The Latest from Iran (17 December): Regime to World --- You Need Us

See also The Latest from Iran (16 December): Re-Visiting the Drone

---

2025 GMT: The House Arrests. Saham News, the outlet of opposition figure Mehdi Karroubi, reports from a source that Karroubi and fellow 2009 Presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi may soon be released from strict house arrest.

Karroubi and his wife Fatemeh and Mousavi and his wife Zahra Rahnavard have been held since mid-February.

1630 GMT: All-is-Well Alert. Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi has said that Iran is prepared for further international sanctions: "We are not really worried. Appropriate responses have been prepared for the worst case scenario, and we have devised a road map."

Salehi did not explain how the "road map" would deal with new sanctions imposed by the US, Canada, Britain, France, and South Korea in recent weeks.

Click to read more ...

The Latest from Iran (14 December): Tehran Loses Another Friend?

See also Iran Feature: The Supreme Leader Is Worried --- Three Developments You Probably Don't Know
Iran Feature: The EA Story That Made It Big in Iranian Media
The Latest from Iran (13 December): Shoes Are Thrown at the President

---

1855 GMT: Elections Watch. Ali Mohammad Gharibani, the head of the Coordination Council of the Reformist Front, has said that, that in the “absence of any possibility for the reformists to inform and campaign,” the reformists will not present a list of candidates or endorse any candidates in March's Parliamentary elections.

The council's announcement asserted, "After months of anticipation and struggle to open the political arena to fair elections and to provide a transparent election process, the situation is in effect becoming more and more restrictive.”

In addition to the standard vetting of candidates by the Guardian Council, the regime has suspended and suppressed major reformist groups such as the Islamic Iran Participation Front, the Mojahedin of the Islamic Revolution, and Etemade Melli.

Click to read more ...

The Latest from Iran (7 December): Rallying the Students

See also Iran Video Feature: On National Students Day, A Tribute to Detained Activist Bahareh Hedayat
Iran Follow-Up: Why is US Playing Crash-and-Tell Over Its Drone?
The Latest from Iran (6 December): The Drone Mystery

---

Majid Tavakoli2355 GMT: Media Watch. Press TV, the English-language Iranian media outlet operating out of the UK has been fined £100,000 by OfCom, the British communications regulatory body, for "breaches of the Broadcasting Code" and ordered to broadcast a statement of Ofcom's findings on its service.

Press TV appears to have complied with the broadcasting of the OfCom finding by posting an article on its site claiming that OfCom has contradicted itself:

The regulator announced that Press TV is required to pay a 100,000-pound fine and “broadcast a statement of Ofcom's findings on its service Press TV.”

This is while Ofcom had previously stated that it would not direct Press TV to broadcast a summary of its findings, requiring the English-language channel to only pay the fine. The summary is as follows:

“Ofcom found that Press TV presentation of the interview of Mr. [Maziar] Bahari in the news item was unfair because it missed out important facts, for example that the interview was conducted under duress whilst Mr. Bahari was being held in a prison in Tehran.”

“Also the interview was broadcast in a context in which inferences adverse to Mr. Bahari could be drawn. Press TV did not obtain Mr. Bahari consent to the interview.”

“Ofcom also found that the filming and broadcast of the interview without Mr. Bahari's consent while he was in a sensitive vulnerable situation was an unwarranted infringement of his privacy.

“As a result Ofcom has fined Press TV 100,000 pounds and directed it to broadcast this summary.”

Click to read more ...

The Latest from Iran (5 December): A Regime in Deadlock Drones On

Mana Neyestani comments on the international situation

See also Iran Analysis: Re-Assessing the Explosion at the Revolutionary Guards Base
The Latest from Iran (4 December): When Your Dad is a Political Prisoner

---

1930 GMT: The Embassy Attacks. In the aftermath of the storming of the British Embassy, international schools in Tehran have closed.

The French school is located on grounds of the British Embassy and children were in class when protesters moved through the compound gates. Windows at the German school nearby were shattered. Teachers at the British school had sent students home early.

Parents have been told that foreign teachers and their families have left Iran. The French school hopes to resume lessons on Sunday, and the British school in the New Year.

1900 GMT: Arresting the President's Men. The President's media advisor Ali Akbar Javanfekr, already sentenced to a year in prison for an issue of his Iran newspaper, has claimed that he was forced to give a controversial interview to the daily newspaper Etemaad.

In the interview, Javanfekr sharply criticised senior clerics and conservatives/principlists who challenged Ahmadinejad. The article led to the banning of Etemaad; the next day, Javanfekr was given his one-year sentence, and the day after that, security forces ransacked the Iran building as they tried to detain the advisor.

Javanfekr did not say who forced him to give the interview.

Click to read more ...

The Latest from Iran (5 November): You're A Terrorist --- No, You Are...

See also Iran Website Special: The Basij Militia's "Wall Street Fall"
The Latest from Iran (4 November): Ahmadinejad Punches Back

---

1445 GMT: Hype Watch. Yet another spin effort by unnamed "diplomats" to international media ahead of next week's release of a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency on Iran's nuclear programme....

The Associated Press is the chosen outlet to declare findings of "computer models of a nuclear warhead and other previously undisclosed details on alleged secret work", including "satellite imagery of...a large steel container used for nuclear arms-related high explosives tests".

AP reports, without critique, that "the newest compilation of suspected weapons-related work is significant in substance and scope".

1434 GMT: The Plot. Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi has again denounced the US claim of an Iran-backed plan to kill the Saudi Ambassador to Washington. He reiterated that Gholam Shakuri, the Iranian military official who is at the heart of the allegations, is actually a member of the insurgent group Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MKO).

Click to read more ...

The Latest from Iran (29 October): The Economy, Propaganda, and the IMF

See also The Latest from Iran (28 October): "Our Prisons Are Full"

---

1720 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Journalists Ali Akrami, Mehdi Afsharnik, Mohammad Heydari, and Mohsen Hakimi have been released on bail.

The reporters were detained during a regime crackdown last month on the Freedom Movement of Iran.

1715 GMT: Parliament v. President. The New York Times has now joined the flutter, started by a speech of the Supreme Leader last week, that Iran might replace an elected President with a Prime Minister chosen by Parliament.

Meanwhile, Aty News --- close to Tehran Mayor Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf --- quotes MP Mohammad Dehghan that there will be no more Presidential elections.

On another front, Khabar Online, linked to Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani, suggested that there may be a move this week towards interrogation of the President, as the number of MPs demanding the session is on the rise.

Click to read more ...

The Latest from Iran (26 October): It's All About US Crimes....

2250 GMT: Reality or Illusion Watch. Prominent Iranian academic Sadegh Zibakalam, speaking at the Tehran Media Exhibit, said the "Islamic Awakening" --- declared by the Supreme Leader to be inspiring movements across North Africa and the Middle East --- is an illusion of the Islamic Republic. Zibakalam said the real significance of events is that Arab people are fed up with dictatorship.

1810 GMT: The Plot. In a speech in South Khorasan Province in eastern Iran, President Ahmadinejad has said the "Iranian nation is very kind and just and does not need to terrorist acts".

Responding to US accusations that Tehran planned the assassination of the Saudi Ambassador to Washington, Ahmadinejad asserted, "Every time the Iranian nation moves toward the peaks of progress, its enemies grab it with their teeth showing." He turned the charge of assassination against others, claiming they had killed Iranian scientists.

Click to read more ...

The Latest from Iran (24 October): How To Instantly Become an Iranian Citizen

See also Iran Video Interview: Ahmadinejad Puts Out His Standard Lines to CNN's Zakaria
The Latest from Iran (23 October): Qaddafi Visits the Supreme Leader

---

1835 GMT: No-Irony-at-All Elections Watch. A leading member of the Islamic Constancy Front, Morteza Agha Tehrani, has urged authorities to safeguard the coming elections and ensure that “votes are not stolen and there is no cheating".

The Constancy Front was established earlier this year by supporters of President Ahmadinejad and his allies. It has been at odds with other conservative factions who have sought a unified front for next March's Parliamentary vote.

In a meeting on Saturday in Qom, Agha Tehrani said: “If you truly want competent people to be elected to office, do not steal or buy votes and do not cheat.”

1605 GMT: CyberCrime. Minister of Communications and Technology Reza Taghipour has declared that the use of VPNs (Virtual Private Networks) and proxies is a “crime": “Now VPNs have been cut off in the country because their use is a legal violation.”

With a VPN, Internet users can get access to internet providers outside Iran by using ISPs within the country. Iranians have been using the VPNs and proxies to circumvent strict censorship by the Islamic Republic of foreign and domestic websites.

Click to read more ...

The Latest from Iran (21 October): Back-Channel Talks with the US?

Iran Feature: Detained Reformist Leader Tajzadeh Writes the Supreme Leader
The Latest from Iran (20 October): 240 Days of House Arrest

---

1635 GMT: The Plot. It looks like Turkey is trying to broker a resolution between Tehran and Washington over the US allegations of an Iranian plot to kill the Saudi Ambassador to Washington....

Ahmet Davutoglu, Turkey's foreign minister, at a joint news conference with his visiting Iranian counterpart Ali Akbar Salehi, made a carefully-balanced statement: "We don't believe that Iran would be engaged in such an act, but America says they have evidence. Governments should be transparent on such issues. Those who make the claims should also be clear about their claims, and Iran should answer to that."

Davutoglu continued, "What needs to be done now is that all parties involved share what they have and clear the issue without giving way to a further increase in tensions. Turkey is ready to contribute if there is anything we can do to help relieve the tension."

Turkish media reported this week that the US sent official to Turkey to present evidence of the alleged plot. A US Embassy spokesman would not comment on the reports.

Click to read more ...

The Latest from Iran (18 October): The Same Old Mahmoud

---

1955 GMT: Movie Watch. Doesn't look like the Supreme Leader will be going to the premiere of Footloose --- he told a crowd in Kermanshah, "Hollywood is in the service of human degradation."

1858 GMT: Currency Watch. Despite the Central Bank's promises to strengthen the value of the Iranian currency, the rial is still 1250 to $1 on the free market, as opposed to an official rate of 1056:1.

Click to read more ...