Iran’s President Rouhani warns against corruption – President Hassan Rouhani has spoken out against corruption in Iran and warned that it is “endangering” the country’s Islamic Revolution.
Iran’s President Rouhani warns against corruption
In a televised speech at an anti-corruption event in Tehran, he said money once “given under the table now is being given on the table”.
Mr Rouhani also called for the “elimination” of monopolies.
A series of high-profile corruption cases have come to light since his government took office in August 2013.
In May, the billionaire businessman Mahafarid Amir Khosravi was executed after being convicted of being behind a scandal involving embezzlement, bribery, forgery and money-laundering that cost 14 state-owned and private Iranian banks nearly $2.6bn (£1.7bn).
And in September, former Vice-President Mohammad Reza Rahimi was reportedly imprisoned after being convicted of corruption.
Mr Rahimi was reported to be linked to another billionaire businessman, Babak Zanjani, who has been accused of skimming up to $2.7bn (£1.7bn) of revenue generated from selling Iranian oil on behalf of the government through his companies to bypass international sanctions.
‘Deepening’ problem
In his speech, President Rouhani called on Iranians to “apply all our power in fighting corruption.”
“The continuation, the deepening and the expansion of corruption is endangering… the Islamic Revolution.”
Mr Rouhani also criticized monopolies – on anything from the production of rifles to advertising – which he said were the cause of corruption.
“Anything which does not have rivalry or whose management is monopolized is flawed,” he said.
“This is wrong and the problem has to be uprooted,” he added.
Analysts said this might be a veiled reference to the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), which has become a major military, political and economic force in Iran since being set up after the 1979 revolution to defend the country’s Islamic system.
The IRGC is said to control around a third of Iran’s economy through a series of subsidiaries and trusts, and is widely believed to engage in illicit and black-market activities.
Iran Is Officially A Real Player In The Global Cyber War – Iran has been steadily developing its cyber warfare capabilities for a number of years and now poses a significant threat to government agencies and critical infrastructure companies around the world.
Iran Is Officially A Real Player In The Global Cyber War
This is according to a new report entitled “Operation Cleaver,” which was released by US cyber security firm Cylance. The title alludes to the custom software used in Iranian hacking operations, which frequently uses the word “cleaver” in its coding.
Operation Cleaver has targeted the military, oil and gas, energy and utilities, transportation, airlines, airports, hospitals and aerospace industries, amongst others. The attacks have taken place at over 50 entities in 16 countries — only 10 of the targeted companies have been in the US.
“We believe that if the operation is left to continue unabated, it is only a matter of time before the team impacts the world’s physical safety,” Cylance said in an 87-page report on the hacking campaign released last Tuesday.
Iran has officially denied involvement in the hacking campaigns. “This is a baseless and unfounded allegation fabricated to tarnish the Iranian government image, particularly aimed at hampering current nuclear talks,” said Hamid Babaei, spokesman for Iran’s mission to the United Nations, told Reuters.
In light of how ambitious Iran’s hacking campaigns have become, the report makes a bold claim: Iran is the new China.
But cybersecurity expert David Kennedy, founder of the security consulting firm TrustedSec, thinks that this may be an overstatement.
“Iran’s cyber capabilities aren’t anywhere near those of Russia, China, or the US,” he told Business Insider. “But it’s certainly getting there.”
Iran’s hacking campaigns began in earnest in 2011, in retaliation to the cyber attacks that were launched against the country’s nuclear program from 2009-2012.
“Cyber warfare doesn’t require a significant number of troops or a superior set of bombs,” Kennedy told Business Insider. “Iran was the first to capitalize on that.”
In the event of a conflict, Kennedy says, Iran will be able to use its cyber technology to shut down core facilities around the world. “Iran is doing it now more for military readiness,” Kennedy says. Ahead of talks on Iran’s nuclear program in 2015, “this definitely gives them negotiating power.”
Sanctions relief: Benefiting Iran’s elite or people? – A majority of Iranian people were hoping that economic sanctions relief would alleviate their suffering, improve their standards of living, and push many families above the poverty line. Almost a year has passed since the Iranian government has been receiving sanctions relief.
Sanctions relief: Benefiting Iran’s elite or people?
Nevertheless, some Iranian civilians began to believe that even economic sanctions relief, or the lifting of whole economic sanctions from the Iranian government, are not going to assist the civilians, their financial day-to-day activities, or bring concrete changes on the ground.
Without a doubt, sanctions on regimes do take a toll on human life. As history has shown, when Iraq was under economic sanctions, the suffering of civilians dramatically increased. The level of poverty and lack of access to medical treatments increased.
Similarly, in Iran, the economic sanctions accompanied with economic mismanagement of the government, high level corruption, lack of a robust private market, and a state-controlled economy have pushed the middle class towards poverty. The percentage of Iranian families living under the line of poverty has increased to 40 percent.
Several Iranian people, some of whom who have lost hope in changes from the sanctions relief, are speaking up. Nastaran, an English teacher in the suburbs of Tehran said to me: “We have yet to see any benefits from these sanctions reliefs. We hear that the government has been receiving billions of dollars every month and it has increased its export. But where is the money going? Is it most likely ending up in the hands of the top few.”
Stock Market
After the interim nuclear deal and extension of the negotiations between the six world powers (known as the P5+1: China, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States) and the Islamic Republic, the Iranian government received an estimated $7 billion. Iran continues to receive approximately $700 million every month under the extension deal.
In addition, there has been some sanction suspensions with respects to some of Iran’s major industries, including Iran’s auto sector, gold and precious metals, and petrochemical exports. The Iranian currency, Rial, has appreciated due to the sanction reliefs, Iran’s oil and non-oil exports have increased, its economy has witnessed signs of stabilization, Tehran’s Stock Exchange has soared and Iran’s exports and business dealings with several countries have ratcheted up.
The suspension of sanctions has definitely given both psychological and financial support to the Iranian government. But the real question is how this money is being spent and which institution primarily benefits from this sanctions relief? Are ordinary people benefiting from this flow of money?
For example, the IRGC controls and owns a considerable amount of shares in the aforementioned industries which have witness sanction reliefs. In the petrochemical industry, the IRGC military-industrial complex owns Zagros Petrochemicals, 40% of Pars Petrochemical Company, part of Arak Petrochemicals and Khark Petrochemicals 25% of Kermanshah Petrochemicals, as well as 19% of shares of Maroun Petrochemicals.
In addition, the IRGC owns 80.18% of the giant Ghadir Investment Company. In that respect, the major beneficiaries are not ordinary Iranian people but the senior cadre of the IRGC whose shares’ value have soared due to the sanctions relief, extension of the nuclear deal and the Joint Plan of Action (JPA) which was signed on November 24 between the six world powers and Iran.
This phenomenon of the monopolization of the economy applies in other sectors of Iran’s economy as well. When it comes to Iran’s economic system, the supreme leader and IRGC do have considerable amount of control and shares in almost all industries including financial Institutions and banks, transportation, automobile manufacturing, mining, commerce, and oil and gas sectors.
As a result, these types of sanction reliefs will mostly benefit the ruling elite, primarily the supreme leader and Iran’s military-industrial complex, IRGC. Iranian people will hardly observe any benefits from these economic sanction reliefs or lifting of economic sanctions.
It appears that the easing of sanctions are strengthening the ruling elite without any sign of redistribution of wealth. This is predominantly due to the fact that Iran’s economic system is a state and military controlled system, it lacks transparency, and is crippled with widespread corruption by the ruling elite and few on top.
If the intention of economic sanction relief is to assist the Iranian people and alleviate their suffering, there ought to be more efficient approaches to develop some type of targeted sanction reliefs (for example being directed at Iran’s educational system health care, etc) which aim at empowering Iranian civilians and primarily the middle class.
IRGC denies negotiations are source of Iran’s security – The head of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Maj. Gen. Mohammad Ali Jaffari, has rejected claims by Iran’s top nuclear negotiator that the nuclear negotiations between Iran and the UN Security Council have made Iran more secure.
IRGC denies negotiations are source of Iran’s security
Rather, Jaffari praised Iran’s defensive and military capabilities, which he said have allowed the nuclear negotiators to operate from a position of strength.
After a meeting of the top officials of the armed forces, Jaffari told reporters, “The strength of our diplomacy in the nuclear negotiations is indebted to the inspiration of the Islamic Revolution and the defensive and security powers of our system.”
While Jaffari did not address anyone by name, it was clear he was responding to a Dec. 2 speech by head negotiator Mohammad Javad Zarif at Allamah Tabatabei University, where he said, “I maintain that as a result of these negotiations, it is Iran that has become more secure.”
Zarif said, “No one can beat the war drums against Iran anymore,” adding that plans to create “a hostile atmosphere against Iran have collapsed and the world understands that they can reach an understanding with Iran based on respect, dialogue and mutual understanding and common interests.”
Zarif’s comments about Iran becoming more secure made headlines across the Iranian media. For the Revolutionary Guard and Jaffari, however, Iran’s own military abilities and the approach of its leaders are the primary source of Iran’s security and enable the negotiators to conduct effective diplomacy.
“Our security is indebted to the philosophy of the leaders of our Islamic Revolution, Imam [Ruhollah] Khomeini and Imam [Ali] Khamenei,” Jaffari said of Iran’s former and current supreme leaders.
Rather than crediting the recent negotiations pursued by Zarif since President Hassan Rouhani took office in August 2013 for Iran’s security progress, Jaffari said, “Years before, we had already become a great power with deterrent abilities, and all of the components of our power have been strengthened considerably.”
Jaffari said that the strength of the system has been “transferred” to Iran’s diplomacy, which has allowed the negotiators “with the massive support of the Islamic Revolution and military and defensive abilities to resist against the excessive demands of the arrogant powers.”
Jaffari continued, “Without a doubt, the confidence of our negotiators stems from the defensive and military power that has been officially recognized.”
On the confrontation between the United States and Iran, Jaffari said, “America’s abilities are not able to expand beyond this … and there is no path for America but to accept the real power of the Islamic Revolution.”
Jaffari wished success for Iran’s negotiators and added, “The officials of the Foreign Ministry should not miscalculate, and pursue resistance and perseverance of the achievements of the Islamic Revolution and the blood of thousands of martyrs.”
IRGC Holds Exhibition against Gonabadi Dervishes – Yesterday morning, a series of posters against the Gonabadi Dervishes on which the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ emblem was engraved, in a street in the city of Ilam province, Abdanan,was put on public display.
Reported by Majzooban Noor, yesterday morning at Imam Khomeini Avenue of Abdanan city of Ilam, an exclusive exhibition in order to create confusion, wrong portrayal and destruction, against this Sufi Mystical Order, Gonabadi Dervishes was held.
It should be noted that the exhibition which had been run by the Revolutionary Guards, after some hours due to the protest of dervishes and presence of the deputy commander of the Revolutionary Guards in the place of exhibition, eventually, led to the closure of the exhibition.
Not long ago, Ali Ostad Hosseini, the commander of the Revolutionary Guards in Alborz province, presented dervishes as a serious hazard and risk threatening Alborz province, and had informed of cultural measures to raise awareness among the public.
Iranian Government May Be Behind Global Cyber attack Campaign – A new report from a U.S. security firm says the Iranian government may be behind a global cyber attack that targeted countries including the United States, China, England, France, Canada, Germany, India and Israel.
Iranian Government May Be Behind Global Cyber attack Campaign
The security firm Cylance said that since 2012, Iranian computer hackers targeted government, military, oil, gas, transportation, telecommunications and hospital networks, among others. Kuwait, Mexico, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates were also among the countries affected, the report said.
Unlike other cyber security threats the world has faced before, these are thought to be different: Cylance believes that it’s not just some lone hacker group compromising online security — it could very well involve the Iranian government itself.
Multiple Internet domains that were used throughout the course of the campaign were registered in Iran, and the cyber attack infrastructure is hosted through Netafraz.com, an Iranian web server provider.
Cylance suggested that the cyber campaign was “sponsored by Iran” because the infrastructure utilized was “too significant” to be a lone individual or a small group.
“With minimal separation between private companies and the Iranian government, their modus operandi seems clear: blur the line between legitimate engineering companies and state-sponsored cyber hacking teams to establish a foothold in the world’s critical infrastructure,” the Cylance report states.
Iran, now engaged in nuclear disarmament talks with the U.S. and other Western countries, denied having anything to do with the attacks.
Turkey’s intel agency wiretapped Iran-backed Tawhid-Salam suspects – Many suspects who were investigated by prosecutors as part of the Iran-backed terrorist organization Tawhid-Salam turned out to have been placed under surveillance by the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) as well, security sources told Today’s Zaman.
This surveillance video still shows a meeting in İstanbul between Tawhid-Salam member and Naser Ghafari, the top representative of the Quds Force in Turkey. (Photo: DHA)
According to the information, the intel agency had wiretapped phone lines belonging to 25 suspects out of the 230 who were named as suspects for belonging to the Tawhid-Salam terror network, also known as the Jerusalem Army, between April 2004 and June 2014. Many of these suspects were Iranian nationals who were monitored by MİT on suspicion of espionage.
The new revelations reflect the remarks made by prosecutor Adem Özcan, who launched an investigation into the network before he was abruptly reassigned in a government-orchestrated move. Özcan said the case file included numerous MİT reports on suspects.
Accordingly, the intel agency had over time filed petitions with 19 courts to wiretap 25 suspects on suspicion of espionage. The names of suspects were listed as (names of Turkish citizens were listed with initials, while the names of Iranian nationals were listed with their full names): A.Y., A.Y., Cafer Bendi Derya, Esmaıel Sabeghı, Habibullah Haydari, Hamid Nosrati, H.Ö., H.A., H.A.Y., H.M., K.A., K.C., K.K., K.Ö., M.D., Mehdi Saghsani Aghdam, M.E., Naser Ghafari, N.Ş., O.K.S., Rahim Bazdar, R.O., Rasoul Abdoullahı, S.Y., Sıamak Mazloumravasan.
According to a report compiled by police investigators, Tawhid-Salam has allegedly been operating through four independent cells, all of which are directed by Iranian intelligence operatives who report directly to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
The first cell was led Ghafari, one of the commanders that the IRGC assigned to Turkey, who operated under the cover of a diplomatic passport attached to the Iranian Consulate in Istanbul. He was directing operations on sensitive targets such as the surveillance of the US Consulate General in İstanbul and the Nuclear Research Institute in İstanbul’s Halkalı neighborhood.
The IRGC’s Quds Force Commander Sayed Ali Akbar Mir Vekili was heading another cell that engages with key officials in Turkey. He was allegedly working with Turkey’s intel head Hakan Fidan; former Justice and Development Party (AK Party) deputy Faruk Koca who worked as a liaison between Fidan and Mir Vekili; Abdülhamit Çelik who was convicted of killing two opponents of the Iranian regime in Turkey; and one of Tawhid-Salam’s founders, Hakkı Selçuk Şanlı who had been trained in Iran for over two months to stage attacks and conduct intelligence operations in Turkey on behalf of Iran.
The İstanbul Chief Prosecutor’s Office dropped the comprehensive, three-year investigation into the Iran-backed terrorist organization in July, a move that was widely seen as an attempt to cover up a highly sensitive probe that had allegedly implicated senior officials in the ruling AK Party government.
It was alleged that the investigation discovered that Interior Minister Efkan Ala, MİT chief Fidan and Deputy Prime Minister Beşir Atalay are all connected to the Tawhid-Salam terrorist network, although the extent of their involvement is not yet clear.
On several occasions, government officials, including Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ, have tried to downplay the significance of the terrorist group to contain fallout from the investigation, despite the fact that the group has been active in Turkey for more than 20 years.
Ali Fuat Yılmazer, former chief of the İstanbul Police Department’s intelligence unit, who was detained on a politically motivated sham investigation, said Tawhid-Salam had penetrated the Turkish government and was guilty of international espionage.
“If details of this case file [on the investigation into Tawhid-Salam] are revealed one day, we will see how a foreign government can operate comfortably in Turkey and how it was able to access many senior government officials,” Yılmazer said.
“They [members of Tawhid-Salam] have been able to develop relationships at the most senior level,” the former intelligence chief added. Yılmazer described the Salam network as, “the stealthiest and most dangerous terrorist organization [to face Turkey] in recent times.”
Tawhid-Salam is registered as a terrorist group by the senior judiciary in Turkey. In the Umut case in April, the 9th Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court of Appeals upheld a ruling by a lower criminal court and sentenced eight defendants to imprisonment. They were convicted of killing Turkish intellectuals Uğur Mumcu, Bahriye Üçok, Muammer Aksoy and Ahmet Taner Kışlalı, and of being members of the terrorist Tawhid-Salam organization.
When the investigation was exposed by pro-government dailies earlier this year, many Iranian suspects cited in the case file reportedly fled Turkey.
This criminal act follows recent protests by 300 students in Jahrom University where they protested against the suppressive measures in the university.
Women in Iran Under Clerical Rule
Iranian women in the 1979 revolution played a main role in support of freedom and democracy in Iran. Soon after mullahs hijacked this movement to establish the most feudal and inhuman religious dictatorship of the past century by eliminating every legal right and privilege women had gained over the years. Women officially became Iran’s second-class citizens.
Women are number One of Mullahs
Along with discriminatory policies against women, they are left reeling even further with recent all-male decisions. In July Tehran’s mayor, Muhammad Bagher Ghalibaf, ordered gender segregation in municipal offices to ensure women’s “dignity”. Two months later Khalil Helali, a national police chief, said the law should ban women from serving in cafes and restaurants because such jobs allow men to ogle them, although allowing them to work in kitchens and non-public areas. Also in the main tourist city of Isfahan, female musicians have been banned from performing.
The essence of the debate over women’s issues in Iran is the clergies’ unease with the idea of Iranians seeking freedom and democracy that threaten the regime. Women were instrumental in the overthrow of the Shah regime, and who now display their opposition to the current regime’s religious fundamentalist policy. Women are rejecting a government campaign for them to get married, stay at home. Considering the current social and economic conditions in Iran, having a large family is not an option.
To further suppress and intimidate women, acid attacks have been carried out to limit their activities and socially alienate them. Unofficial reports indicate 25 incidents of this nature have occurred to date. Such attacks in Isfahan and other cities and towns have lead to street rallies and social media campaigns against these heinous acts. The regime responded by launching an investigation into the assaults, leading to the arrest of several suspects who were then let go due to insufficient evidence.
Iranians believe that the clerical regime was responsible for these attacks. In response, the latter enacted a parliamentary measure to protect the Basij, a paramilitary plain-clothes group, which enforces the country’s social intolerances under the supreme leader Ali Khameini and administered under the recently passed Plan on Protection of Promoters of Virtue and Preventers of Vice.
Protestors chanted that those who performed the acid attacks were more vicious than the Islamic State (ISIS) and brought attention to what the US administration should be aware. First, a narrow focus on defeating and destroying ISIS does little to address the broader problem of militant fundamentalism in the Middle East. Secondly, the Iranian government is complicit in these acid attacks and its policy of empowering most hard line elements of society only encourages its continuation.
Published medical reports have made Iranians fearsome that these attacks were organized and could be repeated, although Parliamentary members have denied this. On October 21, 2014, members of Parliament made an amendment to the Plan that states, “No individual or group has the right to attempt criminal acts such as insults, libel, beating, injuring, or murder of others under the umbrella of ‘promoting virtue or preventing vice’”. The amendment was carried by a majority vote.
One victim has come forth to say the attackers belong to the notorious Ansar-e Hezbollah (Supporters of the Party of God), a gangster organization affiliated with the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei. Ansar’s origin as religious hardliners is traceable to the 1979 revolution with its involvement of beating and killing opponents to the emerging regime. Its current affiliation with the terrorist organization Hezbollah in Lebanon has produced cells throughout Iran. Funding and partial control of the group comes from high-level conservative religious leaders within the government, including Ayatollahs Khameini and Mesbah-Yzadi, for the purpose of carrying out government policy in both political and social spheres.
Ansar has a history of assaulting women on bicycles who were wearing “improper” clothing and were “badly veiled”. In 2010, the Chief Prosecutor of Mashahd, Mahmud Zoghli, imposed a fine of approximately $1,300 for improper wearing of the hijab, which was confirmed by the Interior Minister and Chief of Police, Mostafa Mohammad-Naijar.
Exiled Iranian journalist recalls lost freedoms – Journalism in Iran has never been for the fainthearted. But the challenges of covering the country as a local hire for the foreign press are especially complex, as former New York Times correspondent Nazila Fathi recounts in a moving new memoir, “The Lonely War.”
Exiled Iranian journalist recalls lost freedoms – (photo by Basic Books/Nazila Fathi)
In April 2009, before the disputed presidential elections that consumed the country and sent Fathi and many other Iranians into exile, she asked the director of the office for foreign press to send local and special security police to her home in Tehran to protect her against a third force, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), who were monitoring her movements. Fathi had just fired a long-time maid who had been coerced by the IRGC to spy on her; the Guards evidently did not trust the other security services to keep Fathi in line.
Such are the layers of complexity that characterize post-revolutionary Iran that Fathi eloquently describes.
In an interview with Al-Monitor, Fathi said that she was not “emotionally ready” to write the book after first leaving Iran. But literary agents approached her in early 2010 after she published a piece in The New York Times about the circumstances of her exile and she realized she had an important story to tell.
Her intention, she said, was “to present the human face of Iran — whether pro- or anti-regime and also the demographic changes” that have transformed the country from one with a huge rural population to one that is largely urban and middle class.
The Arab uprisings of 2011 gave her another incentive, she said. While “there are many similarities, the biggest difference was that Iranians had already had a revolution” whose destabilizing impact was “still very much remembered.” Iranians, while unhappy with the status quo, want change without an “institutional breakdown or insecurity,” she said.
In the book, Fathi recounts her own sense of shock at the sudden loss of personal freedom after the revolution and the exhilaration of small victories against the theocratic state.
Just shy of nine when the revolution took place, Fathi had had a happy childhood playing in the garden of her apartment complex and swimming every summer in a refreshing pool. The revolution put an end to that innocent pastime and forced her to wear hijab, including a nylon scarf knotted under her chin, which she found suffocating.
Her “first public act of rebellion” came when she and other pre-adolescent girls went swimming in the pool one night despite the ban, she writes. “Decades later, the memory of that swim still resonates in my mind with a sense of satisfaction” as a small victory in a war in which “our bodies had become battlefields.”
Fathi also describes the terror of living in Iran during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War and the relief that came when Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of the revolution, accepted a cease-fire with Iraq. It was, she writes, “the happiest day of my life.”
His death a year later ushered in optimism that Iran was about to become a less repressive and isolated country — a hope that has risen and been dashed repeatedly over the next two decades, most recently last month, when a year of high-level talks failed to achieve a comprehensive nuclear agreement easing Iran’s pariah status.
Fathi writes that she first became interested in journalism after watching a televised news conference with foreign reporters allowed into Iran to cover the funeral of Khomeini in 1989. Fathi was fascinated when then-presidential candidate Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani admonished Geraldine Brooks, at the time reporting for the Wall Street Journal, for wearing a conservative black abaya. “Why do you wear that heavy veil when a simple scarf would do?” Rafsanjani asked.
Fathi remembered the news conference a year later when she was asked by a tutor to help other reporters who had come to Iran to cover the aftermath of a devastating earthquake. Rafsanjani had chosen a foreign journalist to send the message that he was a relative moderate, “knowing his words would travel farther through Brooks than if they were spoken to an Iranian reporter,” Fathi wrote. “Journalism, I could see, was a powerful profession — and the idea of entering it in any capacity thrilled me.”
Fathi soon graduated from translator to fixer to full-fledged correspondent during two decades of intense ferment in Iran in which the press played an important role. The book intertwines her personal experiences of marriage and motherhood with the major events of the period, including the rise of the Reform movement under Rafsanjani and Mohammed Khatami and the harsh backlash that followed.
Despite setbacks including the so-called “chain murders” of intellectuals and the impeachment of Khatami ministers and closure of newspapers, society continued to evolve. “The great reshuffling of fortunes and fates” that marginalized Iran’s former ruling class in favor of the rural and urban poor did not stop this trend, Fathi writes, because the children of the poor became educated and aware of the regime’s hypocrisy and failings.
Fathi describes how technology fueled this evolution, from videotapes of foreign movies distributed by bootleggers in the 1980s, to satellite TV and the Internet in the ’90s and the cellphones used in the 2009 protests to record and transmit images of the crackdown on peaceful protesters. The government found it could not block the technology without completely handicapping its own work, so Iranians kept finding space between the cracks. Just recently, she remarked to Al-Monitor, tens of thousands of Iranians came out on the streets to mourn the death of a young pop star. “Iranians are constantly sending signals to the regime,” Fathi said, that they are not satisfied with the status quo.
Foreign journalists who go to Iran understand that they are under surveillance but the Iranians who work for foreign news outlets are particularly at risk. Fathi had numerous run-ins with assorted branches of the security establishment, including a mysterious “Mr. X” from the Intelligence Ministry who apparently came to appreciate her analysis of Iranian politics.
Beaten by Basij thugs while covering 1999 student protests and tear-gassed during the 2009 demonstrations, Fathi decided to leave Iran in 2009 after Newsweek correspondent Maziar Bahari was arrested and she was tipped off by a member of the Basij she had once interviewed that her picture had been given to snipers with orders to shoot.
Like many talented young Iranians, Fathi moved west, first to Canada, where she had lived for a time earlier in the decade, and then to the United States. Now settled with her husband and two children in a suburb of Washington, D.C., she writes that she does not know when she will be able to go home but hopes she will get the opportunity to see the mountains ringing Tehran and her old swimming pool. Writes Fathi: “I long to swim in those waters again.”
Khamenei Had Said Earlier Too that He cannot Control the IRGC – Last week, fifteen Majlis representatives summoned the minister of intelligence over a report that had been prepared and submitted to ayatollah Khamenei which negatively portrayed the intelligence agency of the Revolutionary Guards, IRGC. Excerpts of the report were published by SAHAM News, close to pro-reform former presidential candidate Mehdi Karoubi who has been under house arrest since early 2011.
Majlis deputies wanted an explanation of why such a report was prepared in the first place and why it was available to others, specifically “counter-revolutionary media” it they phrased it. The report, as reflected in SAHAM news, describes the secret activities of the intelligence agency of the IRGC for a coup against the 1998-2005 reform administration of president Mohammad Khatami.
Khamenei Had Said Earlier Too that He cannot Control the IRGC
Rooz spoke with Ali-Asghar Ramezanpour, the deputy minister of culture in Khatami’s administration, about the accuracy of the report. “The report is generally correct and accurate and it is quite possible that it was prepared by individuals close to Mr. Rouhani and provided to the supreme leader because many middle-level officials in IRGC intelligence agency and the ministry of intelligence have this information,” he said. He continued, “Most of the (intelligence) agencies that are named in the report officially exist with those very names and there is no doubt that most of those who work in them are opponents of the current administration but to go beyond that and make the conclusion that these activities are officially against the government does not seem reasonable or rational. Normally, cover names are used for sensitive intelligence operations or individuals. In other words, the think tanks that are mentioned in the report do mostly exist and their activities began during the presidential campaign activities which picked up momentum after a specific point in time.”
According to SAHAM’s story on the report, the IRGC through Hossein Taeb, the director of the IRGC intelligence agency had created a number of “safe houses” and engaged in activities against the government in different areas.
Hossein Taeb is not an unknown name to many, particularly reformers. Ramezanpour continued on Taeb’s role in anti-Rouhani government activities. “I know some of the people mentioned in the report, such as Taeb, Moshafagh, Nejabat and Foruzandeh, and others who played a role in creating the Deen and Danesh institute and know that they played a similar role during Mr. Khatami’s days. I think the specifics that are provided by SAHAM news are correct.”
According to Ramezanpour, “The agencies and individuals that are named in the report used to be active in those days (Mohammad Khatami’s presidency) as well. Some of course were not at the same level they are today while others such as Naghdi were more active then. The same is true of someone like Elham who became the government spokesman during Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s presidency. In fact Elham was among the leading organizer of pressure groups against Mr. Khatami administration’s cultural programs and Basij para-military forces were put at his disposal for such ends.” He continued, “Behind-the-scene battles with these centers and individuals took place almost on a daily basis by sections of Khatami’s government in the ministry of culture and ministry of intelligence. At times clashes led to threats exchanged between the two sides. As an example, they would send a message that if a specific program was implemented, they would react by doing something specific or would arrest a specific person. They sometimes even created dossiers against individuals and then used them to extract concessions or make deals. In the first yeas of Khatami’s administration the judiciary tried to stay neutral in these battles but in time things changed and senior officials in the judiciary gradually changed and authority fell into the hands of people such as prosecutor Mortezavi, who was involved in all the activities that took place against Khatami’s government.”
Ramezanpour also talked about the role of ayatollah Khamenei in these battles and in the parallel agencies outside the government. “I doubt that political and security activities at this level can be withheld from Mr. Khamenei’s knowledge. It is part of his management style to create parallel activities (to those of the government) so that he could utilize them against the others if necessary. This is a tried-out intelligence practice in the Islamic republic, and possible in many intelligence agencies of other countries.”
According to SAHAM news, president Rouhani had taken the intelligence report to ayatollah Khamenei and had asked him to advise the IRGC to stop these activities, to which the supreme leader responded by saying that members of the IRGC did not heed to his words either.
On this point, Ramezanpour says that that it was not the first instance of such a remark by the supreme leader. “The first part of ayatollah Khamenei’s response is not new and had been heard before. It is said that sometimes when Mr. Khatami and Mr. Rafsanjani presented complaints about activities of the Revolutionary Guards, the leader had responded by saying that the IRGC did not heed to his calls. The general impression in those days was that Mr. Khamenei merely said this to evade taking action against the force, while not denying the possibility of pursuing the complaints. So it is quite possible that his similar comments to Mr. Rouhani now are for the same purpose. But the second part of his comments is dubious. It is doubtful that Mr. Khamenei would say something to the effect that the Guards were operating against the government.”
About four months ago, during a public address president Hassan Rouhani had made a reference to “think tanks” and “undermining activities” and had said, “A small group of individuals had left think tanks and entered operational rooms. They should know that the government is both aware of their activities and will engage in suitable measures against their destructive activities.”
Speaking about the SAHAM news report to Rooz, a member belonging to the reformist Participation Front in the sixth Majlis said, “The message of the report is clear and was known in political circles. In fact, the main issues in the report had been the subject of discussion by political activists and officials during the reform period. We too had meetings to discuss these a number of times and Mr. Khatami has also mentioned the issues during his presidency and even after it.”
According to this ex-MP, “The activities of this parallel or shadow government grew in intensity during Mr. Khatami’s presidency, whether in the IRGC intelligence agency, in the office of Mr. Khamenei or in the National Broadcasting Organization. If you read Mr. Kardan’s memoirs, you will see that the National Broadcasting Organization had in reality turned into an anti-government think tank. The same is true of the monitoring teams of the Guardian Council. In those days, the IRGC intelligence agency, the Intelligence Protection Agency of the judiciary and the Intelligence Agency of the police had also become active and each tried to undermine Mr. Khatami administration’s activities. We should not forget that the control and command center for all these groups was in one place: The office of Mr. Khamenei.”
He continued, “Mr. Ahmadinejad’s eight years in the presidency provided the best opportunity for these groups to strengthen themselves. In addition to getting an official budget or economic projects, the sanctions helped them as well. IN fact, the security-military forces and the members of the military-style parties established their foundation. Their current financial and logistic capabilities are so large today that they can easily topple any government.”
Speaking about the future of ayatollah Khamenei’s son, Mojtaba Khamenei, this MP said, “I doubt he has the power that he is attributed to. Even if he did have a role in these events, they were because of his father. Mr. Khamenei does not trust many of those around him and because of this tries to put individuals who are close to him or subservient to him in these posts. From Mr. Khamenei’s perspective, Mojtaba Khamenei is not the future leader but someone he can rely on in his pursuit of his goals. The largest goal of which is ‘leadership of Muslims of the world.’”
