Wednesday, December 28, 2005

In Year 2005

Hopefully, now that I have a weblog it will be easier next year to list all the Iran related activities I will be involved in. For the past year, if my memory allows me, below are what my friends and I got involved in.

The year started off with the referendum appeal, for which I had a lot of hope.
I met Mohsen Sazgara in London. I told him for matters inside Iran, I can only be all ears and listen to people who have recently left Iran, but I can help in soliciting international support for the appeal. However despite my initial enthusiasm and backing, the ball just did not get rolling for the referendum appeal.

http://iranvajahan.net/cgi-bin/news.pl?l=en&y=2004&m=12&d=06&a=5

http://azarmehr.blogspot.com/2005/12/where-referendum-appeal-lost-its-way.html

Perhaps the highlight of the year was organising Reza Pahlavi's surprise Iranian New Year visit to Iranian refugees in London. A day which was really unforgettable:
http://www.iranianvoice.org/modules.php?name=News&file=print&sid=1571

The murder of a young Iranian teenager by a cleric in Tehran metro needed to be brought to the attention of the world:
http://www.faithfreedom.org/oped/PotkinAzarmehr50601.htm

Then it was the so called presidential elections in Iran. We went to the voting polls set up by the Islamic Republic in London, talking to and arguing with the people who were taking part in the charade. We learned a lot as to why some Iranians still ignore the appeals to boycott Islamic show elections:
http://www.rozanehmagazine.com/JylyAugust05/Aelectionbehnood.htm

When I came home, I watched VOA Persian TV. Massoud Behnood was on the program. We bumped into him on his way to vote and also questioned his reasons for not boycotting the event as he himself had earlier called for. On TV, Behnood referred to me as a thug and said I had kept calling him a traitor. Complete lies!

I rang VOA and spoke to a Mr. Ardalan, he promised me VOA will give me a chance to say my version but that never happened.

I spent the rest of the evening collecting information about what happened during the Islamic elections. I could not understand how the organisers of the Referendum Appeal had made no provisions for holding a press conference to tell the world what had happened. After all the event was not an unpredictable one:
http://www.faithfreedom.org/oped/PotkinAzarmehr50620.htm

In London, I took part in a press conference at the FPA Head Quarters in Pall Mall.
On the panel was Amir Taheri, Babak Emamian and myself. Babak Emamian represented the British Iranian Business Association (BIBA), dressed in his typical bowtie and looking as plump and baby like as ever, Emamian said Ahmadi-Nejad's message of justice to the poor had appealed to him and prompted him to vote for Ahmadi-Nejad!

I had angry exchanges with him during and after the press conference. Amir Taheri, for reasons I could not understand, kept telling me to leave Emamian alone, and at times it looked like Emamian was going to burst out crying like a baby. To me the likes of Babak Emamian represent the most revolting type of Iranians who always suck up to whoever is in power regardless. Babak Emamian also falsely represents himself as an "entrepreneur", in fact he is just an insurance salesman for Zurich Life. He is also very much like a character played by the English comedian, Harry Enfield, and just like the character keeps uttering "I am considerably richer than you", not realising how vulgar he comes across.

Then there was the London bombings. Luckily on that day I was working from home, otherwise I would have been passing Holborn and Kings Cross in the London Underground around the times the bombings took place. The tragedy had brought home the global threat of the Islamic terrorism. Something we have been warning for years.

We organised a demo outside the Islamic Centre mosque in Maida Vale and handed out leaflets with the heading "Make Islamic Fundamentalism History":
http://www.hyscience.com/archives/2005/07/make_islamic_fu.php
http://www.faithfreedom.org/oped/PotkinAzarmehr50725.htm

More information reached me from inside Iran about the takeover by the Hojjatieh sect and how the new president was a devotee of this messianic sect.
http://www.faithfreedom.org/oped/PotkinAzarmehr50817.htm
http://azarmehr.blogspot.com/2005/08/more-on-messianic-hojjatieh-sect.html

Akbar Ganji's heroic 70 day hunger strike also required us to do our bit in soliciting international support for him:
http://www.zippyvideos.com/130046864900445.html

as well as the brutal murder of Shwane Ghaderi in Mahabad:
http://mensnewsdaily.com/blog/2005/07/msm-ignores-beating-murder-of-secular.htm

Then there was our efforts to stop the building of the Sivand Dam:
http://www.cyrusnews.com/news/en/?mi=2&ni=320
http://azarmehr.blogspot.com/2005/10/cyrus-day.html
http://azarmehr.blogspot.com/2005/09/more-pictures-from-sunday.html
http://azarmehr.blogspot.com/2005/09/4th-day-outside-british-museum.html

Our actions against the Lib Dems after Baroness Nicholson's remarks in the European Parliament:
http://azarmehr.blogspot.com/2005/10/vile-baroness.html
http://baarswestside.blogspot.com/2005/12/for-democratic-secular-iran-for-peace.html
http://www.cyrusnews.com/news/en/?mi=1&ni=362
http://www.melaniephillips.com/diary/archives/001501.html

and the year ended up with our efforts to expose the panel at the SOAS meeting:
http://azarmehr.blogspot.com/2005/12/meeting-at-soas.html

All in all, quite a busy year considering that I was also going through a bitter divorce case and battling with a firm of solicitors by the name of Bross Bennett Family Law, whose only interest is to drain the family pot from both sides. Hopefully next year with my divorce now behind me, I can be more productive.

The injustice of the British legal system which is only designed to make the likes of Bross Bennett richer and divorced children poorer has also prompted me to join Fathers4Justice group, so you may hear about me dressed as batman hanging off some tall building in 2006 :)



1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Dear Compatriot,

Thank you for this blog and above all your commitment to freedom in our motherland.
I'm proud to know that I have compatriots such as yourself.

With the best wishes for the removal of this Islamic tumor in our motherland and for the establishment of a true secular, nationalistic government in Iran.