Is this the beginning of the end the mullahocracy in Iran: Protests and Regime Violence Erupt in Iran

[Elaine Friedland]

TEHRAN -- Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei annointed President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the winner of Friday's presidential race, triggering violent protests across the nation and allegations by his nearest challenger of widespread vote rigging.

The violence ratcheted up the stakes in the most contentious election since the founding of the Islamic Republic 30 years ago. Prolonged strife or a political standoff would heighten the uncertainty hanging over a country that is one of the world's biggest oil producers and Washington's main irritant in the volatile Middle East.

As night descended on Tehran, supporters of main challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi clashed with anti-riot police and plain-clothed militia. The city resembled a military zone as thousands of Special Forces units and anti-riot police stormed streets waving their electric batons and hitting rioters and onlookers.

Military cars blocked large swaths of main throughways and instead of traffic police, the para-military Basijis—trained volunteers in plain-clothes—were directing traffic. Vali Asr, the long Tehran avenue where Mousavi supporters last week formed a giant human chain during presidential campaigning, was covered in smoldered black ash—from burnt campaign posters that had been ripped from walls—and shattered glass. Dark smoke hung in the air from garbage dumpsters that were set ablaze on many streets.

On Motahari Avenue, one of the major streets in central Tehran, three public buses were set afire by demonstrators. Syamak Izadi, 62 years old, said he was riding on the bus in central Tehran when a group of men, dressed in Mr. Mousavi's trademark green, stopped the bus and told passengers to get off. They then doused it with gasoline and set it afire, he said.

Protestors played cat and mouse with the police. They gathered on corners throwing their fists in the air, then ran away when riot police descended. On Hafteh Tir square, several hundred people, including men and women, young and old, marched blocking traffic shouting "God is Great" and asking the public to join them. People gathered on pedestrian bridges and encouraged the protestors while drivers honked their horns.

There was unconfirmed shooting reported in northern Tehran with reports of one woman injured from stray bullets.

"The results are not acceptable to us, Mousavi needs to lead the crowd and depose this government," said a 37-year-old biologist who gave his name only as Kasra.

Shouts of "Allah o Akbar" rocked Tehran, reminiscent of the revolution where residents take to their rooftops and shout God is Great in order to show their protest.

Mobile phone service was suspended across the capital. BBC's Persian language service, which many Iranians listen to for news, was jammed. Social networking site Facebook, used by Mr. Mousavi's young supporters to organize, was blocked. On Vali Asr, a pedestrian bridge was set ablaze near Mellat Park.

Supporters of Mr. Mousavi had begun gathering outside the interior ministry and outside his campaign headquarter in central Tehran early in the morning. At that time, uniformed police and plain-clothes security officials broke up groups of protesters, chasing some away from the buildings.

At one point, groups of supporters near Mr. Mousavi's headquarters shouted "death to the dictator," a chant borrowed from the Iranian revolution. Security forces responded by bludgeoning several with batons.

Several journalists were beaten badly, and a female protester was beaten unconscious by uniformed police. As the police battled the protesters, demonstrators and onlookers from windows and from the sides of the streets shouted, "security forces, shame on you."

"Is this democracy?" said Ali Reza, a 30-year-old Mousavi campaign worker, whose eyes were red from tear gas and his white pants torn and bloodied. "We don't have any power to fight these people, but what they are doing is unfair," he said.

Security forces also used pepper spray and tear gas against workers inside the campaign headquarters, throwing canisters through the front door.

Most shopkeepers had closed their stores along the street. But several also opened their doors to provide refuge to protesters. At a traditional Persian restaurant, security forces knocked down the front door, and dragged out dozens of young men and women.

Iranian universities--in the middle of final exams--suspended classes for a week as of today, students said.

The violence and stiff public resistance to the final tally is unprecedented in recent Iranian elections, and threatens wider demonstrations by Mr. Mousavi's supporters, a stiff crackdown from the state, or both.

Political observers warned of a potentially turbulent week ahead. One popular slogan shouted by Mr. Mousavi's supporters at the campaign rallies: "If there is cheating, Iran will blow up."

Iran's interior ministry, in a televised press conference late Saturday afternoon, said Mr. Ahmadinejad had won 24,527,516, or 62.6% of the votes cast. Mr. Mousavi, a reformist former prime minister, won 13,216,411, or 33.8%, according to ministry figures.

Reformist Mehdi Karroubi garnered just 0.85% of the vote, and Mohsen Rezaei, a conservative challenger, won 678,240, or 1.73%. Mr. Khamenei said turnout was above 80%, and congratulated Iran for the vote.

The endorsement by Mr. Khamenei, who has final say in all matters of state policy, essentially served as an official seal of approval for the results.

Earlier in the day, Mr. Mousavi's campaign workers said the communications wing of their candidate's election operation had been shut down Saturday morning by court order.

"We were expecting some level of cheating but no one was expecting this charade," said Hamid Reza Jalaeipour, a sociologist and senior advisor to Mr. Mousavi's campaign. "Mr. Mousavi will not accept these results and will fight it."

In a statement attributed to Mr. Mousavi in leaflets passed out by supporters and posted on his website, the candidate said he "contests the obvious cheating in the election and would like to warn that he would not cave into this dangerous charade."

"Elections in Iran were a completely popular movement," said Mr. Ahmadinejad in a televised speech late Saturday evening. "It was a very big test, and it came at a very critical time."

Some Iranian voters expressed skepticism at the outcome.

"The television and election commission are all in Ahmadinejad's hands," said a 71-year old retired schoolteacher from southern Tehran, who asked for anonymity for fear of losing her government pension.

Campaign offices at Mr. Mousavi's northern Tehran headquarters were raided by unknown assailants and staff were harassed, according to workers there.

In this election, the race for the presidency wasn't just about the candidates but also about Iran's direction. Mr. Mousavi embodied hope from supporters inside and outside Iran for more moderate, pragmatic administration, while Mr. Ahmadinejad represented the republic's tradition of radical ideology.

On election day, throngs of voters flooded into polling stations. State media reported unprecedented turnout among Iran's voters. At many polling stations across the country, crowds formed lines that snaked several miles.

Mr. Mousavi said there was an organized effort to block his campaign staff from communicating with one another and the public on Friday. The Ministry of Telecommunications imposed a nation-wide block of text messaging from mobiles. Mr. Mousavi's supervisors at polls were planning to report discrepancies by text messages.

Thousands of Mr. Mousavi's volunteer supervisors were not issued credentials by the Interior Ministry, which runs the elections, and were barred from polling stations, Mr. Mousavi said. Internet speed was slower than usual all day and by noon nearly all Web sites affiliated with Mr. Mousavi were blocked.

The campaign said that a group of people, who identified themselves as intelligence officers, entered Mr. Mousavi's campaign headquarters in northern Tehran on Friday evening demanding that the young strategists at the campaign, responsible for much of deploying new media techniques, leave the premises.

Mr. Mousavi's campaign lawyer, Mahmoud Alizadeh, said in an interview that Tehran's chief prosecutor informed Mr. Mousavi's campaign lawyer that security agents would arrive Saturday morning with a court order to shut down all their communication operations.

Farnaz Fassihi
Roshanak Taghavi and Jay Solomon contributed to this article.

[John Fisher]

Do you think that the people of Iran are afraid of the coming attack now that Ahmadinejad has been re-elected?

[Elaine Friedland]

The above is about a strike in Tehran , Iran after huge corruption in election's result by the current government. people fighting with anti riot forces. they are shouting for freedom

[exponential5769]

Hi dear Elaine,
I am very upset, because of that I might not be able to clearly picture some thing, just that much that we trusted the insane power-mongers once more and they stabbed us in the back once more. Do you want a new defenition for democracy? A G-dless Teocracy that uses people as a tool. Musavi si under home arrest, many of the two refoirm party directors have been arrested in the past two days, the youth are brutally treated on the streets and democracy is just a meaningless and rediculed dream. I have hardly felt as bitter as the last two days, the same applied to our people..

[Elaine Friedland]

How much reporting in Iran was there about the election frauds in Kenya and Zimbabwe and the popular reaction afterward?

[Carol Warady]

Its amazing to see people from Iran on twitter reporting what was going on. I think its been shut off fr now. Shows how powerful social media can be.

[exponential5769]

Hi Carole, right, there is no twitter, no facebook, no youtube, and emails would take so long to open, many of the ofifical newswebsites are also filtered because they are not admadi supporters. I don't know for how long they are able to play this sickening game..

[Elaine Friedland]

Dozens of reformist politicians were said to have been arrested at their homes overnight, according to news reports on Sunday and a witness who worked with the politicians. There were also reports of politicians and clerics being placed under house arrest.

Reuters quoted a judiciary spokesman on Sunday as saying that the reformists had not been arrested but had been summoned, “warned not to increase tension” and released.

Meanwhile, some foreign journalists were apparently being told to leave the country.

Witnesses reported that at least one person had been shot dead on Saturday in clashes with the police in Vanak Square in Tehran. Smoke from burning vehicles and tires hung over the city late Saturday.

As night settled in, the streets in northern Tehran that recently had been the scene of pre-election euphoria were lit by the flames of trash fires and blocked by tipped trash bins and at least one charred bus. Young men ran through the streets throwing paving stones at shop windows, and the police pursued them.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/15/world/middleeast/15iran.html?_r=1...

On the streets around Fatemi Square, near the headquarters of the leading opposition candidate, Mir Hussein Moussavi, riot police officers dressed in RoboCop gear roared down the sidewalks on motorcycles to disperse and intimidate the clots of pedestrians who had gathered to share rumors and dismay.

“Another four years of dictatorship,” a voter muttered. “This is a coup d’état,” several others agreed. Some women wept openly. Some talked of “mutiny.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/14/world/middleeast/14memo.html?ref=...

Sunday, Jun. 14, 2009
After a Disputed Election, Tehran's Streets Become a Battleground
By Nahid Siamdoust / Tehran

It's way past midnight in Tehran, but this city is not sleeping. Outside on the streets, people are honking their horns in protest and stretching their hands out of cars making peace signs — a sign of support for Mir-Hossein Mousavi, the opposition candidate apparently defeated by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran's presidential election on Friday. (See TIME's photos of the Iranian elections and protests)

In neighborhoods across north and central Tehran, shouts of "Death to dictator!" fill the air, mostly in female voices, coming from house windows. There are also shouts of "Allah-o Akbar!" — reminiscent of the revolution — on the urging of a communique from Mousavi's office.

Some of Tehran's main streets have been turned into urban battlegrounds. Groups of mostly young men have set large garbage bins on fire in the middle of streets, torn out street signs and fences, broken the windows and ATM machines of state banks, and burnt at least five large buses in the middle of streets.

"They have totally fooled us," said one sad man, a 32-year-old state employee, standing by the roadside. "This time they went too far. They just want to eliminate 'republic' and turn this into an Islamic dictatorship," he said with a sigh.

On Ghaem-Magham Street, a lone chadori woman stood by the roadside, making a peace sign with her index finger wrapped in a green ribbon, saying "Mousavi" to every passing car. Out of 50 cars that passed, all but 5 either honked, rolled down their windows to shout their support, or made peace signs in solidarity.

One man passing by told her, "You wrote Mousavi, they read Ahmadinejad!" She responded: "They're illiterate and need to learn reading."

Then a man in a car moving in the other direction rolled down his window and shouted at her in anger, "You whore! Why are you creating conflict between people?" A basiji (a member of the volunteer paramilitary aligned with Ahmadinejad) charged at her from nowhere with a metal rod and was about to beat her when he was held down and beaten himself by five or six men streaming out of nearby cars.

"I mean, just look at this! If Ahmadinejad won 25 million votes, which they claim, we should be celebrating, right?" an onlooker commented.

On Jahankoodak Square, dozens of armored Police Special Forces were driven in on pick-up trucks; dozens more arrived on motorbikes. They chased groups of people chanting, "The theft of the elections must be uncovered!" and beat them badly. Several people were bleeding from their heads, and had to be taken to hospital. There were also rumors that several people had died in the clashes.

Other groups of people had formed fronts and threw stones at the police forces, leaving stones covering many streets. One of the men throwing stones said they would not stop until "they hold fair elections. Do they think we're that dumb?"

Wherever crowds were gathered, the police used pepper stray, which also affected passengers in cars and buses driving by. On Taleqani Street, where some of the worst clashes took place, a motorcade of basijis drove by waving metal batons and chains in the air.

"When the leader did not respond to Rafsanjani's protest letter," said another man standing by, "I knew the game was over. We should have never voted in the first place." He was referring to Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the head of Iran's Expediency Council, who had written a letter to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last week, sharply criticizing Ahmadinejad's accusations against him and his family in a TV debate, and asking that the leader ensure fair elections.

"This is a mammoth battle between the two Islamic Republic dinosaurs," said Reza, a 28-year old accountant, watching the protests from inside a flower shop.

From early evening onward, the entire mobile phone network was cut off, making it difficult for protestors to coordinate, or to learn of the widespread nature of the protests. The Internet was also blocked in certain parts of the city, and satellite TV trannsmissions were reduced to snow. Out of Iran's six television channels, only the all-news channel aired reports on the election, and those mostly exalted "the glory of people's participation in the election."

"They tricked us into this whole thing. They got us out in droves, only to fool us and credit themselves," one woman watching the clashes said, unable to hold back her tears.

"I even got five of my family members who had not voted since the revolution to come out and vote," she sobbed. "Shame on me!"

http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,1904577,00.html

Update | 6:13 p.m. The Tehran Bureau Web site has posted what it says is a letter from Mir Hussein Moussavi, in the Farsi original and English translation. Unfortunately, they make no mention of how they got it, or why they believe it to be authentic, but it does track closely to the statement from Mr. Moussavi Channel 4 News quoted from earlier on Saturday. If the letter is authentic, it is evidence that Mr. Moussavi has no intention of giving in. The letter reads, in part:

I am obliged, due to my religious and national duties, to expose this dangerous plot and to explain its devastating effects on the future of Iran. I am concerned that the continuation of the current situation will transform all key members of this regime into fabulists in confrontation with the nation and seriously jeopardize them in this world and the next.



Update | 6:50 p.m. The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran reports that the Iranian filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf said on Saturday that officials from Iran’s Interior Ministry had contacted Mir Hussein Moussavi’s campaign after the polls closed on Friday night, saying that he had won the election, but asking that he not make any announcement. Mr. Makhmalbaf, who is currently in Paris, said, “After security forces attacked and shut down the press offices of Moussavi’s campaign in Gheitarieh yesterday, I was asked to act as their spokesperson abroad.”

He added that he was asked to spread the word that “last night Interior Ministry officials told Moussavi and his staff that he has won the elections but they should not make it public yet. Moussavi’s campaign, accordingly, began preparations for a public celebration on Sunday.”

Of course Mr. Moussavi ignored the Interior Ministry request and did announce that he had won. Soon after that, the Interior Ministry made what even Iranian state media reported was a “surprise” early declaration that Mr. Ahmadinejad had won, after less than 20% of the ballots had been counted.

In what looks suspiciously like a related incident, Mr. Makhmalbaf’s personal Web site seems to have been attacked. A Google search for “Makhmalbaf Film House,” leads to a warning saying that within the past 24 hours Google had spotted “malicious software being downloaded and installed without user consent” from the filmmaker’s Web site. As Google’s warning explains: “In some cases, third parties can add malicious code to legitimate sites, which would cause us to show the warning message.”

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/13/landslide-or-fraud-the-...

[John Fisher]

DO you really accept this story as true? It sounds a little fishy to me. They election officials called the winner and told him not to say anything? Iranian filmmaker Mohsen Makhmalbaf said on Saturday that officials from Iran’s Interior Ministry had contacted Mir Hussein Moussavi’s campaign after the polls closed on Friday night, saying that he had won the election, but asking that he not make any announcement. I am having a hard time accepting this. Iran is not a Democratic Representative Republic. The elections are just for show and we know it. If the Mullahs knew who made this phone call that person would be hung in the city square. And the election officials know that thus I do not think that this phone call was made. Now I am sure that Makmalbaf has received the most popular votes. but that is not the way it works. Even if everyone voted Ahmadinejad received 25 million votes that is 37% if every person in the country voted. But we know that not all people who have the right to vote, vote. If half of the people voted then there would have been 32,937,612 people who voted that would mean that Ahmadinejad won 76% of the vote. This would be translated in the United States as a mandate, that the people want Ahmadinejad, and they want Nukes, and they want Israel wiped off the face of the Earth. This just days after Obama's speech to the middle east hoping to regain a relationship with Iran. It never ceases to amaze me how often I am correct in my analysis of world events. But then again Iran does not have a proper Democracy where a persons vote counts for anything. .

[Elaine Friedland]

[Elaine Friedland]

Here is what I found about events of June 14th.in Iran

Ahmadinejad opponents shout protests from rooftops

By ANNA JOHNSON and BRIAN MURPHY
Associated Press Writers
AP Photo

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Protesters battled police over Iran's disputed election and shouted their opposition from the rooftops Sunday, but President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad dismissed the unrest as little more than "passions after a soccer match" and drew his own huge rally of support.

Just after sundown, cries of "death to the dictator" echoed through Tehran as thousands of backers for Ahmadinejad's rival, Mir Hossein Mousavi, heeded a call to bellow from the roofs and balconies. The deeply symbolic act recalled the shouts of "Allahu Akbar," or God is Great, to show opposition to the Western-backed monarchy before the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

The scenes summed up the showdown over the disputed elections: an outwardly confident Ahmadinejad exerted control, while Mousavi showed no sign of backing down and could be staking out a new role as powerful opposition voice.

His charges that Friday's vote was riddled by fraud brought sympathetic statements from Vice President Joe Biden and other leaders. Mousavi made a direct appeal with Iran's ruling clerics to annul the result, but the chances were considered remote.

With his wide network of young and middle-class backers, Mousavi could emerge as a leader for Iran's liberal ranks and bring internal pressure on Ahmadinejad and Iran's theocracy to take less confrontational policies toward the West.

But the struggle Sunday was on the streets in the worst unrest in Tehran since student-led protests 10 years ago.

Demonstrators were back on the streets with the same tactics: torching bank facades and trash bins, smashing store windows and hurling rocks at anti-riots squads in Tehran. Police responded with baton-wielding sweeps - sometimes targeting bystanders - and the regime shut down text messaging systems and pro-reform Internet sites.

There was no official word on casualties.

Authorities detained top Mousavi aides, including the head of his Web campaign, but many were released Sunday after being held overnight.

Iran's deputy police chief, Ahmad Reza Radan, told the official Islamic Republic News Agency that about 170 people have been arrested. It was not known how many remained in custody.

Mousavi has urged his supporters to channel their anger into peaceful acts of dissent. But the official clampdown on the Internet links blunted the reach of the message. At the same time, Mousavi went to the pinnacle of power to try to reverse the election decision.

In a letter to the Guardian Council - a powerful 12-member clerical body closely allied to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - he claimed "fraud is evident."

The letter, posted on Mousavi's Web site that is accessible outside Iran, didn't specify his allegations but claimed that his envoys were unfairly blocked from monitoring polling stations. Iran does not allow outside or independent election observers. The Guardian Council must certify all election counts.

Mousavi later met Khamenei - who has almost limitless power - to press his appeal, said Shahab Tabatabaei, a prominent activist in Mousavi's pro-reform camp.

It was likely a long-shot mission by Mousavi, 67, who served as prime minister in the 1980s. Khamenei has already given his blessing to the election outcome and it would be extraordinary for him to publicly change his position.

Iranian authorities have asked some foreign journalists who were in Iran to cover the elections to prepare to leave. Nabil Khatib, executive news editor for Dubai-based news network Al Arabiya, said the station's correspondent in Tehran was given a verbal order Sunday from Iranian authorities that the office will be closed for one week.

No reason was given for the order, but the station was warned several times Saturday that they need to be careful in reporting "chaos" accurately.

A sustained and growing backlash to Iran's power could complicate the country's policies at a pivotal time.

In Tehran, the day was marked by competing protests from both sides.

Less than a 10-minute walk from Ahmadinejad's news conference, protesters raged through streets and lit piles of tires as flaming barricades to block police. About 300 Mousavi supporters gathered outside Sharif University, chanting "Where are our votes?"

After dark, came the cries from the rooftops across Tehran.

Using Web chat lines, phone calls and word of mouth, the message was passed for Mousavi's backers to shout "death to the dictator" and "Allahu Akbar." The historical connection of the act was hugely significant for Iranians. It was how the leader of the Islamic Revolution, the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, asked the country to unite in protest against the monarchy and was used later to mark its anniversary.

In one neighborhood, anti-riot police tried to disperse people joining in the cries from a street corner, but the crowds threw rocks at the officers and they withdrew.

Mousavi's newspaper, Kalemeh Sabz, or the Green Word, did not appear on newsstands Sunday. An editor, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation, said the paper never left the printing house because authorities were upset with Mousavi's statements.

The paper's Web site reported that more than 10 million votes in Friday's election were missing national identification numbers similar to U.S. Social Security numbers, which make the votes "untraceable." It did not say how it knew that information.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/ML_IRAN_ELECTION?SITE=1010WI...

[Elaine Friedland]

Foreign media say Iran blocking coverage of protests

5 hours ago

BERLIN (AFP) — Several foreign news organisations complained Sunday that Iranian authorities were blocking their reporters from covering protests against President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's re-election.

German public television channels ZDF and ARD said their reporters were not allowed to broadcast their reports, while the BBC said the signals of its Persian services were being jammed from Iran.

The Dubai-based Arab news channel Al-Arabiya in Tehran was forbidden from working for a week and Dutch broadcaster Nederland 2 said its journalist and cameraman were arrested and ordered to leave the country.

Foreign media converged in Iran to cover Friday's presidential election, whose official result sparked violent protests in Tehran after Ahmadinejad was declared the winner by a landslide.

Violence erupted for a second day on Sunday as supporters of Ahmadinejad's closest challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi clashed with riot police. Mousavi denounced the election as a fraud and called for the vote to be annulled.

The editors in chief of German public television channels ZDF and ARD sent a letter to the Iranian ambassador in Berlin accusing Iranian authorities of barring their reporters from doing their work.

ARD correspondent Peter Mezger can no longer leave his hotel while ZDF journalist Halim Hosny and his colleagues have not been allowed to report on the events, their chief editors wrote.

"We see a breach of freedom of the press and democratic principles," their editors said in their letter.

Iranian authorities had already barred the journalists from filming and broadcasting their images in recent days, the editors said.

ARD and ZDF insisted that they would "continue to report on the events in Iran" in a "critical, fair and independent" manner.

The British Broadcasting Corporation said the satellites it uses for its Persian television and radio services had been affected since Friday by "heavy electronic jamming" which had become "progressively worse."

Satellite technicians had traced the interference to Iran, the BBC said.

"Any attempt to block BBC Persian television is wrong and against international treaties on satellite communication. Whoever is attempting the blocking should stop it now," said BBC World Service director Peter Horrocks.

"It seems to be part of a pattern of behaviour by the Iranian authorities to limit the reporting of the aftermath of the disputed election," he said, noting that BBC world affairs editor John Simpson and his cameraman were briefly arrested after filming a report.

Dutch public broadcaster Nederland 2 said NOVA journalist Jan Eikelboom and cameraman Dennis Hilgers, who had been in Iran for several days covering the election, "were filming in front of the headquarters of Mousavi, Ahmadinejad's main rival, when they were arrested by police," the channel said in a statement.

"They were pushed against a wall and their tapes were seized. Their filming permits were withdrawn and they have to leave the country immediately," it said.

The Arab news channel Al-Arabiya said that its correspondent, who has been in Tehran for the past four months, had been "informed verbally" of the decision to shut down his office for a week.

"We are not allowed to do any coverage. No reason was given, and there was no earlier warning," executive editor Nabil al-Khateeb told AFP. "I believe it is due to the current state of unrest."

Belgian radio stations RTBF and VRT said their reporters were briefly detained and ordered not take pictures, Belga news agency reported.

The correspondent of Spanish public channel TVE said during a live broadcast Saturday that police had confiscated a video of one the protests.

Copyright © 2009 AFP. All rights reserved. More »
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Iran election protester details encounter with riot police, militiamen
A bag that an activist left with strangers during a Tehran protest against election results leads to an interview in which she recounts a frantic search for her brother and beatings.
By Borzou Daragahi
June 15, 2009
Reporting from Tehran -- Anousheh's hazel eyes burned from the smoke. She caught her breath. Up the boulevard, amid the hazy din, the riot police were beating people with batons and threatening others. Screams erupted, as young men and women ran for cover.

The 29-year-old Iranian interior designer and her brother Babak had just been up there, at the northern end of Tehran's Africa Boulevard, where the crowds were chanting, "Death to the dictator!" -- a burgeoning mass of hundreds of people protesting alleged vote count fraud in the reelection of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

As bearded, truncheon-wielding Ansar-e Hezbollah militiamen began storming the gathering crowds, Anousheh and Babak sprinted down the street, losing sight of each other in the chaos. She searched for him on side streets with no luck. She thought about going back home, but knew there was no way her protective big brother would leave the scene without first finding her.

She imagined him lying in agony on the roadway, or locked up in a wagon and taken to prison, perhaps Evin and its solitary confinement wing, where she said her mother had spent 40 grueling days in 2003.

Before going back into the crowd and risking arrest or a beating, she decided to jettison her backpack, which contained a digital camera packed with potentially provocative images of stone-throwing demonstrators, a wallet full of identification cards and both her and her brother's cellphones, with numbers of all their contacts.

"Can you please take this?" she said to a group of strangers sitting in a car, observing the unrest ahead. "I need to find my brother."

The baffled passengers took the bag, opened it quickly to be sure the contents were not dangerous, and watched as she sprinted back into the melee, a solitary figure in a beige coat and light green head scarf.

Anousheh asked that her last name not be published. Trained as a graphic artist, she makes an unlikely political activist. She lives with her parents. She stayed home on election day, unlike her brother and parents, who voted for moderate candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi, who has charged Ahmadinejad with fraud. But she believes Mousavi should have won.

"I don't accept any of them," she says in steady voice. "None of them can do anything."

She's driven, she says, not by politics but by a heartfelt sense of the injustice of it all, and a strong commitment to her country, her city and her neighborhood, called Jordan, among the Iranian capital's most urbane districts.

Jordan was a target of the Islamic revolutionaries who took control of Iran in the late 1970s, a symbol of all that was decadent about the toppled regime of Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. Authorities re-designated Jordan Boulevard, named after American educator Samuel Jordan, who established a high school here, Africa Boulevard, in a showy sign of solidarity with the Third World, and a slap to the district's cosmopolitan pretentions.

Analysts sometimes describe the great rift in Iran between rich and poor, between the pious downtrodden masses and the wealthy Westernized elite. But many say Iran's divide is more about culture than class, more about cool than cash.

Plenty of the bazaar merchants who bankrolled the ayatollahs and became fundamentalist pillars of the Islamic Republic were rich, just as many of the low-income young working stiffs at menial jobs in wholesale districts listen to made-in-L.A. Persian pop music and sip homemade vodka with their friends on weekends.

And among the so-called north Tehran elite are many of modest means -- government employees or teachers who treasure the arts, travel abroad and, above all, believe in a good education for their children.

The revolutionaries were resentful of the north Tehranis not so much for their money but for their schooling and worldliness, for what they viewed as a pretention that they could meld East and West instead of just being content with Iran's traditions.

The late intellectual Ali Shariati, who once inspired Iranian revolutionaries, came up with a term for it: "gharb-zadeghi," meaning struck or poisoned by the West.

Growing up, Anousheh encountered pro-government militiamen on motorcycle patrols of her neighborhood. They regularly made their way up to Jordan to set up checkpoints. They searched passing cars for alcohol and young unmarried couples to detain.

On occasion, the young people of the district would fight back, pummeling the militiamen with their fists and chasing them out. For the kids of Jordan, the clashes between the pro-government militiamen and the youth unfolding over the last few days are just the latest episode of a 30-year-brawl.

Anousheh wound up studying art and graphics in college, while Babak, six years her senior, became an engineer, like their father.

Their mother, a homemaker turned community activist, became involved in Iran's budding civil society movement under the government of former President Mohammad Khatami, the reformist who tried but failed to open up Iran's religiously conservative political system. She was arrested in 2003 while supporting a student uprising.

Anousheh lived in London briefly and in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, for two years, studying English and working an administrative job.

After returning to Tehran, she decided one day to dress in an elegant, foot-to-toe Arabian abaya, in the style worn by women in the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. For fun, she decided wear a colorful Thai print blouse over it.

As a result, she says, she was stopped on the streets.

"You look like a billboard," the woman from the Guidance Patrol told her.

"Excuse me?" Anousheh recalled responding. "Everyone is looking at you," the woman said.

Anousheh became furious. "My legs are covered, my arms are covered, my clothes aren't tight," she said. "What could you possibly complain about?"

Such experiences made her want to move abroad. But she was continually drawn back by close-knit friendships and her country's breezy familiarity, a society where someone could drop off a backpack with a digital camera, cellphone and cash inside with random strangers on the street and be reasonably sure she'd get it all back in a day or so.

Unbeknownst to her, she had dropped her bag off Saturday night with a group of journalists discreetly making mental notes while watching the storm outside.

We used her cellphone to call her Sunday morning and told her we had her bag. "Come on over," we said.

"I trust people," she explained during a late-morning chat, as she nursed deep purple welts on her legs and thigh. "If you never steal something from someone, no one will ever steal from you."

She then explained what happened after she left us Saturday night. Anousheh said that when she raced to find her brother, the anti-riot police screamed at her to go home. "Get out of here, or we'll hit you, crush you," one militiaman told her.

"Go ahead, crush me, but I still have to find my brother," she told them.

It was a chaotic gantlet, she says. There were chubby, helmeted militiamen swinging clubs. There were black-uniformed special police units on motorcycles. There were anti-riot police. And along the sidelines, there were bearded, plainclothes security officials, barking orders into walkie-talkies.

As she navigated the layers of armed authorities, she endured insults and baton swings, about five judging from the number of bruises on her lower body. The security forces then began spreading out into the side streets.

"Anousheh," a neighbor told her, "your brother is looking for you."

After 90 minutes, she found him hovering inside the doorway of a building along a side street, just as worried about her as he was about him, and just as bloodied.

But instead of going home, she says, they jumped back into the fray, chanting slogans and playing cat-and-mouse with the police until just before 6 a.m.

"My brother said Nelson Mandela was in prison for 20 years until he reached his goal," she says. "I learned from my mother that you fight for your rights. Your rights are something you take,not something you're given."

[e-mail]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-iran-protester1...

[Elaine Friedland]

TEHRAN, June 15 (Reuters) - Supporters of Iran's defeated presidential candidate plan a rally in Tehran on Monday to protest against the re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, which has sparked two days of violent protests in the capital.

Former Prime Minister Mirhossein Mousavi has appealed to the Islamic Republic's top legislative body to annul Friday's election result, in which hardliner Ahmadinejad took 63 percent of the vote, because of what he alleges were irregularities.

Pro-Mousavi demonstrators threw stones at police at Tehran University on Sunday and also clashed with Ahmadinejad supporters on a main street in the city that was littered with broken glass and fires.

In the north of the capital, a stronghold of Mousavi backers, riot police patrolled streets after midnight. Rubbish burned in the street, some cars had their windows broken, and police blocked access to roads.

MOUSAVI'S APPEAL

In a statement on his website, Mousavi said he had formally asked Iran's legislative Guardian Council to cancel the election result.

"I urge you, Iranian nation, to continue your nationwide protests in a peaceful and legal way," he said.

Mousavi's supporters handed out leaflets calling for a rally in Tehran on Monday afternoon. After dusk some took to rooftops across the city calling out "Allah Akbar" (God is greatest), an echo of tactics by protesters in the 1979 Islamic revolution.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/oilRpt/idUKLE14097520090615

06/14/09 Bookmark and Share
Reformist Iranian Cleric: 'The Establishment Seems To Fear Democracy'

Source: RFE/RL

In an exclusive interview with Radio Farda, Iranian reformist cleric Hassan Yusefi Eshkevari has spoken out following the government's announcement of President Mahmud Ahmadinejad's election victory. He was interviewed by telephone from his home in Tehran by Elaheh Ravanshad.

Radio Farda: What is your reaction to the official election result?

Hassan Yusefi Eshkevari: It seems that what has happened in Iran is a punishment for the people. People, including young Iranians, took to the streets and showed their maturity and their wish for peace and goodwill. That's one issue. The other issue is that the establishment seems to fear democracy, and because of that it held an election coup d'etat to take its revenge on the people, especially on the youth.

Radio Farda: What surprised you most about the official result?

Yusefi Eshkevari: The election result is not understandable by any logic because if Ahmadinejad was supposed to have 62 percent of the vote, there would have not been so many protests and so many efforts to replace him. Especially in the past month, all of Iran was calling in a united voice: We want to change [him] and we don't want him [as president].

Radio Farda: Who do you think is behind it all?

Yusefi Eshkevari: I am not aware of what goes on behind the scenes. I cannot comment on this. I have always criticized this secretive, behind-the-scenes diplomacy and non-transparent negotiations. Issues that could and should be solved lawfully should not be solved in behind-the-scene negotiations with the Supreme Leader or others. Those who possibly rigged these elections would not have done so without the consent of their leaders. It is impossible that they would have done it without getting reassurance from the authorities that they wouldn't get punished.

Again, I am not aware of what has been going on behind the scenes and I cannot say what exactly has happened. Still, it wasn't like a few people in the Ministry of the Interior decided in the last few hours to rig the election results and by doing so, put themselves against the nation and at the same time put themselves at risk, because such actions have serious consequences. The majority of people didn't want Ahmadinejad to win, but it wasn't only that. In recent days it became clear that Ahmadinejad had serious opponents even inside the leadership, among his fellow traditionalists. The damage of what has happened here, will be more apparent and more severe in future; it has caused more damage to Iran's political system than Musavi's victory would have.

Radio Farda: Do you mean Ahmadinejad's re-election has done more damage to the system than Musavi's presidency would have?

Yusefi Eshkevari: Yes, of course. Ahmadinejad's second term will result in more crises for Iran's international standing. And inside the country it will be a kind of confrontation with the people. Obviously, people's opposition, dissatisfaction and criticism will increase and the distance between the people and the system will get bigger, because people feel that they were deceived or even insulted. Besides, inside the leadership the gap between Ahmadinejad's supporters and his opponents will increase too.

Radio Farda: How do you see Ahmadinejad's second term in office?

Yusefi Eshkevari: I predict that in the next four years, Ahmadinejad will face severe crises both outside and inside the country and especially within the political system. It is possible that serious disagreements will arise between the president and parliament, between the president and other bodies. It might even result in the president's impeachment by the parliament.

Radio Farda: How do you think the other presidential candidates who lost their election bid will react in the coming days?

Yusefi Eshkevari: My 30 years of experience tells me that they won't be able to do much. They will issue statements, send letters to the Supreme Leader protesting the results. But in a few days, the dust will settle and everybody will go back to their business. I don't rule out that in two months' time, these candidates will even take part in Mr. Ahmadinejad's inauguration ceremony. So, everything will finish calmly.

Radio Farda: Many students and others, who during the election campaign acted against Mr. Ahmadinejad, or expressed their happiness about the possibility of his departure or demonstrated their willingness for change in the country are now reportedly worried that they will be targeted by Mr. Ahmadinejad's supporters. What do you think?

Yusefi Eshkevari: It is not impossible that Mr. Ahmadinejad's supporters, directly or indirectly, will target those people both to get revenge and create a climate of fear in society. They want to frighten people, because other elections, including parliamentary elections will take place in coming years and of course there is the next presidential election in four years -- and they, by creating a climate of fear, want to prevent people from becoming politically active.

This election isn't the end. They will try to secure their victory in all those upcoming elections. And yes, those revenge attacks are possible.
Copyright (c) 2009 RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036. www.rferl.org
8:13 update: A friend of NIAC sent us the following message she received over IM from a protestor in Tehran:

[W]e just returned to the protest, it has continued and will continue…Today is the second day that we’re continuing – tell your friends in Iran to continue protesting because communications between this society are cut off. The news is reaching us from Paris. You should continue protesting abroad too.

Today Karroubi will march in our protest from Tajrish to Vali Asr at 11 at night

7:50 update: A powerful message from a friend of NIAC in Mashad, Iran:

“[We] are still safe, but to tell you the truth, all of us are feeling sick of what we have to see on streets these days. This afternoon, [we] saw five policemen attack a middle age lady. They beat her brutally, with no mercy. She tried to escape with her young daughter but they got her. I stopped and tried to help her, but three men in civilian clothes attacked my car, and I had to drive away because [my daughter] was with me. Tonight, people shouted “Allah o Akabar” from their roof tops, but hundreds of police forces on bikes swept the streets and marked houses from which they could hear voices. Tomorrow, I will go to a lawyer to ask for a [foreign] visa. This country will not be a safe place anymore, and I don’t want to repeat my parents’ mistake in 1979 by staying and watching.”

I entered facebook with an anti-filter, but I don’t know how long will it work. Please help us by sending emails. All internet news services are blocked, and we cannot understand if what we hear is true or false. Please tell U.N officials about police violence. People are dying here. Don’t leave us alone.

7:10 update: In case there were any doubt whatsoever, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is making his position very clear. He just endorsed the election results for a second time. “Elections in Iran are the soundest, the healthiest of their kind,” he said to cheering supporters. “Some people inside or outside the country … say that the vote has been disrupted, there has been fraud. Where are irregularities in the elections?”

7:00 update: We would be remiss if we failed to mention that tens of thousands of people heeded Ahmadinejad’s call for a victory celebration, attending rallies in central Tehran. Of course, we should also note that no one risked life or limb to attend Ahmadinejad’s rally.

6:45 update: From a very trusted Iranian colleague of ours in DC:

I received news today that SMS remains shut down and Internet connections in Iran have been slowed down to below 1kbps limiting emal usage. Apparently the only pro reform newspaper being printed is Etemad-Emelli belonging to Mr. Karroubi and it was printed with white pages due to censoring. No other pro-reform papers were printed. Also, cell phone companies have been shut down so, cell phones cant be used. Tomorrow Mousavi has announced he will appear in public. Some say he has a permit for a public gathering, but others say this is not the case – if not, then the stage is possibly set for more clashes.

In the meantime, the unleashing of the anti-riot police and informal militias like the basij is terrible. For some time now my concern has been that the sanctions, economic isolation and subsequent unemployment among the young is providing the hardliners with the perfect conditions for recruiting young, poor men into their militias and ‘para-police’ forces – teaching them to be violent and tying their livelihood to the protection of the state. People in the city are witnessing them (and experiencing them) on the streets of Tehran now.

5:19 update: From an Iranian American and NIAC member in California:

I just talked to my relatives in Tehran. The atmosphere is just like in 1978-79. Sporadic demonstrations continue throughout the city with tires and other objects burning in the streets to dissipate the tear gas. People have left their houses’ doors unlocked for demonstrators to have a safe haven to escape when the riot police attacks them. The solidarity and unity of the people is amazing. Luckily, Mousavi and Karoobi have both asked people to continue their peaceful opposition to the massive rigging of their votes. The regime has made a strategic mistake as it appears that people this time are not going to relent.

4:35 update: Foreign media crackdown underway. NBC and ABC have had their cameras and film confiscated. BBC has been ordered out of the country.

http://niacblog.wordpress.com/2009/06/14/