Thursday, June 30, 2011

Public Enquiry, Islamic Republic Style

The attack on Tehran university dormitory, three days after the fraudulent elections in 2009, was brutal even by the Islamic Republic standards.  A combined force of Islamic Republic’s most ruthless crackdown units, LEF’s Special Guards, Special Units and hired thugs and hoodlums resulted in 100 students injured and 5 killed.

A year later,  a film which must have been taken by one of the attackers reached the West, which showed captured students dragged on the floor and piled on top of each other:





Despite all the evidence shown in the film footage that the attack was organised, the regime denied responsibility and promised a judicial enquiry. Two years later this is the verdict of the judicial review into the incident:

Amir Mohammadi - Management student, 91 days prison, $1000 fine.
Ali Refahi - Social Sciences student, 3 months prison, $500 fine
Kamal Razavi, Social Sciences student, 3 months prison, $500 fine
Rassoul Mohsenzadeh, Social Sciences, 10 months prison
Amir Hossein Fazli, 91 days prison, $1000 fine
Kaveh Akbari, Social Sciences student, 10 months prison
Yadollah Nemati, 10 months prison, $1000 fine
Habib Farahzadi, 10 months prison, $1000 fine
Naeem Aghayi, 10 months prison, $500 fine
Ayub Nemati, 10 months prison, $500 fine
Avat Rezania, 3 months prison, 74 lashes or $3000 fine
Vahid Qeysari, 5 months prison, $500 fine
Ali Sahar Vakili, Social Sciences student, 4 months prison, $500 fine.

So there we have it, the students who were savagely beaten, dragged and piled on top of each other were solely responsible for the atrocity. Islamic Republic style justice.

Here is Press TV’s report of UK police brutality against the students, highlighting the extent of injuries of a UK student with a scratched hand:

Monday, June 27, 2011

U2 at Glastonbuty 2011 - Pictures of Neda and Post Election Protests in Iran

U2 at Glastonbury 2011 performing Sunday, Bloody Sunday with pictures of post-'election' protests in Iran and Neda's pictures displayed on the stage




Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Fears for Missing Iranian Woman Photographer, Maryam Majd

I remember how seeing this picture on the left shook me and how angry I felt. Nothing distresses me more than seeing children frightened, humiliated and unhappy. Today I found out the picture was taken by Maryam Majd, Iranian woman photographer, who is feared to have been held by Islamic Republic security thugs, before boarding a flight from Tehran to Düsseldorf, where she was supposed to cover the Fifa Women's World Cup.



Galloway Loses Another Wager

Once again Galloway denied he ever said, he backed Ahmadinejad’s election campaign and once again he challenged someone for a £1000 wager. Of course losing a £1000 here and there is small potatoes for someone who is paid £25k/month for his programs on Press TV alone, but the point is he loses every time and he still doesn’t pay up.

Watch Galloway on Andrew Neil’s show



And a reminder of what Galloway actually said in his interview





Sunday, June 19, 2011

The General Madhi Fiasco

Jahanchahi showing off with his Russian bodyguard at a
Press Conference in London
For the self-centred ego-maniac Iranian billionaire Amir Jahanchahi, the defected revolutionary guard, General Madhi was his biggest star prize. For Jahanchahi, General Madhi was the living proof that he was buying the regime officials and causing them to defect. Yet General Madhi recently appeared on a state TV program, the Diamond Deception and claimed he had been a regime operative on a mission to infiltrate the Iranian opposition in exile. The egg on Jahanchahi's face that made him look even more foolish was laughable but the seriousness of the farce was the ammunition it has unjustly provided against the incarcerated leaders of the Green Movement, Moussavi and Karroubi.

So what was it all about? Some of the information I have below is solid and where there are question marks, I will point them out. It seems Madhi was a senior revolutionary guards figure who was injured in the Iran-Iraq war as a result of exposure to Saddam's chemical warfare on Iran, as a result of which Madhi was in need of costly treatment. A rift develops between Madhi and his superiors, although we don't know exactly why, it may have been financial or it may have been a gripe over the lack of adequate treatment he was receiving or another reason. In any case Madhi manages to leave Iran for Bangkok with some money, but the cost of his treatment continues to mount. With the start of the protests across Iran, Madhi decides to back the protests against the regime and switch sides. Like most Iranians inside Iran, he considers the Iranian opposition, the usual familiar faces that are constantly paraded on BBC Persian and VOA and thus he contacts Jahanchahi, whose two man outfit, the so-called Green Wave Campaign, is more than jubilant to hold press conferences and arrange interviews with him and announce their alliance with Madhi's claims of heading a group of dissident revolutionary guards, "Association of Fellows". In return Madhi may have expected his medical costs to have been paid, or at least his immigration issues to be sorted, yet as we know Jahanchahi is all mouth and no trousers. The Iranian diplomats who defected had also denounced Jahanchahi's lies in this statement.

As I have seen on so many previous occasions, Madhi must have been disappointed with what he learned about the familiar faces of the Iranian opposition in exile and simply had enough. Whether he did a deal with the regime to go back or he was put under pressure, we don't know, but once again the familiar faces of the Iranian opposition in exile have inflicted a huge damage on Iran's pro-democracy movement. It is not the first time we see an Iranian expat millionaire whose narcissism prompts him to also have a dabble in politics and gloat in the resultant media publicity. Expat millionaires who think because they have made money they can also "save" Iran and be the next leader. Credulous egomaniacs who do not realise the importance of tedious grass root work but think they will become the next leader of Iran simply by holding press conferences and achieving media publicity with their outrageous  aggrandizements or as we say in Persian "Gondeh Goozi" - whopper farts!

Far from starting a mass defection from the body of the Iranian regime, Jahanchahi's two man team, if anything, have put off any other Iranian officials who may have contemplated defecting and the regime's propaganda machines have been hard at work trying to parade zeros like Jahanchahi & co. as the Iranian opposition.

Friday, June 17, 2011

Monday, June 13, 2011

Name a Street After Hoda Saber

Hoda Saber, dissident Iranian journalist, died yesterday in Evin prison, ten days after starting his hunger strike in protest at the killing of Haleh Sahabi during her father's funeral.

Dissident journalist, Hoda Saber has been jailed numerous times, his current sentence started in August last year. Hoda staged a hunger strike 10 days ago in section 350 of the Evin prison, accepting only water, sugar and salt. His inmate Amir Khosro Delresani, who also joined him on hunger strike, is still continuing with his protest.

In 1981, when IRA's Bobby Sands died in the Maze prison after staging a 66 day hunger strike, the Islamic Republic wasted no time to rename a street near the British Embassy to Bobby Sands street. Now it will only be appropriate to rename streets near Islamic Republic embassies as Hoda Saber street. There is of course one difference. Bobby Sands was a member of an armed group which carried out bombings, Hoda was just a journalist.

Sunday, June 12, 2011

The Second Anniversary of the Fraudulent Elections in Iran

Lets not forget the Green Movement protests which sparked the new awakening in the region. Iran still remains at the forefront of the yearning for democracy and to get rid of the dictators. Today marks the second anniversary of the fraudulent election which led to these protests. Pictures that tell the story:


Tuesday, June 07, 2011

Galloway's Denial of Tiananmen Square Massacre

This isn't new but I hadn't come across it before. In this radio program George Galloway, this former stooge of Saddam and now the stooge of the Islamic Republic and £25000 a month Press TV employee, denies there was ever a Tiananmen Square massacre:



There are almost 57000 useful idiots on Galloway's fan page on Facebook, which include the likes of Salma Yaqoob, Muslim Defence League, John Pilger, Stop the War Coalition and some Iranian women like US resident Azita Shafazand on the left here, who boastfully put this picture on her own Facebook page after going to the Conference of Iranians Abroad in Tehran, to pledge support for the Islamic Republic.








Amongst the complimentary comments posted under this picture is one by California resident Taxi driver, Hamed Taghavi who says"Wow! You met this great guy"


Sunday, June 05, 2011

Help the Noble People of Syria

Bashar Assad's murderous dictatorship stooped to a new low after what they did to the 13 year old Hamza al-Khatib. Unspeakable crimes were carried out against this fun loving cheeky looking 13 year old Syrian boy, a diligent student who enjoyed football and raised homing pigeons. Hamza and his family had gone to break the siege against the heroes of Deraa, when Hamza was arrested and taken in by Bashar Assad's thugs. Scars on his face shows he was whipped in the face, he had cigarette burns all over his body and his genitals were severed. Hamza is not the only child to have been murdered by Bashar's regime, since the protests in Syria erupted.





Some of Bashar's savage thugs, the Shabiha militia or Bashar's equivalent of Baseej, who carry out these unspeakable crimes against the people of Syria





Thursday, June 02, 2011

Iran's Green Revolution and the Arab Spring

I think last time I wrote about a debate at the Frontline Club, was five years ago. This time, it was different, I was one of the panel members :)


Watch live streaming video from frontlineclub at livestream.com