Iranian democracy

[scottdisco]

good on ya Vim.

is the 26th thing an action inside Iran or is that the date that international trade unions have chosen to show mass solidarity? (because i have read websites on the latter, for sure.)

one assumes the artesh are sitting on their hands?

My god, I'm starting to really hate Chavez... terrible cognitive dissonance.

Edit: Speaking of dissonance -- Lenin's Tomb, pretty funny.

ha, yeah. still, the SWP's position on this one is wholly admirable and worth getting behind AFAICT.
that said, good for Lenny (if only for fear of RSI) that they appear to have formulated a coherent line on this quite early on; i'm sure readers of the TOMB well remember flip-flops there in the past on some issues, e.g., wildcat strikes, what to write about George Galloway, as party bosses would change their minds and their take over time, sometimes quite a lot..

 

[Mr. Tea]

I was down with the guys outside the Embassy earlier for an hour or so. Quite a decent-sized crowd (no idea how big London's Iranian population is), loads of singing as others have mentioned - some very good tunes, actually! - and chanting, stuff about "down with the state of bastards", "down with dictators", "freedom for the people of Iran" etc., as you can imagine. Or so I heard from my mate, who speaks a smidgen of Farsi. Notable were the surprisingly small police presence and the overwhelming preponderance of designer sunglasses among the protesters.

Oh, and the much smaller (about 1/10 of the size of the pro-Mousavi contingent) parallel protest being held by supporters of the Shah-in-exile!

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

@Mr. Tea - good on ya too!

one assumes the artesh are sitting on their hands?

yeh but is it:

sit on their hands they're staying out of it?

or

sit on their hands waiting to see which way to jump?

(it's probably a different thing to take about "the Artesh" - the generals, Salehi & them, vs. "the Artesh" - the soldiers.)

I guess even if it were the latter the moment for a jump may have come & gone. if there ever was a moment, or if it was ever a possibility. no way to know about any of it, of course. also, I've no idea who Artesh/IRGC has control over what weapon systems, transportation & communication networks, etc & who has responsibility for what. (going to try to buckle down & get thru a chunk of that paper Vim linked after I get down studying)

& scott - answer your bloody pms ya wasteman!

 

[Mr. Tea]

Cheers padraig.

Just seen on Newsnight that there are reports of Basij goons daubing paint on the front doors of known protesters so as to identify them for later 'interrogation' - people frantically trying to scrub it off before it dries, of course...

Oh, and some seriously explicit photos of the young woman who was shot dead, and other victims of state violence, on placards carried by protesters in South Ken. 500-hundred-odd arrests reported so far.

 

[vimothy]

Ta. Some good moments. Arguing with the Wahhabi. "No freedom with the hejab." Threatening to burn pictures of Khamenei. "Death to Khanenei." Lots of chants I recognised from the internets coverage as well (my friend, also called Neda, was translating), like "don't be afraid, don't be afraid, we are all together". Very anti the regime and the republic.

(going to try to buckle down & get thru a chunk of that paper Vim linked after I get down studying)

Fascinating stuff innit...

 

[josef k.]

Meanwhile, the Republicans:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/index.jhtml?episodeId=230696

 

[crackerjack]

Meanwhile, the Republicans:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/index.jhtml?episodeId=230696

This website is blocked in UK...which episode was it?

 

[crackerjack]

Since we're all in activist mood, this from Amnesty

Dear Supporter,

I'm sure you will be aware of the disturbing news coming out of Iran over the last week or so.

Getting this information is becoming increasingly difficult as the Iranian authorities are attempting to suppress information by blocking websites and severely restricting foreign media - but we can show them that the world is still watching.

After the disputed election results of 12 June, hundreds of thousands of Iranians took to the streets of Tehran and other cities to protest. But in Iran, expressing your opinions can be dangerous - dozens were arrested and by the end of last week Amnesty had recorded at least 10 deaths. On Friday, the situation was further inflamed when, rather than appealing for the security forces to exercise restraint, Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, declared that further protest would not be tolerated - effectively condoning the violent actions of the security forces.

This did not deter more demonstrations on Saturday - defiant and courageous people are continuing to exercise their right to peacefully assemble and express their dissent. As we have seen, they are doing so despite great personal risk.

Amnesty has issued an Urgent Action appeal in support for the people of Iran and the right to peaceful protest and freedom of expression - please email the Iranian Ambassador in the UK.

 

[vimothy]

Done.

On Saturday, amid the most violent clashes between security forces and protesters, Mr. Alipour was shot in the head as he stood at an intersection in downtown Tehran. He was returning from acting class and a week shy of becoming a groom, his family said.

The details of his death remain unclear. He had been alone. Neighbors and relatives think that he got trapped in the crossfire. He wasn't politically active and hadn't taken part in the turmoil that has rocked Iran for over a week, they said.

"He was a very polite, shy young man," said Mohamad, a neighbor who has known him since childhood.

When Mr. Alipour didn't return home that night, his parents began to worry. All day, they had heard gunshots ringing in the distance. His father, Yousef, first called his fiancée and friends. No one had heard from him.

At the crack of dawn, his father began searching at police stations, then hospitals and then the morgue.

Upon learning of his son's death, the elder Mr. Alipour was told the family had to pay an equivalent of $3,000 as a "bullet fee"—a fee for the bullet used by security forces—before taking the body back, relatives said.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124571865270639351.html

 

[...]

Well, anyway, Anne Applebaum makes an important and largely (stupidly) overlooked point today:

In the United States, the most America-centric commentators have somberly attributed the strength of recent demonstrations to the election of Barack Obama. Others want to give credit to the democracy rhetoric of the Bush administration. Still others want to call this a "Twitter revolution" or a "Facebook revolution," as if zippy new technology alone had inspired the protests. But the truth is that the high turnout has been the result of many years of organizational work, carried out by small groups of civil rights activists and above all women's groups, working largely unnoticed and without much outside help.

 

[crackerjack]

Global Solidarity Day set for Friday

http://www.workers-iran.org/News/June 26, 09 global action day, IASWI statement.htm

here's the London one

Global Action Day – 26 June 2009 - Free the jailed union leaders and May Day activists

Friday, 26 June 2009, in London
12:30pm to 1.30pm
Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran, 16 Princes Gate, London SW7 1PT
(parallel to Kensington Road, not far from the Royal Albert Hall).

Join trade unionists, exiled Iranians and human rights activists to protest against the violation of workers’ rights and human rights in Iran.

The protest will call on the Iranian government to:

* Release imprisoned trade unionists
* Recognise independent workers’ organisations
* Ratify ILO Conventions on freedom of association and right to collective bargaining
* Reinstate unfairly dismissed workers

Supported by the Trades Union Congress, International Transport Federation and other unions, and Amnesty International.

If you cannot attend the protest, write, phone or email your protest to the Iranian Ambassador, Rasoul Movahedian:

Movahedian@iran-embassy.org.uk
020 7225 4208
Embassy of Iran, 16 Princes Gate, SW7 1PT.

 

[crackerjack]

stwc site hacked by its own domain holder

http://www.stopwar.org.uk/

 

[droid]

Chomsky on Iran (audio)

 

[scottdisco]

cheers for the Amnesty, demo and StWC hat-tips, Cracker.

great point from Anne A.

i see Tehran top brass are now saying the UN secretary-general is interfering in Iranian affairs with his calls for dialogue.

and no significant discrepancies with the election say the people in charge, good to know eh.

 

[vimothy]

Ghassan Khatib:

The ongoing domestic unrest in Iran does have one significant effect in both the Palestinian and Arab public domains. It distorts the image of Iran to a certain extent. The way the government has been treating protestors and the divisions in the leadership over how to contain these events weaken the argument of Islamists in the region who have been holding Iran up as a model for future anti-Zionist and anti-imperialist Islamist Arab states. As far as this issue is concerned, the damage is irreversible regardless of the outcome of the ongoing protests in Iran.

In the medium term, and in spite of the many similarities between the different competing groups in Iran, the outcome will certainly have an effect on the Iranian role in the Arab and Palestinian streets. Much of the current popularity of Iran results from the rhetoric of Mahmoud Ahmedinezhad, whose verbal attacks on Israel have wide resonance. The possible absence of both him and his rhetoric, one of the potential outcomes of the current unrest, may also reduce the popularity of Iran in Arab and Palestinian circles. A possible defeat for the hard line represented by Ahmadinezhad is certainly bad news for the Islamist political movements in Palestine and the Arab world.

 

[crackerjack]

Footballers banned, passports confiscated.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jun/23/iran-football-protest-ban

 

[massrock]

I have to say, at the end of the day, they're not doing themselves any favours these Iranian authorities.

 

[scottdisco]

just reading the preliminary Chatham House voting survey [.pdf here].

plenty of 'greatest hits' but one skim read that struck me went

In a third of all provinces, the official results would require that Ahmadinejad took not only all former conservative voters, and all former centrist voters, and all new voters, but also up to 44% of former Reformist voters, despite a decade of conflict between these two groups;

(soz Vim! you'd already posted this. hard to keep up..)

 

[crackerjack]

The Big O cranks it up

The Iranian people are trying to have a debate about their future. Some in the Iranian government are trying to avoid that debate by accusing the United States and others outside of Iran of instigating protests over the elections. These accusations are patently false and absurd. They are an obvious attempt to distract people from what is truly taking place within Iran's borders. This tired strategy of using old tensions to scapegoat other countries won't work anymore in Iran. This is not about the United States and the West; this is about the people of Iran, and the future that they – and only they – will choose.

The Iranian people can speak for themselves. That is precisely what has happened these last few days. In 2009, no iron fist is strong enough to shut off the world from bearing witness to the peaceful pursuit of justice. Despite the Iranian government's efforts to expel journalists and isolate itself, powerful images and poignant words have made their way to us through cell phones and computers, and so we have watched what the Iranian people are doing.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

Obama statement & answering press questions on Iran right now, as part of more general speech (other 2 topics domestic U.S. - building a green/clean economy & health care reform) - paraphrasing:

"this is not about the U.S. or the West - that is a tired line that some in Iran (regime) are using to take focus on what is going on in Iran - what is going on can only be decided by the people of Iran"
"we (U.S./West) bear witness to peaceful protest - there is no iron fist in the world today that can stop the world from bearing witness"
"those who protest for justice are always on the right side of history"
"we can't say exactly what happened in polling places across Iran - what we do know is a significant # of Iranians/large section of Iranian society are unhappy w/it - there are serious questions about legitimacy of election"

sorry for inaccuracies - trying to listen & type at same time.

*EDIT* - there's a bunch more stuff but, sorry, I missed most of it (tho I'm sure a transcript will be available presently). what I did catch:

"there is a path for Iran to worldwide acceptance where it's sovereignty/culture/faith etc. is respected" (then said some specific things Iran had to do but I missed it - I'll bet they can be guessed)
"U.S. has a core national security interest in making sure Iran doesn't obtain nuclear weapons & stops exporting terrorism"

then loads about health care reform which I'm very interested in (as all Americans should be) but well OT