Mir Hossein Mousavi - Tag Search

President Obama issued his second Nowruz message this morning; it blamed the Iranian government for "choos[ing] to isolate itself," and failing to "choose a better future" for its people.

The message repeated Obama's offer of diplomatic engagement with Iran, a wish he also expressed last year during his first Nowruz video. Obama also said the U.S. will expand opportunities for Iranians to study in the United States, and pledged to give Iranians better access to Internet technology to enable them to "communicate... without fear of censorship."

Update, 8:16 a.m. (from Gregg): Opposition Web sites are reporting (فارسی) a massive security presence in the streets: rows of riot police, some seven or eight deep, lining the streets along the route of the pro-government rally. Opposition groups are trying to organize rallies, but it sounds like (so far) they haven't been able to gather en masse. 

RAHANA, an Iranian activist site, is reporting dozens of arrests in Sadeghieh Square and other locations throughout Tehran. Sadeghieh Square is about one kilometer from Azadi Square, where the pro-government demonstrators assembled.

Over at Informed Comment, Juan Cole wants everyone to breathe deeply and think about whether Iran's latest nuclear announcement is really that threatening. Cole called "bizarre" remarks made on Sunday by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who equated Iran and North Korea as both being "nuclear-armed" and "a real or a potential threat":

The US intelligence establishment continues to doubt that Iran has or wants a nuclear weapons program. Tehran does have a nuclear enrichment program, which is permitted by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Iran allows United Nations inspections of it nuclear facilities. Although Iran is not as transparent as the UN International Atomic Energy Agency would like, there is no dispositive evidence of a weapons program. For the Secretary of State to frame Iran as she did is just muddled or dishonest.

How do Iranians actually feel about their government, the June 12 election, and president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad?

We've lamented the lack of good polling data more than once on this blog. So I was intrigued by an event at the New America Foundation this afternoon, which presented a dozen pre- and post-election polls of Iranians -- most conducted by the University of Tehran. The polls aren't new (the most recent one was conducted in September), but it was the first time the data were collected in one place.

The Iranian judiciary plans to execute another nine prisoners -- convicted of "waging war against God" -- in the coming days.

Iranian state media say the group belongs to "anti-revolutionary groups." The regime executed two people last month -- Arash Rahmanipour and Mohammad Reza Ali-Zamani -- and recently started trials for another 16, five of whom could face the death penalty.

30 years ago, give or take two months, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and his allies were marking the first anniversary of the founding of the Islamic Republic. (They did this, in part, by declaring the term "democratic" verboten, a "Western style," and by banning opposition groups and purging universities. It was a real party.)

Three decades later? The Revolutionary Guard is threatening violence against an opposition movement that has managed to defy the regime for nearly a year.

The Iranian parliament finally approved a controversial subsidy reform bill, which would sharply slash subsidies on food, fuel and other staples.

The bill was approved after months of debate between legislators and Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Much of the discussion focused on one question: what to do with the money saved through subsidy reform. Ahmadinejad wanted free rein to spend it as he saw fit; parliament wanted the savings rolled back into the Iranian budget.

More details -- but still no culprit. Massoud Ali-Mohammadi, you'll remember, is the Iranian physics professor assassinated yesterday by a motorcycle bomb outside his north Tehran home.

We can conclude, based on the available evidence, that Ali-Mohammadi had no role in Iran's nuclear program. His colleagues describe him as a particle physicist; a former head of Israel's Mossad says he'd never heard of Ali-Mohammadi. The speculation about his possible nuclear role was fueled, it seems, by irresponsible media reporting.

I'm a little tired, I must admit, of reading essays about Iran from the Leveretts, mostly because they make the same point over and over: The Iranian regime is here to stay, and Obama needs to negotiate with it.

Their op-ed today, as Evan noted earlier, asks three questions about the Iranian opposition movement: What does it want? Who leads it? And how will it overthrow the government?

Late last month, Gregg interviewed three Iranian opposition activists who told him of an emerging crack in the nascent Green Movement between the group's mainstream and those who had become more radicalized by the Iranian government's brutal crackdown. The movement had entered a crucial stage and needed a defined leadership and philosophy, they told him.

Robin Wright, a Washington Post reporter-turned-think tanker, believes the movement has remedied that problem, she writes in an op-ed today.

The release of an opposition "manifesto" - actually three statements from separate groups - signals the coalescence of the movement's philosophy, Wright says.

The British Daily Telegraph claims to have an account from an Iranian defector that details both amusing and disturbing personal anecdotes about Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the man at the top of the often paranoid clerical regime.

Among the alleged revelations: Khamenei lives an "imperial" lifestyle among six palaces, including one former residence of the Shah and two with "reinforced concrete nuclear bunkers said to be capable of withstanding nuclear attack." He also suffers "regular bouts" of depression that he remedies, in part, by calling in a "mid-ranking mullah" for regular sessions of vulgar joke-telling.

Conventional wisdom on Mir Hossein Mousavi's statement on the Ashura protests is that he offered a bold rebuke of the Iranian regime's recent brutality.

That analysis isn't entirely wrong. Mousavi condemns the regime harshly for killing and beating and torturing demonstrators. In a savvy bit of rhetorical judo, he acknowledges that some demonstrators took "unacceptable" actions -- chanting anti-Khamenei slogans, for example, and tearing down street signs bearing his name -- but then argued the regime brought that behavior on itself.

We mentioned yesterday that Mir Hossein Mousavi had released a statement in which he declared his willingness to die for Iran's opposition movement. That line grabbed headlines -- but it was only a small part of a remarkably detailed missive from Mousavi, in which he condemns violence towards protesters and offers Ayatollah Ali Khamenei "a way out of this crisis."

We'll post some analysis of the statement soon, but for now, here's a complete translation (in English). You'll also find a PDF version of the original Farsi statement after the jump.

Witnesses in Tehran report loud chants of allahu akbar from the rooftops tonight, while down below, on the streets, the regime has deployed hundreds of police officers to prevent possible protests.

The regime was trying to preempt what it anticipated would become another day of street protests in the capital. We haven't heard any reports of demonstrations; whether that's because the show of force was effective, or simply because there were no rallies planned, I'm not sure.

Update 2: Sounds like Mousavi's camp has also denied the reports of "fleeing" Tehran, according to Enduring America.

Update: Parlemannews, an Iranian opposition Web site, says the reports aren't true, and that Karroubi is in Tehran.

Original story: Al-Arabiya is reporting (عربي) that Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi have been placed under a sort of internal exile, "for their own protection." The report is sourced to Iranian state media, which says both men are being held in Mazandaran province in northern Iran.

There were also reports this morning that Mousavi's wife, Zahra Rahnavard, was arrested by Iranian security forces. We'll update you on all of this when we hear more.

Thousands of pro-government protesters took to the streets this afternoon in Tehran and other Iranian cities.

The protests were organized by the regime. Demonstrators, dressed in black, chanted slogans like "Death to Mousavi" and carried portraits of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. AFP puts the size of the crowd in the "hundreds of thousands," and reports that some state-owned businesses bussed their employees to the rallies; public schools also sent students.

When the Iranian opposition first took to the streets, in the days and weeks after Iran's election, they had a clear demand: Protesters believed the election was stolen, and they wanted their votes to count; they demanded either a recount -- a real one, not the token recount allowed by the regime -- or a new election.

Six months later, it is hard to say what, exactly, the opposition wants. Its ostensible leaders, Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, have modest aims. They want Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to step aside; they want democratic reforms within the framework of the Islamic Republic. But there is also a more revolutionary wing of the Green Movement, one that wants to topple the entire system -- and it's unclear how the opposition will reconcile those competing views.

Clashes between opposition protesters in Tehran continued overnight; police have now killed at least ten people and wounded hundreds more, and the regime has rounded up a number of prominent opposition leaders, according to witnesses and opposition Web sites.

Police used tear gas to disperse hundreds of protesters who continued demonstrating into the early morning hours. Opposition Web sites reported that yesterday's clashes extended well outside of Tehran; reformists reported demonstrations in Shiraz, Tabriz, Isfahan, Najafabad, and several other cities around the country.

Most of the deaths happened yesterday, when riot police opened fire on groups of protesters. The victims haven't been identified -- except for Seyed Ali Mousavi, the nephew of opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi.

Mousavi's family says it cannot hold a funeral for Ali because his body was mysteriously removed from the hospital.

Opposition Web sites claim that at least four people have been killed today in Tehran during pro-reform protests.

Thousands of Iranians are using Ashura ceremonies as an opportunity to stage pro-reform protests in the capital. (As always, it's impossible for anyone to accurately count the number of protesters.)

The opposition Web site Jaras claims that police opened fire on one group of protesters, killing four of them. Other opposition sites report that police are now refusing orders to shoot. One of the victims, an elderly man, was reportedly shot in the head in downtown Tehran; the others were killed near Kalej bridge.

Demonstrators have fought back against security forces, according to the AP, which reports protesters throwing stones at police and Basij and setting their vehicles on fire.

Azizollah Rajabzadeh, the Tehran police chief, denied that any protesters have been killed, according to Iranian state media.

Iranian opposition Web sites are reporting heavy clashes between security forces and reformists in Isfahan.

"Large crowds" gathered at the Sayyid mosque to pay their respects to the late Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri, according to Rahesabz.net (فارسى). Before the ceremony started, though, uniformed security forces reportedly entered the mosque and started firing tear gas at the mourners. The street around the mosque has now been closed to traffic.

Protesters reportedly held signs criticizing Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and vilayet-e-faqih, or "guardiandship of the jurists," the Iranian system of government.