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Tyranny@25 - Oppression Reaches a Milestone in Iran

 
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Michael Rubin
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 01, 2004 11:56 am    Post subject: Tyranny@25 - Oppression Reaches a Milestone in Iran Reply with quote

Tyranny@25
Oppression reaches a milestone in Iran.

Source: http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/rubin200404010848.asp

Thursday, April 01, 2004

April 01, 2004
National Review Online
Michael Rubin

Twenty-five years ago today, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini stood triumphant in the holy city of Qom. For two days, millions of Iranians had flocked to the polls to vote in a referendum. The question was simple: "Do you want an Islamic Republic?" According to revolutionary authorities, 98.2 percent said yes.

Khomeini claimed victory. "By casting a decisive vote in favor of the Islamic Republic," he told enthusiastic crowds, "you have established a government of divine justice, a government in which all segments of the population shall enjoy equal consideration, [and] the light of divine justice shall shine uniformly on all...."

So began a quarter century of tyranny. In the weeks that followed, Iranians would awake to see pictures splashed across the front page of the official daily Ettelaat of government officials, intellectuals, and liberals before and after execution. Khomeini gave vigilantes tacit approval to sack the U.S. embassy, even while distancing himself from their actions. Looking back on her experience as a revolutionary, one elementary-school teacher told me during my first trip to Iran, "Khomeini promised us Islamic democracy, so we voted yes. By the time we realized we got another dictator, it was too late."

In the Islamic Republic of Iran, the key issue is not degree of reform, but rather fundamental ideology. Iran's leadership uses the rhetoric of democracy to bestow respectability to one of the region's most brutal regimes. President Muhammad Khatami may call for democratic reforms, but he has never believed in universal suffrage. Writing in the official daily Keyhan while still a deputy in the Majlis [parliament], Khatami argued that ordinary people cannot comprehend God's will, and so the full privileges of democracy should only extend to those with clerical education. He has never repudiated his view.

Far from being on the path of reform and moderation, as is claimed by many European governments, access-seeking pundits, oil-company lobbyists, and Senator Arlen Specter (R., Penn.), the Islamic Republic continues to erode the basic human rights of its citizenry. Khatami, now more than halfway through his second term, has failed to implement a single substantive reform. On March 17, 2004, he quietly announced that he would no longer seek to push fundamental reform through the Majlis. No amount of negotiation with Khatami, even if he were sincere, would change the fact that he has neither the will nor the power to implement meaningful change.

Over the last five years, Iranian authorities have closed more than 50 newspapers. According to Reporters Sans Frontiers, the Islamic Republic has the second-greatest number of imprisoned journalists in the world. On July 11, 2003, Iranian authorities murdered Canadian journalist Zahra Kazemi while she was in detention. Nevertheless, with Iranian state television tightly controlled and satellite access limited, it was possible on March 30, 2004, for Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Mahmud Hashemi-Shahrudi to claim with a straight face, "No country enjoys freedom, democracy, and the press freedom that currently exists in our country."

The fight against capital punishment is among the European Left's most popular causes. When it comes to Iran, however, there is only the silence of hypocrisy. Executions in Iran have risen proportionally to European trade. During the Khatami administration, application of the death penalty has ballooned. Iranian newspapers regularly document executions. For example, on February 14, 2004, Jomhuri Islami announced the public hangings of several youths, some less than 18 years old, in an orchard in the southwestern town of Mahshahr. Four days later, Sharq reported public hangings in Bandar-e Gaz's main square. On February 25, Jomhuri Islami announced the public hanging of Mohammad Ali Firouzi, only after he received 173 lashes.

Iranian women today mark a quarter century of oppression. While the American media applauds the struggle of women to win new rights throughout much of the Middle East, correspondents often fail to mention that in Iran, women fight for the restoration of basic rights taken away by the Islamic Republic. Human-rights groups may march against the French government's decision to ban the veil in French public schools, but they remain conspicuously silent about the Islamic Republic's enforcement of mandatory veiling.

The Islamic Republic's constitution does guarantee limited rights, but Iranian authorities use vigilante gangs to sidestep even these. Police fail to respond to calls as vigilantes break up crowded lectures in Tehran, Isfahan, and Shiraz. In the late 1990s, Fedayin-e Islam, a shadowy group linked to Iran's intelligence ministry, assassinated a series of writers and intellectuals, a crime as yet unsolved, which has cast a pale over the reform movement. In 1999, armed vigilantes from Ansar-e Hezbollah attacked a student dormitory, setting off widespread protests. Authorities used the unrest as reason to crackdown on freedom of expression. Scores of students and dissidents arrested in the aftermath of the crisis still languish in Tehran's Evin Prison.

Iranians have lost faith in the Islamic Republic. Recent telephone polls indicate that 85 percent of Tehran's residents seek fundamental change. According to the Iran-based Organization of Combatant Youth, voter turnout in recent polls was just 14 percent. Iranians visiting Iraq last month reported that in rural districts (to which Western journalists are forbidden access), turnout hovered near seven percent. According to Majlis deputy Fatimah Haqiqatju, as quoted in the [New Jersey] Star-Ledger, "It has gotten to the point where it is impossible to accomplish political reform within the system. The fate of the country will be either dictatorship or collapse, although they [the clerics] should remember that the outcome of a dictatorship is also collapse."

Twenty-five years after Khomeini declared the Islamic Republic, nearly 70 million Iranians struggle to be free. It's imperative that we do not abandon them.

— Michael Rubin is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
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stefania



Joined: 17 Jul 2003
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 01, 2004 1:51 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote


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stefania



Joined: 17 Jul 2003
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Location: Italy

PostPosted: Thu Apr 01, 2004 2:18 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

PROOF OF LINKS BETWEEN COMMUNISTS AND ISLAMISTS



Five-Country Roundup of Turkish Marxist Militants

Thursday, April 01, 2004



http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,115824,00.html

ANKARA, Turkey — Italy, Turkey, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands arrested 41 militants in a coordinated crackdown Thursday on a Turkish Marxist group considered a terrorist organization by Washington, Turkey's Interior Ministry said.

Police in Istanbul arrested 25 suspects of the Marxist Revolutionary People's Liberation Army/Front (search), or DHKP-C, while security forces in the other countries detained 16 others, an Interior Ministry official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Turkish and German police have been preparing for the crackdown for the past year, while the Italian police became involved more recently, the official said.

German and Italian police discovered during their investigations that the group also was active in the Netherlands and Belgium and coordinated the European crackdown outside of Turkey, the official said.

The DHKP-C seeks to topple the Turkish government and replace it with a Marxist one.

The group and its forerunner, Dev Sol (search), have claimed responsibility for a number of bombings in Turkey, including two suicide attacks in 2001 that killed three Istanbul policemen and an Australian woman. It has also carried out attacks in Germany and has targeted U.S. military personnel and diplomatic missions.

The group, which is branded as a terrorist organization by the State Department and by the European Union, was active before the 1980 coup in Turkey but has become increasingly marginalized due to a harsh police crackdown.

Several leading members of the group fled to Europe, where it is believed the group has hundreds of sympathizers.

In Istanbul, suspected DHKP-C militant Hasan Midilli was injured Thursday, reportedly when a bomb he was making exploded, police said. The explosion occurred in the low-income Gaziosmanpasa (search) district.

In Italy, police arrested five people Thursday in the central town of Perugia, Italian Prosecutor Nicola Miriano said. About 100 police and Carabinieri paramilitary forces took part in those raids.

Italian Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu said the operation broke up the movement's cell based in Perugia, and showed links between the Turks and Italian far-left militants. He said three of those detained were Italian.

Miriano said the three Italians were believed to have provided the suspected Turkish militants with money, equipment, cell phone cards and other logistical support. One of the three is a woman who married a Turkish suspect only to help him get papers, he said.

In the Netherlands, police searched five addresses throughout the country at the request of Italian authorities in Perugia, said spokesman Wim de Bruin of the Dutch national prosecutor's office.

De Bruin said evidence will be handed over to Italy but no arrests were made.

Belgium's RTL-TVI television reported a half dozen people were detained in Belgium and documents were seized.

One of those detained was Fehriye Erdal (search), who was arrested in 1999 in Belgium in the slaying of a Turkish businessman in Istanbul and placed under house arrest.

Erdal's lawyer, Jan Fermon told RTL-TVI that it appeared that Erdal was detained after she was discovered outside of the house where she was under house arrest.



Italy Arrests Turkish Marxist Militants

Thursday, April 01, 2004



http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,115821,00.html

ROME — Italian police carried out a series of arrests Thursday as part of an investigation into an outlawed Turkish Marxist group responsible for a series of attacks in Turkey, news reports said.

Police in Perugia (search), who are coordinating the raids, confirmed arrests were taking place but refused to provide any details, saying the operation was still in progress. An official described the operation as aimed at "international terrorism" but declined to be more specific.

About 100 police and Carabinieri paramilitary forces took part in the raids in Perugia, a city about 80 miles north of Rome (search) with a high percentage of foreigners mainly due to a university that attracts students from abroad.

Italian news agencies ANSA and AGI and state-run RAI TV said some suspects were picked up in Turkey as part of the same probe, as well as in Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium.

Turkish police said they had no immediate information on the arrests.

The Italian reports said the arrests broke up a cell of the far-left DHKP-C, or Revolutionary People's Liberation Army/Front (search) — a group that is branded as a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department and by the European Union.

DHKP-C has claimed responsibility for a number of bombings in Turkey, including two suicide attacks in 2001 that killed three Istanbul policemen and an Australian woman. It has also carried out attacks in Germany.

The banned group aims at toppling the government and replacing it with a Marxist one. Over the years, the DHKP-C and its forerunner, Dev Sol (search), have claimed the killings of generals, police officers, government officials and foreigners. It has also targeted U.S. military personnel and diplomatic missions.

The group is reported to have some 1,000 followers.

In September, Istanbul police announced they had captured two DHKP-C militants suspected of plotting suicide bombings. A woman believed to be part of the group died in May after her bomb apparently exploded prematurely in the restroom of an Ankara cafe.

Italy has been on high alert against terrorism since the Sept. 11 attacks. After the bombings in Madrid earlier this month, Interior Minister Giuseppe Pisanu told law enforcement agencies across the country to be extra vigilant.

Pisanu cited Perugia as one of the Italian cities at greater risk of terror attack, along with Rome, Milan, Naples and Bologna.
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stefania



Joined: 17 Jul 2003
Posts: 4250
Location: Italy

PostPosted: Thu Apr 01, 2004 2:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I just read a news saying that Mr. Prodi,which is currently the President of the EU Commission (which will be candidate as the italian prime minister ) said that if he will be elected,he would "call the italian troops home.This is an illeggittimate war".

I am little worried.. I am not an admirer of Mr. Berlusconi at all and i won't vote for him .. I won't vote at all.I will stay home..

But the prospects of a Spain-style retreat worry me a lot.

I fear that that will not end the terrorist threat against us at all..

But since Prodi is what he is and rules the EU , i also have no hope the EU to change his foreign policy.

Prodi: Italian Left Would End Iraq Mission

http://breakingnews.nypost.com/dynamic/stories/I/ITALY_PRODI_IRAQ?SITE=NYNYP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
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Liberty now !
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PostPosted: Sun Apr 04, 2004 2:02 pm    Post subject: the Link Reply with quote

The Link between Islamists and Marxists was always there.

Islamic revolution was very much the illegitimate child of these two mosters.


Half british half russian it's now a 25 year old monster recruiting new Islamists and Marxists around the globe with some help from grandma & grandpa!
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