Iranian election

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In the Shadows, Ayatollah's Son Calls the Shots

Mojtaba Khamenei has power throughout the security apparatus

(Newser) - Ayatollah Ali Khamenei rarely appears in public and cultivates a shadowy reputation—but even further out of the public eye, his son has become one of the post powerful men in Iran. Ultraconservative cleric Mojtaba Khamenei, believed to be around 50 years old, has connections throughout the Revolutionary Guards and...

Mousavi Fights On as Ahmadinejad Bashes Obama

Iranian opposition leader may be under house arrest

(Newser) - Mir Hossein Mousavi said today that the Iranian regime has pressured him to drop his challenges to the disputed election, but that he would resist any efforts to abridge his "constitutional right to protest." The opposition leader has not been seen in public for days, reports the Guardian,...

Iran Arrests 70 Profs Who Met With Mousavi

Crackdown intensifies as opposition calls off rally

(Newser) - Iranian authorities arrested 70 university professors yesterday, after they met with Mir Hossein Mousavi, according to a dissident website, as the regime intensified its crackdown on demonstrators. The professors' whereabouts are now unknown, but hundreds of activists are now being held in a prison system notorious for torture and human...

Latest Iran Protests Turn Bloody, Witnesses Say

It's like a war zone: witnesses

(Newser) - Hundreds of protesters faced off against several thousand riot cops in a Tehran square today after Ayatollah Khamenei said Iran won’t budge on election results, the Guardian reports. Witnesses called the site a war zone, with helicopters hovering overhead as police savagely beat and arrested demonstrators. The reports could...

Gunmen Thought Neda Had Terrorist Links: Iran

Extremists blamed for 'murderous objectives' against regime

(Newser) - Neda Agha-Soltan may have been mistaken for a terrorist’s sister when she was gunned down mid-protest, Iran’s state-run news agency claims. “Groups who want to create division” purposely killed the 26-year-old—now the face of the demonstrations—“to accuse the Islamic republic of ruthlessly dealing with...

Mousavi's Wife Sees 'Martial Law' in Iran

(Newser) - Zahra Rahnavard, wife of opposition presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, today reassured Iranians that she had not been arrested, but called on the regime to release those who had, AFP reports. In a statement on her husband’s website, she condemned the crackdown, saying it was “as if martial...

Obama Sent Letter to Iran Before Election

Proposed cooperation, improved relations to ayatollah in May

(Newser) - A little more than a month before Iran’s disputed election, the Obama administration sent a letter to Ayatollah Khamenei proposing improved bilateral relations and a resolution to the dispute over Iran’s nuclear program, the Washington Times reports. Khamenei mentioned the letter in a lengthy sermon last week, amid...

Khamenei: We Won't Yield 'At Any Cost'

(Newser) - Ayatollah Khamenei ruled out political compromise today, telling parliament that Tehran would not “yield to pressure at any cost,” the New York Times reports. “I insisted and will insist on implementing the law on the election issue,” he said. He spoke after Mohsen Rezai, one of...

Iran Teen Describes, Via Email, His Torture

(Newser) - Iranian-American activists are circulating an email, written in Farsi, in which a 17-year-old boy describes his torture at the hands of the regime, complete with graphic photographs, Salon reports. The boy, who says he's not an activist of any stripe, says he was minding his own business in a parking...

Iranian Press Pushes for Mousavi's Arrest

Pro-regime papers may be laying ground for new crackdown

(Newser) - Several Iranian newspapers sympathetic to the regime have published articles blaming Mir Hossein Mousavi for recent violence, reports the Telegraph. The papers demand that the opposition leader be arrested for treason, a strategy that may be part of an effort to strengthen the position of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Meanwhile, the...

Wallop Iran Where It Hurts: Oil Revenues
Wallop Iran
Where It Hurts:
Oil Revenues
OPINION
Jun 24, 2009 7:58 AM CDT

Wallop Iran Where It Hurts: Oil Revenues

Two 'green' revolutions could bring down regime: Friedman

(Newser) - Pundits and politicians are wasting their time telling Barack Obama what he should be saying about the growing "green revolution" in Iran, writes Thomas L. Friedman. The country's reformers and protesters don't need American encouragement; they need a weakened theocracy—which will only happen when oil prices go into...

Mousavi Silenced by 24-Hour Secret Police Guard

Opposition candidate prevented from speaking freely to supporters

(Newser) - Iranian opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi is constantly surrounded by guards and secret police and can no longer speak freely to supporters, protest spokesman Mohsen Makhmalbaf tells the Independent. Makhmalbaf, one of Iran's leading film directors, says Mousavi's lines of communications have been cut or confiscated.

Council Asks Ayatollah to Extend Iran Election Probe

(Newser) - The top body investigating the results of the recent election is asking Iran’s supreme leader to give it more time to clear up any and all “ambiguities,” Reuters reports. “We are urging you to allow us to extend the deadline to receive further complaints five more...

Shah's Son: I'd Serve If Elected

(Newser) - Though his family wasn’t much for democratic rule in Iran, the son of Iran’s last shah says he would return to serve the country if that’s the will of the people, Dana Milbank writes in the Washington Post. Reza Pahlavi, 48, hopes Iran’s post-election protests turn...

Iran 'Retires' Soccer Players Over Protest

Banned for life for wristbands showing Mousavi support

(Newser) - Iran has barred four of its national soccer players from the field for life after they wore green wristbands during a match last week in apparent support of opposition presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, an Iranian pro-government newspaper said. Six players wore the bands; most took them off at halftime,...

Shadowy Militia Is First Line of Defense for Iran Regime

(Newser) - The Iranian regime’s first response against pro-Mousavi protesters last week was not the Revolutionary Guard but its volunteer branch, the Basij militia, CNN reports. Iran says the militia, created by the Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979, numbers 12 million; the actual count is probably a smaller—but still effective—300,...

Obama: World 'Appalled' by Iran Violence

(Newser) - President Obama today declared the United States and the entire world are "appalled and outraged" by Iran's violent efforts to crush dissent, a clear toughening of his rhetoric as Republican critics at home pound him for being too passive. Obama condemned the "threats, beatings, and imprisonments of the...

UK Kicks Out Iranian Diplomats
 UK Kicks Out Iranian Diplomats 
Jun 23, 2009 11:37 AM CDT

UK Kicks Out Iranian Diplomats

(Newser) - The UK will expel two Iranian diplomats, in retaliation for Tehran’s own banishment of two British diplomats yesterday, the BBC reports. Gordon Brown said that he was “disappointed that Iran has placed us in this position.” He defended the UK diplomats, saying the accusation that they were...

Thank Women for Iran's Revolution
 Thank Women for 
 Iran's Revolution 
OPINION
Jun 23, 2009 10:25 AM CDT

Thank Women for Iran's Revolution

(Newser) - Americans like to thank Barack Obama or George Bush or even Twitter for Iran’s revolution, but the real movers and shakers are Iran’s women, writes Anne Applebaum in the Washington Post. They’ve spent years organizing and campaigning for equal rights, and their presence in the streets “...

Neda Mourned Privately as Iran Bans Memorials

Slain 26-year-old lover of music, travel 'couldn't stand injustice'

(Newser) - Neda Agha-Soltan has become the face of the Iranian protests but friends say she was never an activist before the disputed election, the Los Angeles Times reports. The 26-year-old, a music lover who was studying for a career in tourism, was shot dead by a sniper on her way to...

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