Iran News Round Up

A selection of the latest news stories and editorials published in Iranian news outlets, compiled by Ali Alfoneh, Ahmad Majidyar, and Michael Rubin. To subscribe to this daily newsletter, e-mail [email protected].

Politics

• The newly-appointed interim Friday Prayer leader of Tehran says that the post-election unrest in Iran was pre-planned and urges the Parliament to endorse Ahmadinejad’s cabinet.

• [E] Ahmadinejad calls for punishment of leaders of post-election unrest. He urged the judiciary and security officials to deal strongly with ‘main agents’ behind the unrest and warned that the leaders should not be immune while their inferiors were punished.

• Ahmadinejad's candidates for cabinet positions deliver speeches at Friday Prayer ceremonies all over Iran.

• Tehran Show Trials:

  •  Emrouz News Agency claims that indictments made at the Tehran Show Trials are indeed prepared by Partov-e Sokhan, mouthpiece of Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi.

  • Student organizations meeting Supreme Leader Khamenei demand prosecution of Rafsanjani, Mousavi and Khatami. More here. 

• Ahmadinejad says Supreme Leader’s thanking the government means the government has passed the exam.  

• Participating in the funeral ceremony of Iraqi Shi’a leader Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani praises the late Hakim's "recognition of the Guardianship of His Holiness Ayatollah Khamenei."

• A'zam Taleghani, daughter of Ayatollah Mahmoud Taleghani and Secretary of the Islamic Women's Association, in an open letter to the parliament:

  • "People have serious concerns and worries. If you do not try to support the gentlemen Karrubi and Mousavi in a sincere and courageous manner, and do not arrest, prosecute and punish the torturers and those sexually abusing or killing the youth and prisoners, the nation will totally lose its confidence in you..."

  • "Since the beginning of the revolution, you have used the logic: Don't criticize; be quite; don't weaken the Islamic Republic; and you are saying what the enemy says. This has let some people who are worse than the foreigners grow roots [in Iran] and become an infectious sore which cannot be easily cured…"

  • "Imprisoning the torturers and murderers, prosecuting and punishing them in public, and informing the public of unofficial prisons and their closure are necessary. Don't just fire them. They have endangered the honor of the Islamic Republic to the degree that they are much more dangerous than foreign opponents of the Islamic Republic. The public expects that justice is done in order to avoid a regime collapse. They believe the enemy is in our midst."

• [E] Ahmadinejad says detainee abuse was a plot by enemies.

Military and Security

• Salam News Agency claims that the Revolutionary Guards is planning to purchase 51 percent of the shares in Mokhaberat-e Iran [Iran Communications] in the largest transaction in the history of Tehran Stock Exchange. Should this takeover take place, the Revolutionary Guards will be the owner of all landlines in Iran, Operator One mobile line, DATA Communications and many more.

• Fars News Agency praises a recent expedition by the Revolutionary Guards' Navy's to the Gulf of Aden.

• The Islamic Republic of Iran Law Enforcement Forces announces resumption of the Societal Discipline Scheme.

• Mowj-e Sabz-e Azadi [Green Wave of Freedom] discloses that parliamentarian Hossein Fadayi has served as an interrogator at the Kahrizak Detention Center.

  • Mowj-e Sabz-e Azadi alleges that Ala al-Din Boroujerdi, Chairman of Parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, and Sorouri, member of the committee investigating allegations of maltreating political prisoners, are not impartial and ridicules complaints sexual abuse of prisoners.

• Gholam-Hossein Esmaili, current Mashhad Prosecutor General, to be appointed Head of the Islamic Republic's Prison Organization.

• Commander Mohammad Eslam-Khah appointed the Chief of Varamin Revolutionary Guard.

Human Rights

• [E] Nobel Peace prize-winner and prominent Iranian lawyer Shirin Ebadi has condemned the on-going mass trial of reformists as “illegal”. She told RFE/RL: “These trials are completely illegal based on the Islamic republic’s laws that deal with trials, interrogations, and arrests. We can describe [the trials] as a parody of justice…”

Nuclear Issue

• [E] Israel not to attack Iran “in near term”.

Photos of the Day

• Burial of Iraqi Shi’a leader al-Hakim.  

• Students meet Supreme Leader Khamenei.