?

At the beginning of my talk, I said I hope you have not forgotten the images of the protests of Iranian people against the violation of human rights and the absence of freedom and democracy.

However, let me be honest and tell you that I concerned. I am concerned that these images and these struggles may be forgotten. Yes, if violation of human rights in Iran does not face any resistance or repercussions and if these struggles are not defended in a concrete way, the Iranian people have the right to tell us you have forgotten us. My concern becomes even much deeper when I see that the western media is becoming less and less concerned about the violation of human rights in Iran and even politicians are not better than the media.

Unfortunately, forgetting the thousands who were arrested and tortured in prisons, the hundreds who were killed and the unknown number of prisoners who were raped are killed in detention is a real concern. The fact is that in Iran, while on the one hand people’s struggles and protests are still powerful and living and on the other hand , violation of human rights continues in a systematic way in all spheres, from women’s rights to freedom of gatherings, from rights of prisoners to freedom of speech, it appears that European nations and states are beginning to forget what they witnesses in Iran this summer. It is my conviction that by forgetting these realities, western governments not only forget their own responsibility which has been defined as countries who uphold human rights, but they are also putting in jeopardy the interests of their own state and their own citizens by forgetting these events.

They sit at the same table of negotiations with Ahmadinejad in the capacity of a legitimate president and the only item on the agenda of these negotiations is the issue of nuclear energy, as if none of these events had happened in Iran and as if none of the disasters which we see today keep occurring in Iran. On the level of international politics, everything is business as usual with the Islamic Republic like before the events of this summer. Even when there is talk of sanctions against Iran, sanctions are considered in the face of Iran’s advancements in the area of nuclear technology, as if no one sees the day to day violation of the basic rights of Iranian citizens by the Iranian government. Human rights is a universal issue and if one state claims to be supporting human rights, this claim brings about responsibilities with it . Ignoring these responsibilities, not only subjects Iranian people to further and wider suppression, but it also has long term repercussion for the citizens of countries who consider themselves defenders of human rights, because just in the same way that human rights is universal, fundamentalism as one of the greatest enemies of human rights has also become universal and global. Silence, toleration and recognition of a fundamentalist government that violates the rights of women, dissidents and minorities result in the enhancement and the export of global fundamentalism. We can already see symptoms of it even on this side of the borders: Holland is one of the societies which is now dealing with the issue of religious fundamentalism as a social and political problem..

In the latest demonstration of the Iranian people against the government which was held last week, a large number of people and this time, women more than before, were attacked, beaten up and abused by security guards. Women were wounded, arrested and among them were a large number of political activists such as Vahideh Mowlavi, a women’s rights activist , were violently arrested. In these demonstrations, people were chanting the slogan: “Obama! Obama! You are either with us or with them!” The slogan clearly implies that right before the eyes of the people who are now fighting for freedom, democracy and human rights in Iran, one cannot sit at a negotiation table with a dictatorial government to speak about nuclear energy or economic contracts and talk about concrete conditions and at the same time, criticise the state of human rights in Iran through political statements which have no actual guarantee to be put into action. Demonstrators are overtly challenging Obama to clarify his position towards the struggles of the Iranian people and they have the same expectation from European governments.

As a women’s rights activist who comes from the heart of the struggles of the people, I am here in The Hague, in Holland – the city which is the seat of the International Criminal Court for addressing crimes against humanity – to speak of two dire needs of the movement of the Iranian people. These needs and necessities will not be realised unless western governments take responsibility. First, it is necessary that the issue of human rights in Iran remains on the table of negotiations alongside the issue of nuclear energy with equal significance. As long as the issue of human rights is not raised at least in a parallel way to the nuclear issue at all levels of political and economic negotiations with the Iranian government and sanctions and other possible guarantees of action do not include both areas, one cannot accept that some real effort has been made to stop the violation of the rights of Iranian citizens.

The second necessity is that all those involved and all those who have ordered the widespread and systematic violation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran should be prosecuted and tried. It is true that Iran, like many other violators of human rights, has not ratified the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, but western governments, including the Dutch government, as the host of the International Criminal Court, can ask the UN Security Council to pursue the issue of crimes against humanity through setting up an international court for Iran. Let us not forget that a global issue can only be dealt with through a global action.

Thank you.

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One of the more dramatic rumours in the post-election crisis has been the Iranian Government has moved out $18.5 billion in gold to Turkey for “safekeeping”. It has emerged again during President Ahmadinejad’s stay in Turkey for the Organization of Islamic Cooperation meeting on economic issues. In his press conference, Ahmadinejad replied to a question from a BBC Persian correspondent:

I think first the press should think over the news and evaluate it. Now I ask, do you know how much space does $18.5 billion takes up. I hear that it was $8.5 billion Gold, do you know how many Lorries it takes to transfer this amount of money. Where are you going to get this much gold in one place? It is impossible to find this much of money in one place. It is normal to transfer $100’000 from one bank to another, it is very common. But I think this was more like propaganda and the press rumour.

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The video below is extraordinary, showing Deputy Minister of Defense and MP Ali Khamenei in discussion with US diplomat John Limbert, one of the 52 American hostages in the 1979/81 US Embassy takeover. But the 2009 sequel to the story may be even more significant.

Although the footage had been shown on Iranian television at the time and had been posted by Liveleak in 2008, it rose to prominence when it was posted on the Supreme Leader’s website on 2 November. At that time John Limbert was a prominent ex-diplomat, soon to appear on US television talking about the 30th anniversary of the Revolutionary and Embassy crisis. Now, however, John Limbert has been appointed to the new post of Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Iran.

So why does Ayatollah Khamenei’s camp “out” this video just before the Obama Administration offers a significant signal on US-Iranian relations? Could it be that the Supreme Leader is wanting to turn Embassy pictures of 1979, which have spurred anti-Iran hostility for a generation in the US, into images of warmth and friendship? And could it be that the US Government, far from pushing a hard line on the Iranian nuclear programme (and the post-election crisis and human rights) leading to further sanctions or a suspension of talks, is demonstrating its renewed dedication to “engagement”?

In other words, are the Leader of Iran and the Leader of the Free World now walking alongside each other, unclenched fist in unclenched fist?

Summary of video from Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty:

In the video Khamenei, who was then a deputy defense minister and a member of parliament, is seen chatting with one of the hostages, who appears to be U.S. diplomat John Limbert, who speaks fluent Persian.

Khamenei asks him about the detention conditions and issues such as food, hygiene, or whether the hostages have access to books. “Any shortcomings, problems, or difficulties can be removed,” says Khamenei.

The U.S. hostage responds that there is only one problem. Khamenei quickly reacts by saying “right, the fact that you’re here” and then expresses hope that “the Iranian criminal,“ the shah, will be delivered to Iran and the hostages will be free to go. The hostage replies: “Inshallah.”

Later in the video Khamenei appears to be giving an interview to Iranian state television. He describes his meeting with the hostages and gives details about their detention, including what he says is the good library they have access to.

In the interview, Khamenei says that the hostages are “very happy” with their living conditions and the food they’re receiving. “American food is being specially prepared for them,” says Khamenei.

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This video emerged last week but we held off posting it until we could clarify what Mohsen Hashemi, the son of former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, was claiming.

At a “technical” meeting five days after the 12 June election, Mohsen Hashemi took the microphone to launch a fierce criticism of President Ahmadinejad. About six minutes into the clip, he claims that his family does not have a penny abroad, countering pre-election allegations (to be repeated in the Tehran trials) of Rafsanjani’s corruption. Then he reveals….

Hashemi Rafsanjani’s campaign manager in the 2000 Parliamentary elections was Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

That bit of information, offered publicly for the first year, puts the Rafsanjani-Ahmadinejad in a new light. The two men were politically, if not personally, close at one point but, for unknown reasons, fell out before the 2005 Presidential election.

More to come?

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