Iran expanded its mass trial of opposition supporters Sunday, adding 25 more defendants including a Jewish teenager who are accused of involvement in unrest over the disputed presidential election. The adding of defendants, which brought the total number to 135.
The defendants in the trial include a former Iranian vice president and other former senior government officials linked to the country's pro-reform movement, French and Iranian-American academics, employees of the British and French embassies, and an Iranian-Canadian reporter for Newsweek magazine. They are charged with plotting a "soft revolution" against the Islamic theocracy and some made public confessions that the opposition charges were coerced.
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Posted by: ed ||
08/16/2009 13:09 ||
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State television said Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the country's supreme leader, has appointed Sadeq Larijani, a hardline cleric, as head of the judiciary for the next five years. Larijani is brother of parliamentary speaker Ali Larijani, and a member of the Guardian Council constitutional watchdog.
The appointment is not seen as directly related to turmoil following disputed presidential elections in June. However the judiciary is playing a key role in events, most recently with the trial of 100 reformist activists.
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Posted by: Steve White ||
08/16/2009 00:00 ||
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[Al Arabiya Latest] Iran will put on trial seven members of the banned Baha'i religion on charges of spying for arch-foe Israel, the official IRNA news agency reported Saturday.
Six of the seven Baha'is were detained in May 2008 on security related charges, while another was arrested in March of last year. Iran had previously linked the group to Israel, saying they had received orders from Tel Aviv to undertake measures against the Islamic system.
Israel is the world headquarters of the Baha'i religion, because the Jews support freedom of religion and the Shiites don't. Every Baha'i is supposed to make pilgrimage there sometime in his/her life, like Muslims go on Haj. One signs up, then goes on the week assigned, a year or more later. Only Baha'i are allowed on the headquarters property.
"The trial of seven arrested Baha'is accused of espionage for Israel and insulting sanctities will be held on Tuesday," deputy Tehran prosecutor Hassan Haddad said.
Haddad said that the suspects were also charged with making "propaganda against the Islamic republic of Iran" and that they will be prosecuted in a revolutionary court.
The Baha'i International Community has said they were members of a committee that tends to the needs of Baha'is in Iran. The Baha'i International Community represents the faith worldwide, operating under a governing council which is based in Israel, according to its website www.bahai.org.
Baha'is say hundreds of their followers have been jailed and executed since Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution. The government denies it has detained or executed people for their religion.
No, of course not. Perish the thought! It's just that the Baha'i are all apostate Muslims -- even the ones that converted from Judaism, Christianity, or Other -- and therefore deserve what they've got coming to them. As for the other non-Muslims, submission is their job, so they might as well shut up and get on with submitting.
Baha'is consider Bahaullah, born in 1817, to be the last prophet sent by God. This is in direct conflict with Islam, the religion of the vast majority of Iranians, which considers Mohammed to be the last prophet.
In late 2008, Iran reported the hanging of a Baha'i man for rape and adultery.
The European Union has expressed "serious concern" about the continuing systematic discrimination and harassment of Iranian Baha'is on the grounds of their religion.
The Baha'i faith originated in Iran 150 years ago and Baha'is say the faith has 5 million adherents worldwide, including an estimated 300,000 or more in Iran.
Iran held this month two mass trials of detainees arrested over unrest that erupted after the country's disputed June presidential election.
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Posted by: Fred ||
08/16/2009 00:00 ||
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Link ||
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#1
"Iran to try seven Bahais accused of spying not being muslim"
#2
You almost got it parabellum
"Not being Muslim Enough"
there, fixed it for you.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
08/16/2009 13:50 Comments ||
Top||
#3
The Baha'i are not Muslim at all... They're kinda sorta the Unitarians of Islam, as far as I can tell. At their worship services someone reads a selection from their collected book of readings that strikes him or her as appropriate somehow, then all ponder silently until someone else reads whatever strikes him/her as at the moment meaningful for whatever reason, after which all ponder some more. Perhaps they get more excited on holidays, but trailing daughter #2 saw no evidence of it.
Hezbollah's leader says Israel does not have the military might to destroy the resistance movement adding that if the regime bombards Beirut they will strike back Tel Aviv. "I have a question to ask all political and military experts as well as analysts. In your eyes, are the Israeli army and the ruling government capable of attacking Lebanon and breaking the resistance? I tell you that they are not," Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah said in a speech to mark the end of the third anniversary of Israel's 33-day war on Lebanon in 2006.
Nasrallah made the remarks after Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak hinted at Tel Aviv's intention to launch another offensive against Lebanon. "We tell the Israelis today that if they bombard Beirut or the southern suburbs we will strike Tel Aviv," he added.
Nasrallah said Lebanon's victory in the 2006 war proved that the Israeli army was no longer undefeatable. "Lebanon must have a deterrent armed force. When we have such a force, we can tell the Israelis that they will not be able to achieve their goals."
Israel is unlikely to attack Lebanon, Nasrallah reiterated, asserting at the same time that any Israeli attack, whether it came from ground or air, would surely be repelled by the resistance no matter how modern the Israeli military system would be.
After receiving a crushing defeat in the 2006 war, the Israeli army has been planning to upgrade its military system including its tanks. Israeli military officials said earlier that Tel Aviv was to equip its Merkava IV tanks, one of the world's strongest tanks, with a new anti-missile system capable of intercepting incoming missiles. Hezbollah fighters had destroyed several Israeli Merkava tanks during the war.
Nasrallah also pointed to the recently held maneuvers by the Israeli military, saying that the resistance could hit any Israeli cities in case of an attack. He also said that the Lebanese would all stand united to foil any Israeli plot 'aimed at disintegrating' the country.
The Hezbollah leader said Israel's ongoing threats against Lebanon were 'psychological warfare' and served to sow discord among Lebanese parties to hinder the formation of a new cabinet. Tel Aviv "is (rather) seeking to pressure the Lebanese government against Hezbollah's participation in the new Cabinet," he said.
Nasrallah also strongly called on the Lebanese security and intelligence services to double their efforts to track down and arrest Israeli-linked spies. Lebanon has been engaged in disbanding what it believes to be Israeli spy networks as part of a four-month crackdown on espionage activities.
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Posted by: Fred ||
08/16/2009 00:00 ||
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[11135 views]
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#1
When the rubble bounces and Harb el Dhimma World Community screams itself hoarse...
#3
If more than three missiles hit Tel Aviv, Israel will nuke all of Lebanon - not just the Litani valley or the Bekaa valley. Lebanon will die, and all the Hezbullies with it. The Israelis have been in this situation before, and they are da$$$$ sure not going to allow it again. Yeah, the "world" will hate them forever, but it already does, so what's the beef?
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
08/16/2009 16:49 Comments ||
Top||
The President of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is going to address the Iranian nation on his cabinet make-up at a live TV broadcast.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will give further details about his next administration and his possible choices to fill Iran's ministerial posts on Sunday afternoon at a live television broadcast on the state-run IRIB TV 1, the Fars news agency reported.
In a letter to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, some 202 Iranian parliamentarians warned the Iranian President about the make-up of his new cabinet as he has so far avoided consultation with the Majlis (Parliament) in forming his next administration.
"Your colleagues ... must be practically committed to the constitution and leadership, have revolutionary spirit ... adequate experience and expertise," read the letter.
The lawmakers highlighted that Ahmadinejad's ministers must meet these conditions if he wanted their 'maximum cooperation and effort during the vote of confidence' for his ministers.
This is while President Ahmadinejad has vowed to make 'considerable changes' to his government, including appointing younger people.
He has also pledged to work to improve the economy, stamp out corruption and combat the country's high inflation rate.
[Iran Press TV Latest] Amid talks of the emergence of an opposition political party in Iran, top figure of the nascent Green movement Mir-Hossein Mousavi confirms taking preliminary steps to establish the party.
The leading opposition figure Mousavi made an official announcement on Saturday affirming that he was working to forge a new political party to pursue his political goals.
In a meeting with members of the Islamic Association of Iran's Medical Society, Mousavi made public the name of his party -- the Green Path of Hope Association.
"The color green is the symbol of this movement; its slogan is demanding the impeccable implementation of the Constitution, and innumerable self-motivated independent societies form the body of this movement," Mousavi explained.
The defeated presidential candidate had earlier said that the establishment would give a legal political framework to the Green movement, adding that by forming this body he sought to "defend the rights and votes of citizens that were crushed in the election."
Following the June 12 vote, hundreds of thousands of Mousavi's green-clad supporters took to the streets asserting that the presidential election was "rigged".
At least 30 people were killed in the unrest, according to officials, while nearly 4,000 hundreds of protestors, political activists and journalists were rounded up over the course of opposition demonstrations. Some 300 protesters remain in custody.
Earlier, one of Mousavi's senior aides, Alireza Beheshti, said that forming a party would pave the way for the 67 year-old opposition figure to keep up his protests against the results of the 10th presidential election through a new platform.
"The establishment of this front is on Mir-Hossein Mousavi's agenda," he told Iran's Labor News Agency (ILNA). "We will soon announce its establishment."
By forming a party Mousavi will have the right to call political rallies and demand government permission for them.
The move comes as many Principlist figures along with senior members of the powerful Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) have demanded that Mousavi and his supporters be barred from further participation in Iranian politics.
Meanwhile, one influential Principlist figure, Habibollah Asgaroladi, head of the Islamic Coalition Party, has so far endorsed the creation of a Mousavi-led political party.
"Establishing a party to voice one's ideas and political perceptions is a wise move," Asgaroladi said in July.
However, many Principlists in the country see the move as a chance in which defiant Mousavi would eventually acknowledge the legitimacy of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's election victory and his government.
"If Mousavi considers the government to be legitimate and asks for permission (to set up the party), then it is a good and positive move and we will welcome it," said Mohammad-Reza Taraghi, a member of the Principlist Islamic Coalition Party.
Mousavi, however, continues to strike a defiant tone making clear that protests against the disputed re-election of President Ahmadinejad "will not end."
The former prime minister said that he would not give in to "pressures" that he said were aimed at "making me change my position regarding the annulment of the election."
[Iran Press TV Latest] Amid a persistent volley of opposition allegations that protestors had been raped in Iranian prisons, Iran's Judiciary tasks a committee to obtain evidence on the claims.
Leading opposition figure Mehdi Karroubi broached the subject of "jail rape" in a letter to Head of the Assembly of Experts Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani on July 29.
In his letter, Karroubi claimed that a number of detainees had informed him that several women and men, arrested over the course of post-vote demonstrations, were 'sexually assaulted' by their jailers.
"A number of detainees have said that some female detainees have been raped savagely... teenagers held in detention have also been savagely raped," Karroubi said, adding that they were suffering from depression and serious physical injuries after the alleged assaults.
The much-criticized allegations put forward in Karroubi's letter provoked mixed reactions inside and outside the country.
Iran's former judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Shahroudi is said to be among the many who reacted to the claims of jail rape by saying that "in detention centers under the supervision of the Judiciary, no such treatment has been carried out."
He, however, went on to urge an inquiry into the matter.
The call for investigations comes as the allegations of rape provoked strong criticism in the country.
In a sermon at Tehran University on Friday, Principlist cleric Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami called Karroubi's claims of prison rape a "total slander against the Islamic establishment."
He went as far to call for the opposition figure's prosecution, arguing that "If someone libels the system by saying that rape takes place in prisons, then he must either prove it or, if he cannot, then the system must press charges and the public prosecutor must act."
Meanwhile, Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani said earlier in the week that a special Majlis (Parliament) committee tasked with probing the situation in Iranian prisons "should also look into whether 'jail rape' allegations are true or false."
He then moved to defuse the controversy by saying "the issue of detainees being sexually abused is a lie."
"On the basis of thorough and comprehensive investigations conducted about the detainees at Kahrizak and Evin prisons, no cases of rape and sexual abuse were found," Larijani said one day after he called for a probe.
The Majlis speaker also encouraged the defeated presidential candidate to come forward with evidence proving his claims of "jail rape".
Esmail Gerami Moqaddam, a spokesman for Karroubi's National Confidence Party (Etemad-e-Melli), said the former presidential candidate's would definitely provide evidence to validate his claims of jail rape.
According to Fardanews, Ayatollah Shahroudi has called on the country's prosecutor general Qorbanali Dorri-Najafabadi to dispatch a committee to Karroubi's office to exchange views about the matter and obtain the cited evidence.
Amid the already tense political situation in Iran over claims of prison rape, Karroubi has shown no sign of letting up on the issue as he went further on Saturday making fresh claims about "prisoner abuse."
[Iran Press TV Latest] Jordan's King Abdullah II has sent a congratulatory message to Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on being sworn in to a second presidential term. According to a report published by the Islamic Republic of Iran News Network (IRINN) on Saturday, the Jordanian leader wished the Iranian nation success and advancement during President Ahmadinejad's second tenure.
Western leaders, already upset by Ahmadinejad's anti-Israel rhetoric, Holocaust denial and unwavering stance on Iran's nuclear program, refused to congratulate the president on his inauguration, although their counterparts in Japan and Turkey did. Among those prominent leaders who withheld their congratulations to Ahmadinejad were US President Barack Obama, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
In a strong message to the Western leaders, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he was not awaiting their messages of recognition or congratulation. "We heard that some of the Western leaders had decided to recognize but not congratulate the new government ... Well, no one in Iran is waiting for your messages," he said. "Iranians will neither value your scowling and bullying nor will they pay attention to your smiles and greetings."
Continued on Page 47
Posted by: Fred ||
08/16/2009 00:00 ||
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[Al Arabiya Latest] Twenty five more Iranian protesters will go on trial Saturday as fresh claims surfaced that several protesters in jail were tortured to death while Khamenei appointed a new chief of judiciary. "The third session of the elements of recent riots in Tehran will be held on Sunday," a court statement carried by the ISNA news agency said. "In this session charges against 25 defendants...will be presented."
Iran has already put on trial 110 people charged with protesting against the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The defendants include top reformists, political activists, a French lecturer and two employees of the French and the British embassies.
The trial of lecturer Clotilde Reiss has finished, although she remains in custody. Securing her release has been a diplomatic priority for Paris, with President Nicolas Sarkozy raising the case with other leaders.
Opposition leaders have denounced the court proceedings as "show trials." The hearings have angered the international community and heightened political tensions as Iran battles its worst political crisis since the 1979 Islamic revolution.
Continued on Page 47
Posted by: Fred ||
08/16/2009 00:00 ||
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[Jerusalem Post Front Page] Twenty Syrians were killed and over 60 injured in a failed Scud missile test carried out by Syria, Iran and North Korea in May, Japan's Kyodo News reported on Friday. One of two missiles had apparently strayed off its course due to a technical malfunction, landing in a civilian populated area in a town on the Syrian-Turkish border. The victims were all civilians.
Syria is lucky only their own citizens were killed. Can you imagine Turkey's reaction had the technical malfunction occurred in the nearest town on the far side of the border?
The incident was part of a botched attempt to test a new short-range ballistic missile developed together by the three countries, the report said. According to Kyodo News, the area - a marketplace - was immediately closed off to the public, who was told that a gas explosion had ensued and was the cause of the wreckage. It was unclear where the other missile landed.
Continued on Page 47
Posted by: Fred ||
08/16/2009 00:00 ||
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Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
08/16/2009 13:35 Comments ||
Top||
#8
The good news is the warhead works.
Posted by: ed ||
08/16/2009 13:35 Comments ||
Top||
#9
Not necessarily, Ed, it could've been unexpended fuel.
Posted by: Bobby ||
08/16/2009 15:23 Comments ||
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#10
RJ, even satellites come down. It just takes longer. Ask the Australians.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
08/16/2009 15:51 Comments ||
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#11
Oh to be a fly on the wall (who could understand the language of Syria) when the locals are discussing how a gas leak could fall on them from above.
I suspect that the NKor food rationing may lead to lack of brain development in their engineers.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Iran Press TV Latest] Jordan's King Abdullah II has sent a congratulatory message to Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on being sworn in to a second presidential term. According to a report published by the Islamic Republic of Iran News Network (IRINN) on Saturday, the Jordanian leader wished the Iranian nation success and advancement during President Ahmadinejad's second tenure. 
[Al Arabiya Latest] Twenty five more Iranian protesters will go on trial Saturday as fresh claims surfaced that several protesters in jail were tortured to death while Khamenei appointed a new chief of judiciary. "The third session of the elements of recent riots in Tehran will be held on Sunday," a court statement carried by the ISNA news agency said. "In this session charges against 25 defendants...will be presented."
[Jerusalem Post Front Page] Twenty Syrians were killed and over 60 injured in a failed Scud missile test carried out by Syria, Iran and North Korea in May, Japan's Kyodo News reported on Friday. One of two missiles had apparently strayed off its course due to a technical malfunction, landing in a civilian populated area in a town on the Syrian-Turkish border. The victims were all civilians. 
