Link: http://uk.news.yahoo.com/4/20100921/tuk-cable-to-shine-light-on-murky-corpor-dba1618.htlm
Cable to shine light on 'murky corporate world'
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Announcing a wide-ranging probe into "murky" corporate activities, Mr Cable is to condemn markets as "often irrational or rigged". He will also insist that unrestrained capitalism "kills competition".
The tough comments may reassure Lib Dem activists who have been questioning the compromises leader Nick Clegg made in order to forge the coalition with David Cameron.
But they could also make life difficult for Mr Cameron, as Conservative traditionalists are similarly concerned that they are being dragged to the left on issues such as replacing Trident.
As the Lib Dem conference in Liverpool draws to a close, Mr Cable will use his speech to announce a consultation starting next month to cover issues surrounding takeovers, executive pay and corporate short-termism.
"The principle of responsible ownership should apply across the business world," he will tell party members. "Let me be quite clear. The Government's agenda, is not one of laissez-faire. Markets are often irrational or rigged. So I am shining a harsh light into the murky world of corporate behaviour."
FRITIRAN SECULAR LIBERAL MINORITY REPORT: Fritirans sekulære liberale mindretal opfordrer til at lære af Danske søfolk og modstandsfolks kamp mod Nazisme, men gøre tidlig, fredelig modstand mod Islamiske Imperialistiske stater og deres neo-Nazi axis. As a member elect of Fritiran, secular liberal minority, I urge all to learn from Danish sailors and resistance fighters 1940-1945, but show early, peaceful and firm resistance against the Islamic Imperialist states and their neo-Nazi axis.
onsdag den 22. september 2010
tirsdag den 21. september 2010
Fritiran Secular Liberal Minority Report on 18 Sept. Action for Sakineh and against stoning, flogging and executions and also to expose the Islamic state of Iran's genocide of political prisoners in 1988 and bring the leaders of the Islamic Imperialist state to justice at the International Court of Justice
Fritiran Secular Liberal Minority Report: Maryam Namazie's new statement and report from Copenhagen 18-09-2010 action to Save Sakineh and to stop stoning, flogging and executions and to remember and condemn 1988 Islamic Republic genocide of political prisoners:
Enough! On the ‘storm’ around Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani’s case
By Maryam Namazie
The Islamic Republic of Iran and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have raised the issue of 41 year old Teresa Lewis’ impending execution in the US to challenge the “storm” surrounding 43 year old Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani who has been sentenced to death by stoning in Iran.
Clearly both women must not be executed. Executions – for whatever reason – are the most deplorable form of intentional murder.
Having said that, however, there are a number of reasons why Sakineh’s impending stoning has caused such a huge public outcry.
Firstly, we have a photo of Sakineh; we know her full name, that she has had a fifth grade education, and that she ‘wants to live,’ making it extremely personal.
Her children have pleaded for help. The international campaign took off in an unprecedented manner after an open letter from Sakineh’s two children calling on people to intervene.
Who can ever forget that letter?
It said: ‘Today we stretch out our hands to the people of the whole world… Is the world so cruel that it can watch this catastrophe and do nothing about it?’
Also we – and particularly Mina Ahadi – have been campaigning against stoning for years. Mina first started working on Sakineh’s case three years ago.
Finally, stoning is the most egregious and barbaric form of execution. The law even specifies the size of stone to be used. Prior to the stoning, the bodies of the victims are washed in the same way the dead are (whilst they are alive), wrapped in a shroud, and then buried in a ditch – up to the waist for men and chest for women. They are then pelted with stones – on prison grounds or in their already dug out graves – until they are dead.
Sakineh has become the cry of 21st century humanity vis-à-vis this era’s barbarism.
Today, stoning has become the racial apartheid of this century – intolerable and unacceptable. The public are just not going to stand for stoning anymore. And as a result governments have taken heed. We know that many governments supported racial apartheid in South Africa for a very long time and only as a result of public pressure did they eventually deem racial apartheid a crime against humanity. We also know that many of the very governments criticising Iran on Sakineh’s case have had and continue to have wonderfully cosy relations with that regime despite its slaughter of an entire generation.
But that is the nature of public outcries – they change laws, they ban the intolerable, they challenge the powers that be and even bring down governments and regimes.
Sakineh’s case has caused such a storm because we want her to live.
We want to save her.
We won’t let her die.
Not because she is the only one in this situation but because she symbolises that which we will no longer tolerate.
There are many others like her – in Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, China and yes the US waiting to be killed one way or the other by the state as a tool to repress and intimidate society at large.
But there are also many others like Baby P or Dua Khalil, yet it is their faces and names and stories that force us to scream enough.
Enough!
Copenhagen Action for Sakineh and to remember victims of the 1988 genocide in Iran
Dear Save Sakineh campaign coordinators,
A handful of dedicated political refugees from Iran to Denmark and a Danish college professor defied short notice and the Autumn windy weather of Copenhagen on 18 September 2010 to inform Danes of Sakineh's case and urge them to make the leadership of Denmark to get active in stopping Islamic Imperialist states in their sharia-law stoning, flogging and executions and to remember and condemn 1988 Islamic Republic genocide of political prisoners. Those who remain indoors due to weather were offered extensive information from the campaign website resources. After the Save Sakineh action we went on to a conference regarding the 1988 genocide of political prisoners in Iran, a meeting called by the cross-political grassroot movement the Committee to Defend Political Prisoners in Iran, Denmark, where indictment of the leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran incl. Khamenei and Mousavi, Rafsanjani, Khatami, Karoubi and all for their establishment's genocide and for their following and execution of the now dead Khomieni's Islamic order, fatwa, to perpetrate the genocide wiping out most of the secular activists of Iran in a matter of weeks. The focus was the recently published legal report by the Boroumand Foundation and the task to break the silence of the Danish establishment as well as Danish left, centre and right about the 1988 genocide.
Sincerely
Pedram Kazemi-Esfarjani, Fritiran's secular, liberal minority member elect of the board.
Enough! On the ‘storm’ around Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani’s case
By Maryam Namazie
The Islamic Republic of Iran and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have raised the issue of 41 year old Teresa Lewis’ impending execution in the US to challenge the “storm” surrounding 43 year old Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani who has been sentenced to death by stoning in Iran.
Clearly both women must not be executed. Executions – for whatever reason – are the most deplorable form of intentional murder.
Having said that, however, there are a number of reasons why Sakineh’s impending stoning has caused such a huge public outcry.
Firstly, we have a photo of Sakineh; we know her full name, that she has had a fifth grade education, and that she ‘wants to live,’ making it extremely personal.
Her children have pleaded for help. The international campaign took off in an unprecedented manner after an open letter from Sakineh’s two children calling on people to intervene.
Who can ever forget that letter?
It said: ‘Today we stretch out our hands to the people of the whole world… Is the world so cruel that it can watch this catastrophe and do nothing about it?’
Also we – and particularly Mina Ahadi – have been campaigning against stoning for years. Mina first started working on Sakineh’s case three years ago.
Finally, stoning is the most egregious and barbaric form of execution. The law even specifies the size of stone to be used. Prior to the stoning, the bodies of the victims are washed in the same way the dead are (whilst they are alive), wrapped in a shroud, and then buried in a ditch – up to the waist for men and chest for women. They are then pelted with stones – on prison grounds or in their already dug out graves – until they are dead.
Sakineh has become the cry of 21st century humanity vis-à-vis this era’s barbarism.
Today, stoning has become the racial apartheid of this century – intolerable and unacceptable. The public are just not going to stand for stoning anymore. And as a result governments have taken heed. We know that many governments supported racial apartheid in South Africa for a very long time and only as a result of public pressure did they eventually deem racial apartheid a crime against humanity. We also know that many of the very governments criticising Iran on Sakineh’s case have had and continue to have wonderfully cosy relations with that regime despite its slaughter of an entire generation.
But that is the nature of public outcries – they change laws, they ban the intolerable, they challenge the powers that be and even bring down governments and regimes.
Sakineh’s case has caused such a storm because we want her to live.
We want to save her.
We won’t let her die.
Not because she is the only one in this situation but because she symbolises that which we will no longer tolerate.
There are many others like her – in Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, China and yes the US waiting to be killed one way or the other by the state as a tool to repress and intimidate society at large.
But there are also many others like Baby P or Dua Khalil, yet it is their faces and names and stories that force us to scream enough.
Enough!
Copenhagen Action for Sakineh and to remember victims of the 1988 genocide in Iran
Dear Save Sakineh campaign coordinators,
A handful of dedicated political refugees from Iran to Denmark and a Danish college professor defied short notice and the Autumn windy weather of Copenhagen on 18 September 2010 to inform Danes of Sakineh's case and urge them to make the leadership of Denmark to get active in stopping Islamic Imperialist states in their sharia-law stoning, flogging and executions and to remember and condemn 1988 Islamic Republic genocide of political prisoners. Those who remain indoors due to weather were offered extensive information from the campaign website resources. After the Save Sakineh action we went on to a conference regarding the 1988 genocide of political prisoners in Iran, a meeting called by the cross-political grassroot movement the Committee to Defend Political Prisoners in Iran, Denmark, where indictment of the leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran incl. Khamenei and Mousavi, Rafsanjani, Khatami, Karoubi and all for their establishment's genocide and for their following and execution of the now dead Khomieni's Islamic order, fatwa, to perpetrate the genocide wiping out most of the secular activists of Iran in a matter of weeks. The focus was the recently published legal report by the Boroumand Foundation and the task to break the silence of the Danish establishment as well as Danish left, centre and right about the 1988 genocide.
Sincerely
Pedram Kazemi-Esfarjani, Fritiran's secular, liberal minority member elect of the board.
mandag den 20. september 2010
An update on the Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani campaign
Hello
Thanks to all of you who supported the 18 September day of action in support of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani and against stoning and flogging.
You can see a visual report of some of the actions here: http://stopstonningnow.com/wpress/3930. Highlights include a rally of over 150 people in Brussels organised by Brussels humanists/secularists, MPs and Amnesty International as well as nearly 20,000 people chanting ‘stop stoning now’ at the Protest the Pope rally in London at which I spoke along with Terry Sanderson, Pragna Patel, Richard Dawkins, Johann Hari, Peter Tatchell and others: http://iransolidarity.blogspot.com/2010/09/we-dont-need-corrective-supplied-by.html.
Our next actions are on 10 October, International Day against the Death Penalty and against Ahmadinejad’s visit to New York to address the UN General Assembly this week: http://notoahmadinejad.net/.
In protest to Ahmadinejad’s visit, 40 campaigners, academics and writers have called on the UN General Assembly to issue an emergency resolution calling for an end to the medieval and barbaric punishment of stoning as well as the immediate release of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani and all those sentenced to death by stoning. The open letter also asks that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad not be allowed to address the General Assembly and that his government be boycotted. You can see the letter here: http://notoahmadinejad.net/letters/openletterUN.html.
Just recently, Ahmadinejad has said in an interview with ABC network that Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani had never been sentenced to death by stoning. Her son, Sajjad, a 22 year old transport worker, has challenged him to a debate on this. In Sajjad’s letter distributed by the International Committees against Stoning and Execution, he says: ‘For peoples’ information, we will publish documents of our mother’s stoning sentence, issued by the offices that work under Mr. Ahmadinejad’s presidency, so the world can judge his words objectively.’ He goes on to ask ABC network to ‘arrange for a live broadcast discussion between Mr. Ahmadinejad and I on these issues...’ You can read his full statement here and also see copies of the actual stoning sentence: http://stopstonningnow.com/wpress/4059.
In Ahmadinejad’s interview he also blames: ‘someone in Germany’ for the uproar surrounding Ms Ashtiani’s case. Mina Ahadi’s response will be translated into English shortly. In her statement in Persian she ‘accepts the “accusation” with pride!’
By the way, Facebook had disabled Mina and my accounts recently right before the 18 September day of action for Sakineh and against stoning. After many letters of protest from supporters, and an open letter to Facebook founders by a number of well-known personalities (http://iransolidarity.blogspot.com/2010/09/open-letter-to-facebook-founders-on.html), my account has been enabled again, though Mina’s has not. Please keep writing to Facebook until they enable her account as well: http://iransolidarity.blogspot.com/2010/09/protest-faceooks-disabling-of-maryam.html.
Finally, please don’t forget to donate to the Save Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani campaign. Thank you for all your donations so far but we need a lot more money to be able to cover all our costs. You can donate via cheque or Paypal here: http://countmein-iran.com/donate.html. No amount is too small or too big!
Thanks again
Warm wishes
Maryam
Maryam Namazie
Iran Solidarity
BM Box 2387
London WC1N 3XX, UK
Tel: +44 (0) 7719166731
iransolidaritynow@gmail.com
www.iransolidarity.org.uk
iransolidarity.blogspot.com
Thanks to all of you who supported the 18 September day of action in support of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani and against stoning and flogging.
You can see a visual report of some of the actions here: http://stopstonningnow.com/wpress/3930. Highlights include a rally of over 150 people in Brussels organised by Brussels humanists/secularists, MPs and Amnesty International as well as nearly 20,000 people chanting ‘stop stoning now’ at the Protest the Pope rally in London at which I spoke along with Terry Sanderson, Pragna Patel, Richard Dawkins, Johann Hari, Peter Tatchell and others: http://iransolidarity.blogspot.com/2010/09/we-dont-need-corrective-supplied-by.html.
Our next actions are on 10 October, International Day against the Death Penalty and against Ahmadinejad’s visit to New York to address the UN General Assembly this week: http://notoahmadinejad.net/.
In protest to Ahmadinejad’s visit, 40 campaigners, academics and writers have called on the UN General Assembly to issue an emergency resolution calling for an end to the medieval and barbaric punishment of stoning as well as the immediate release of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani and all those sentenced to death by stoning. The open letter also asks that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad not be allowed to address the General Assembly and that his government be boycotted. You can see the letter here: http://notoahmadinejad.net/letters/openletterUN.html.
Just recently, Ahmadinejad has said in an interview with ABC network that Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani had never been sentenced to death by stoning. Her son, Sajjad, a 22 year old transport worker, has challenged him to a debate on this. In Sajjad’s letter distributed by the International Committees against Stoning and Execution, he says: ‘For peoples’ information, we will publish documents of our mother’s stoning sentence, issued by the offices that work under Mr. Ahmadinejad’s presidency, so the world can judge his words objectively.’ He goes on to ask ABC network to ‘arrange for a live broadcast discussion between Mr. Ahmadinejad and I on these issues...’ You can read his full statement here and also see copies of the actual stoning sentence: http://stopstonningnow.com/wpress/4059.
In Ahmadinejad’s interview he also blames: ‘someone in Germany’ for the uproar surrounding Ms Ashtiani’s case. Mina Ahadi’s response will be translated into English shortly. In her statement in Persian she ‘accepts the “accusation” with pride!’
By the way, Facebook had disabled Mina and my accounts recently right before the 18 September day of action for Sakineh and against stoning. After many letters of protest from supporters, and an open letter to Facebook founders by a number of well-known personalities (http://iransolidarity.blogspot.com/2010/09/open-letter-to-facebook-founders-on.html), my account has been enabled again, though Mina’s has not. Please keep writing to Facebook until they enable her account as well: http://iransolidarity.blogspot.com/2010/09/protest-faceooks-disabling-of-maryam.html.
Finally, please don’t forget to donate to the Save Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani campaign. Thank you for all your donations so far but we need a lot more money to be able to cover all our costs. You can donate via cheque or Paypal here: http://countmein-iran.com/donate.html. No amount is too small or too big!
Thanks again
Warm wishes
Maryam
Maryam Namazie
Iran Solidarity
BM Box 2387
London WC1N 3XX, UK
Tel: +44 (0) 7719166731
iransolidaritynow@gmail.com
www.iransolidarity.org.uk
iransolidarity.blogspot.com
fredag den 17. september 2010
Dansk/English: Erklaering/Statement for d.18.09. kl.14-16 ved Glentevej-Vibevej, Kbh. NV
Opfordring til handling Lørdag den 18. September 2010: Medborgere over hele Verden mod et Regime af Piskning og Stening
I København d.18.09. kl.14-16 ved Glentevej-Vibevej, Kbh. NV
Den Islamiske Republik i Iran har endnu engang, ifølge dens voldelige Islamiske love, pisket Sakineh Ashtiani 99 slag. Regimet har lagt et foto publiceret i avisen the London Times af en kvinde fejlagtigt rapporteret at være Sakineh Ashtiani, uden det Islamiske hijab-slør, til grund for piskningen. Anklagen lød paradoksalt nok: “spredning af korruption og uanstændighed”. Regimet havde truet, at Sakineh ville blive henrettet Søndag 29 August. Derfor hænger både dødsdommen og stenings-truslen stadigt over hendes hoved. Sakineh’s søn, Sajjad, har fornylig udtalt sig til en presse-konference i Paris ved telefonisk kontakt fra Iran, at han er bekymret for, at afslutningen af ritualistiske Ramadan måned ville blive benyttet til at henrette Sakineh. Vi er virkeligt oppe imod et sadistisk Islamisk regime. Regimet er ved at tage livet af Sakineh lidt for lidt, for at demonstrere sin magt og fortsatte existens. Hvert skridt taget af regimet afslører dybden af dets vildskab, totalt manglende respekt for menneskerettigheder, dimensionerne af regimets had til kvinder, fratagelse af ethvert forsvar fra de tiltalte fanger, regimets barbariske retssystem, bagstræberiske religiøse love, og den høje grad af regimets vold og blodtørst, og samtidig dets totale impotens. Det er nødvendigt at komme ud med fuld kraft for at redde Sakineh Ashtiani og mod dette Regime af Stening og Piskning. Vi har til enhver tid erklæret, at det ville være et effektivt skridt i støtte til befolkningen i Iran i deres kamp mod den Islamiske Republik, at regimet skulle blive boykotted politisk og dets ambassader og kontorer skulle blive lukket over hele Verden. I mange år har vi sagt, at regimet skulle blive ekskluderet fra det internationale samfund, fra FN, fra ILO etc. og ikke blive anerkendt som repræsentanter for det Iranske folk. Tiden til at implementere disse krav er NU. Befolkningen i Iran accepterer ikke den Islamiske Republik blive givet talerstole ved regeringer og andre internationale etablissementer. Den Islamiske Republik er en skamplet på menneskeheden og regimets ledere skal blive retsforfulgt for 31 år af daglige forbrydelser mod mennekseheden. Vi opfordrer alle medborgere af Verden til at demonstrere om lørdagen, den 18. september, i alle byer over hele Verden, mod den Islamiske Republik af Piskning, Stening og Henrettelse. Demonstrer og fordøm regimet. Vi skal kræve at Sakineh ummedelbart og ubetinget sættes paa fri fod. Stening, henrettelse, piskning og lignende forbrydelser skal blive afskaffet for bestandig.
Stil krav om, at Ahmadinejad ikke skulle tilladelses deltagelse i FN’s General Assembly. Lad os med vores deltagelse gøre denne aktions- og folkeoplysningsdag større end den vellykkede 100 Cities Against Stoning den 28. August 2010, hvor 111 byer deltog markerede deres modstand mod stening og krævede, at Sakineh og andre ofre skal sættes på fri fod!
Frit oversat af den lokale kontaktperson for kampagnen, Pedram Kazemi-Esfarjani, sekulaer, liberal aktivist
Valgt bestyrelsesmedlem i Fritiran, sekluaert, liberalt mindretal
docpedram@gmail.com
www.fritdanmark-fritiran.blogspot.com
A Call for Urgent Action Saturday September 18th: Citizens of the World against the Regime of Flogging and Stoning
The Islamic Republic has once again, in accordance with its savage Islamic laws, flogged Sakineh 99 times. The regime has used a picture published in the London Times of a woman, purportedly Ashtiani, whithout the Islamic hijab, as an excuse to flog her on charges of spreading corruption and indecency. The regime last week threatened Sakineh to be executed on Sunday August 29th. And of course both the execution sentence and stoning are still hanging over her head. Sajjad told the audience of today’s press conference in Paris by phone that he’s worried that by the conclusion of Ramadan this week, his mother would be executed. Indeed we are dealing with a sadistic Islamic regime. It is killing Sakineh little by little, to demonstrate its continued existence. Every move of this regime further reveals the depths of its savagery, the utter absence of peoples’ rights, the dimensions of the regime’s misogyny, the sheer defenseless of prisoners, the barbarity of the judiciary system of this regime, the backwardness of religious laws, and the heights of the regime’s savagery and blood lust, and – at the same time – its total impotence. It is necessary to come out with full force to save Sakineh Ashtiani and stand against the Regime of Stoning and Flogging. We have always said that as an effective step to supporting the people in Iran in their struggle against the Islamic Republic, this regime should be politically boycotted and its embassies and offices closed around the world. For years we have said this regime should be expelled from the international community, from the United Nations, from the International Labor Organization, and all other communities, and not to be recognized as the representative of the Iranian people. The time to implement these demands is now. The people of Iran do not accept that the Islamic Republic be given a podium from which to speak by any entity or government . The Islamic Republic is the shame of humanity and its leaders must be prosecuted for 31 years of daily crimes against people. We ask all citizens of the world to demonstrate on Saturday, the 18th of September, in all cities around the world, against the Islamic Republic of Flogging, Stoning and Execution. Demonstrate and condemn this regime. Announce that Sakineh must be immediately and unconditionally free. Stoning, execution, flogging and the like all should be abolished forever. Demand that this Regime of Flogging, Stoning and Execution not be recognized and that its offices and embassies be closed everywhere.
Announce that Ahmadinejad should not be permitted to take part in the General Assembly of the United Nations, from behind a podium, as the representative of Iranian people. Prepare yourself for demonstrations against the Regime of Flogging and Stoning and Execution. Tell your friends. Decide the place and time of demonstration and inform us. We know that this is short notice, but this time, we must try to have even larger demonstrations that on the 28th of August.
I København d.18.09. kl.14-16 ved Glentevej-Vibevej, Kbh. NV
Den Islamiske Republik i Iran har endnu engang, ifølge dens voldelige Islamiske love, pisket Sakineh Ashtiani 99 slag. Regimet har lagt et foto publiceret i avisen the London Times af en kvinde fejlagtigt rapporteret at være Sakineh Ashtiani, uden det Islamiske hijab-slør, til grund for piskningen. Anklagen lød paradoksalt nok: “spredning af korruption og uanstændighed”. Regimet havde truet, at Sakineh ville blive henrettet Søndag 29 August. Derfor hænger både dødsdommen og stenings-truslen stadigt over hendes hoved. Sakineh’s søn, Sajjad, har fornylig udtalt sig til en presse-konference i Paris ved telefonisk kontakt fra Iran, at han er bekymret for, at afslutningen af ritualistiske Ramadan måned ville blive benyttet til at henrette Sakineh. Vi er virkeligt oppe imod et sadistisk Islamisk regime. Regimet er ved at tage livet af Sakineh lidt for lidt, for at demonstrere sin magt og fortsatte existens. Hvert skridt taget af regimet afslører dybden af dets vildskab, totalt manglende respekt for menneskerettigheder, dimensionerne af regimets had til kvinder, fratagelse af ethvert forsvar fra de tiltalte fanger, regimets barbariske retssystem, bagstræberiske religiøse love, og den høje grad af regimets vold og blodtørst, og samtidig dets totale impotens. Det er nødvendigt at komme ud med fuld kraft for at redde Sakineh Ashtiani og mod dette Regime af Stening og Piskning. Vi har til enhver tid erklæret, at det ville være et effektivt skridt i støtte til befolkningen i Iran i deres kamp mod den Islamiske Republik, at regimet skulle blive boykotted politisk og dets ambassader og kontorer skulle blive lukket over hele Verden. I mange år har vi sagt, at regimet skulle blive ekskluderet fra det internationale samfund, fra FN, fra ILO etc. og ikke blive anerkendt som repræsentanter for det Iranske folk. Tiden til at implementere disse krav er NU. Befolkningen i Iran accepterer ikke den Islamiske Republik blive givet talerstole ved regeringer og andre internationale etablissementer. Den Islamiske Republik er en skamplet på menneskeheden og regimets ledere skal blive retsforfulgt for 31 år af daglige forbrydelser mod mennekseheden. Vi opfordrer alle medborgere af Verden til at demonstrere om lørdagen, den 18. september, i alle byer over hele Verden, mod den Islamiske Republik af Piskning, Stening og Henrettelse. Demonstrer og fordøm regimet. Vi skal kræve at Sakineh ummedelbart og ubetinget sættes paa fri fod. Stening, henrettelse, piskning og lignende forbrydelser skal blive afskaffet for bestandig.
Stil krav om, at Ahmadinejad ikke skulle tilladelses deltagelse i FN’s General Assembly. Lad os med vores deltagelse gøre denne aktions- og folkeoplysningsdag større end den vellykkede 100 Cities Against Stoning den 28. August 2010, hvor 111 byer deltog markerede deres modstand mod stening og krævede, at Sakineh og andre ofre skal sættes på fri fod!
Frit oversat af den lokale kontaktperson for kampagnen, Pedram Kazemi-Esfarjani, sekulaer, liberal aktivist
Valgt bestyrelsesmedlem i Fritiran, sekluaert, liberalt mindretal
docpedram@gmail.com
www.fritdanmark-fritiran.blogspot.com
A Call for Urgent Action Saturday September 18th: Citizens of the World against the Regime of Flogging and Stoning
The Islamic Republic has once again, in accordance with its savage Islamic laws, flogged Sakineh 99 times. The regime has used a picture published in the London Times of a woman, purportedly Ashtiani, whithout the Islamic hijab, as an excuse to flog her on charges of spreading corruption and indecency. The regime last week threatened Sakineh to be executed on Sunday August 29th. And of course both the execution sentence and stoning are still hanging over her head. Sajjad told the audience of today’s press conference in Paris by phone that he’s worried that by the conclusion of Ramadan this week, his mother would be executed. Indeed we are dealing with a sadistic Islamic regime. It is killing Sakineh little by little, to demonstrate its continued existence. Every move of this regime further reveals the depths of its savagery, the utter absence of peoples’ rights, the dimensions of the regime’s misogyny, the sheer defenseless of prisoners, the barbarity of the judiciary system of this regime, the backwardness of religious laws, and the heights of the regime’s savagery and blood lust, and – at the same time – its total impotence. It is necessary to come out with full force to save Sakineh Ashtiani and stand against the Regime of Stoning and Flogging. We have always said that as an effective step to supporting the people in Iran in their struggle against the Islamic Republic, this regime should be politically boycotted and its embassies and offices closed around the world. For years we have said this regime should be expelled from the international community, from the United Nations, from the International Labor Organization, and all other communities, and not to be recognized as the representative of the Iranian people. The time to implement these demands is now. The people of Iran do not accept that the Islamic Republic be given a podium from which to speak by any entity or government . The Islamic Republic is the shame of humanity and its leaders must be prosecuted for 31 years of daily crimes against people. We ask all citizens of the world to demonstrate on Saturday, the 18th of September, in all cities around the world, against the Islamic Republic of Flogging, Stoning and Execution. Demonstrate and condemn this regime. Announce that Sakineh must be immediately and unconditionally free. Stoning, execution, flogging and the like all should be abolished forever. Demand that this Regime of Flogging, Stoning and Execution not be recognized and that its offices and embassies be closed everywhere.
Announce that Ahmadinejad should not be permitted to take part in the General Assembly of the United Nations, from behind a podium, as the representative of Iranian people. Prepare yourself for demonstrations against the Regime of Flogging and Stoning and Execution. Tell your friends. Decide the place and time of demonstration and inform us. We know that this is short notice, but this time, we must try to have even larger demonstrations that on the 28th of August.
torsdag den 16. september 2010
Loerdag 18. Sept. kl.14-16 mod stening, Glentevej-Vibevej, Kbh. NV, derefter kl.17 deltagelse i Ali Azad og andres moede om 1988 folkemordet i Iran, Kulturhuset Indre By, Ahlefeltsgade/Charlotte Ammundsens Plads 3, Kbh K
Jeg inviterer hermed alle fredelige, lovlydige medborgere til en tvaerpolitisk, fredelig, lovlig oplysnings-kampagnedag mod stening, piskning og henrettelser. Arrangementet er sekulaer og religioese sympoler frabedes. Kampagnen vil ogsaa saette fokus paa, at et regime af stening ikke burde anerkendes af FN som repraesentanter for det Iranske folk. Danmark kunne starte med at tage sagen op!
Demonstrationen/folkeoplysningsdagen afholdes loerdag d.18.09.2010, kl.14-16, i naerheden af den Iranske Islamiske statsmoske, ved Glentevej-Vibevej, som led i det internationale samarbejde: http://stopstonningnow.com/wpress/3692, idet vi i Koebenhavn vil samtidig vise, at den statslige sharia-stormoskee paa Vibevej ikke er velkommen. Jeg vil fraraade megafon-larm, idet vi er der ogsaa til at stoette nabolaget mod den larm, uro og undertrykkelse, som en evt. kommende stormoskee vil udsaette dem for. Vi vil som d.28.08.2010 samtale med interesserede forbipasserende - folkeoplysning! Hvorfor tror I, at Islamisk Imperialisme truer og assassinerer vores forfattere, forlaeggere, redaktoerer, tegnere og kunstnere? Det er fordi folkeoplysning om og mod sharia og Islamisk Imperialisme er et effektivt redskab i folkelig modstand mod disse.
Hidtil er 32 byer over hele Verden med i denne kampagnedag for at holde Sakineh og andre truede fanger i live, og for at opfordre Verdenssamfundets til at goere alt hvad der er i vores magt til at stoppe stening, piskning og henrettelser, i Iran og i resten af Verden. Men ogsaa at sikre retfaerdig, sekulaer, civil og humanistisk rettergang for de indsatte og anklagede.
Politiet og kommunen har givet tilladelse til stopstoningnow demonstration/oplysnings-kampagnen ved Glentevej-Vibevej Der vil komme en pressemeddelelse i morgen.
Vejrudsigt fra DMI: Lørdag lidt eller nogen sol, men også spredte byger. Temp. op mellem 12 og 15 grader, og jævn til hård vind omkring vest, ved kysterne endnu lokalt op til kuling.
I London vil der paa samme tid vaere demonstration og oplysningskampagner mod Paven, som man flere inkl. Sam Harris og Richard Dawkins har indstillet til at blive arresteret og stillet for retten for de forbrydelser mod menneskeheden, hvilke han og hans multinationale etablissement er ansvarlige for.
Kl.17: Derefter vil jeg opfordre alle at deltage i konference og sekulaer mindehoejtidighed for de faldne venner, bekendte, familiemedlemmer og kammerater i 1988, under en af de stoerste Holocausts i den Iranske Islamiske stats blodige historie: man kunne kalde den folkemord mod de sekulaere mindretal i Iran, omend der ogsaa blev henrettet mange troende.
Nedenfor brev fra Maryam Namazie om 18. September aktionsdagen paa Engelsk, efterfulgt af Ali Azads brev paa persisk med indkaldelse til moedet om 1988 henrettelserne.
Med venlig hilsen
Pedram Kazemi-Esfarjani, fortsat fuldgyldigt medlem af bestyrelsen i den koebenhavnske forening Fritiran, sekulaert liberalt mindretal.
BILAG: 1- Maryam Namazie's brev vedr. 18. September aktionsdag for Sakineh. 2- Maryam Namazie og venners kampagnes hjemmeside har bragt nedennaevnte analyse af folkemord i Iran 1988; 3- Ali Azad og Komitteen til Forsvar af Politiske Fanger i Iran indklader til moede om 1988 masse-henrettelserne.
Nedenfor en af koordinatorerne, kommunisten Maryam Namazie, saa bedes I forstaa, at dette er en tvaerpolitisk engagement mellem saavel kommunister som liberale. pke
"Hello
Since I last wrote to you Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has again been flogged 99 times for an unveiled photo mistakenly attributed to her . She has also been threatened with execution, and denied visitation rights. Even, her lawyer’s home (Hatoun Kian) has been ransacked and his computer and documents seized. Court documents pertaining to Ms Ashtiani’s husband’s closed murder case have also gone missing.
Her 22-year-old son Sajjad is extremely concerned that the Iranian authorities are trying to frame Ms Ashtiani for his father’s murder by constructing a ‘new’ murder case to refute the stoning sentence. Unfortunately a number of media outlets have bought into the lie (see for example BBC Sunday Morning Live’s bias here). In fact, the press have been given a copy of the actual court judgment of stoning for adultery at a 30 July press conference in London. Also, even the man who has been found guilty of murdering her husband has not been executed. In Iran, under Diyeh laws, the family of the victim can ask for the death penalty to be revoked. Ms Ashtiani’s son explains why he and his 17 year old sister spared the man’s life in an interview with French writer and philosopher, Bernard-Henri Levy.
Despite all the regime’s outrages against Ms Ashtiani, her lawyers and family, on 8 September, a government official had the audacity to deceivingly claim that Ms Ashtiani had not been denied visitation rights, that her televised confession was not made under duress, and that she had not been flogged again. He also went on to say that her execution had been halted when no official documents halting her stoning or execution have been given to her lawyer or family.
Clearly this is yet another one of the regime’s ploys to push back the international campaign in her defence by giving the false impression that Ms Ashtiani is safe.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
On 18 September, we call on citizens everywhere to come out in defence of Ms Ashtiani and against the regime of flogging, stoning and execution. We are also calling for protests during 23-24 September when Ahmadinejad will be addressing the UN General Assembly.
Nothing can and will stop us from defending Sakineh’s precious life and bringing an end to the medieval and barbaric punishments of stoning and execution.
Let’s keep the pressure on.
We look forward to receiving news of your actions and events at actionforsakineh@gmail.com.
Warmest wishes
Maryam
Maryam Namazie
PLEASE ACT NOW!"
http://stopstonningnow.com/wpress/3809
The mass execution of political prisoners in the summer of 1988 was genocide
During the summer of 1988, as a continuation of the massacres and political executions that had taken place from the moment that the regime took power [in 1979], the Islamic Republic perpetrated mass executions of political prisoners. In a hasty operation, several thousand imprisoned opponents of the Islamic Republic were “tried” in minute courts (1) without any legal defense, sentenced to death, and immediately executed. What happened in the summer of ’88 was not only a new wave of political executions, but a genocide (2) against the Islamic Republic’s imprisoned opponents that was designed to systematically decimate and physically eradicate all who opposed the Islamic Republic.
The Iranian Revolution [which marks its beginning in June 2009] turned the eyes of the world towards Iran and blew the dust away from the hazy picture of 31 years of crime and genocide that people have suffered under the rule of the Islamic Republic. Today, the whole world is witness to the bloodthirsty political system confronting Iranian people. The International Campaign to Save Sakineh Ashtiani has drawn the attention of people worldwide to this reality: the Islamic Republic is a regime of stoning, execution, flogging, torture, enslavement of women, and utter denial of peoples’ rights.
Today, 22 years after the tragic genocide carried out against the Islamic Repblic’s opposition in the summer of ’88, and in the midst of efforts to save the life of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani and others sentenced to stoning and execution in Iran, we declare that all leaders of the Islamic Republic must be prosecuted and tried immediately. None of the heads of the Islamic Republic should be permitted to visit other countries. None of them should be permitted to stand behind a podium in front of international bodies and claim to be a representative of Iranian people. All political relationships with the Islamic Republic should be severed, and embassies of this regime of genocide should be closed.
On the 18th of September, people should demonstrate everywhere, and demand the freedom of Sakineh, as well as the legal and practical abolition of stoning, flogging, torture, and execution. Loudly declare that you stand with Iranian people in their endeavor to bring down this regime.
This regime is the murderer of the Iranian people, and it is the shame of all humanity. This regime should be brought to an end.
(1) “Minute courts” is the name given to these summary trials, which lasted less than 5 minutes in total and were followed by immediate execution.
(2) “The Genocide Convention of 1948, to which Iran has been a party since 1949, applies to killings of, or causing serious mental or physical harm to, members of a racial or religious group as such, with intent to destroy that group in whole or in part. The “religious group” that the Iranian regime intended to destroy in the second wave were those in its prisons who had been born Muslim but who had later renounced Islam. Whether or not atheists should count as a “religious group” for the purposes of the Convention, it is clear that persons who are born into a particular faith that they later renounce can be so categorised. This is a feature of the second wave of killings and is one reason why they must, in international law, engage continuing attention. And it must never be forgotten that the first wave of killings, although triggered by fury at the “Mersad” incursion, was based on the conclusion
that the MKO version of Islam was a blasphemy. Both the MKO and the leftists were condemned as moharebs, warriors against God, whose divinely ordained punishment was to be enforced by the state.”
The legal argument for judging the regime to be guilty of genocide begins on page 106.
Robertson, G. 2010. The Massacre of Political Prisoners in Iran, 1988: Report of an Inquiry Conducted by Geoffrey Robertson, Q.C. Washington DC: The Abdorrahman Boroumand Foundation.
به مناسبت بیست ودومین سالگرد قتل عام هزاران زندانی سیاسی توسط رژیم جنایتکار اسلامی
در بیست دومین سالگرد قتل عام زندانیان سیاسی یاد هزاران زندانی سیاسی که در زندانهای جمهوری
اسلامی به قتل رسیده اند ، بخصوص کشتار دسته جمعی زندانیان در دهه 60 و نسل کشی تابستان 76 را
گرامی میداریم
با ردیگر همراه با میلیونها انسان آزادی خواه و دها هزار خانواده جانباختگان برای برچیده شدن بساط
زندان ، شکنجه ،اعدام و رژیم جنایتکار جمهوری اسلامی ایران تلاش میکنیم ، و باردیگر با آرمانهای
بزرگ وانسانی همه جانباختگان راه آزادی ،برابری ، عدالت خواهی و سوسیالیسم تجدید عهد میکنیم
کشتار زندانیان سیاسی ونسل کشی دهه شصت را نه فراموش میکنیم ونه می بخشیم و تا برچیده شدن
پدیده زندان ، شکنجه ،اعدام ومحاکمه همه دست اندرکاران این جنایت هولناک مبارزه وتلاش پیگیری
این خواست برحق دهاهزار خانواده داغدار ادامه خواهد داشت . به همین مناسبت کمیته دفاع از زندانیان
سیاسی ایران مراسم ویژه ای را تدارک دیده است .
زمان . شنبه 18 سپتامبر 2010 از ساعت 17 تا 20
مکان . KULTRHUSET INDRE BY
آدرس . (Ahlefeldtsgade) CHAROTTE AMMUNDSENS PLADS 3
8531 KØBENHAVN K
برگزار کننده .کمیته دفاع از زندانیان سیاسی ایران )دانمارک)
Demonstrationen/folkeoplysningsdagen afholdes loerdag d.18.09.2010, kl.14-16, i naerheden af den Iranske Islamiske statsmoske, ved Glentevej-Vibevej, som led i det internationale samarbejde: http://stopstonningnow.com/wpress/3692, idet vi i Koebenhavn vil samtidig vise, at den statslige sharia-stormoskee paa Vibevej ikke er velkommen. Jeg vil fraraade megafon-larm, idet vi er der ogsaa til at stoette nabolaget mod den larm, uro og undertrykkelse, som en evt. kommende stormoskee vil udsaette dem for. Vi vil som d.28.08.2010 samtale med interesserede forbipasserende - folkeoplysning! Hvorfor tror I, at Islamisk Imperialisme truer og assassinerer vores forfattere, forlaeggere, redaktoerer, tegnere og kunstnere? Det er fordi folkeoplysning om og mod sharia og Islamisk Imperialisme er et effektivt redskab i folkelig modstand mod disse.
Hidtil er 32 byer over hele Verden med i denne kampagnedag for at holde Sakineh og andre truede fanger i live, og for at opfordre Verdenssamfundets til at goere alt hvad der er i vores magt til at stoppe stening, piskning og henrettelser, i Iran og i resten af Verden. Men ogsaa at sikre retfaerdig, sekulaer, civil og humanistisk rettergang for de indsatte og anklagede.
Politiet og kommunen har givet tilladelse til stopstoningnow demonstration/oplysnings-kampagnen ved Glentevej-Vibevej Der vil komme en pressemeddelelse i morgen.
Vejrudsigt fra DMI: Lørdag lidt eller nogen sol, men også spredte byger. Temp. op mellem 12 og 15 grader, og jævn til hård vind omkring vest, ved kysterne endnu lokalt op til kuling.
I London vil der paa samme tid vaere demonstration og oplysningskampagner mod Paven, som man flere inkl. Sam Harris og Richard Dawkins har indstillet til at blive arresteret og stillet for retten for de forbrydelser mod menneskeheden, hvilke han og hans multinationale etablissement er ansvarlige for.
Kl.17: Derefter vil jeg opfordre alle at deltage i konference og sekulaer mindehoejtidighed for de faldne venner, bekendte, familiemedlemmer og kammerater i 1988, under en af de stoerste Holocausts i den Iranske Islamiske stats blodige historie: man kunne kalde den folkemord mod de sekulaere mindretal i Iran, omend der ogsaa blev henrettet mange troende.
Nedenfor brev fra Maryam Namazie om 18. September aktionsdagen paa Engelsk, efterfulgt af Ali Azads brev paa persisk med indkaldelse til moedet om 1988 henrettelserne.
Med venlig hilsen
Pedram Kazemi-Esfarjani, fortsat fuldgyldigt medlem af bestyrelsen i den koebenhavnske forening Fritiran, sekulaert liberalt mindretal.
BILAG: 1- Maryam Namazie's brev vedr. 18. September aktionsdag for Sakineh. 2- Maryam Namazie og venners kampagnes hjemmeside har bragt nedennaevnte analyse af folkemord i Iran 1988; 3- Ali Azad og Komitteen til Forsvar af Politiske Fanger i Iran indklader til moede om 1988 masse-henrettelserne.
Nedenfor en af koordinatorerne, kommunisten Maryam Namazie, saa bedes I forstaa, at dette er en tvaerpolitisk engagement mellem saavel kommunister som liberale. pke
"Hello
Since I last wrote to you Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has again been flogged 99 times for an unveiled photo mistakenly attributed to her . She has also been threatened with execution, and denied visitation rights. Even, her lawyer’s home (Hatoun Kian) has been ransacked and his computer and documents seized. Court documents pertaining to Ms Ashtiani’s husband’s closed murder case have also gone missing.
Her 22-year-old son Sajjad is extremely concerned that the Iranian authorities are trying to frame Ms Ashtiani for his father’s murder by constructing a ‘new’ murder case to refute the stoning sentence. Unfortunately a number of media outlets have bought into the lie (see for example BBC Sunday Morning Live’s bias here). In fact, the press have been given a copy of the actual court judgment of stoning for adultery at a 30 July press conference in London. Also, even the man who has been found guilty of murdering her husband has not been executed. In Iran, under Diyeh laws, the family of the victim can ask for the death penalty to be revoked. Ms Ashtiani’s son explains why he and his 17 year old sister spared the man’s life in an interview with French writer and philosopher, Bernard-Henri Levy.
Despite all the regime’s outrages against Ms Ashtiani, her lawyers and family, on 8 September, a government official had the audacity to deceivingly claim that Ms Ashtiani had not been denied visitation rights, that her televised confession was not made under duress, and that she had not been flogged again. He also went on to say that her execution had been halted when no official documents halting her stoning or execution have been given to her lawyer or family.
Clearly this is yet another one of the regime’s ploys to push back the international campaign in her defence by giving the false impression that Ms Ashtiani is safe.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
On 18 September, we call on citizens everywhere to come out in defence of Ms Ashtiani and against the regime of flogging, stoning and execution. We are also calling for protests during 23-24 September when Ahmadinejad will be addressing the UN General Assembly.
Nothing can and will stop us from defending Sakineh’s precious life and bringing an end to the medieval and barbaric punishments of stoning and execution.
Let’s keep the pressure on.
We look forward to receiving news of your actions and events at actionforsakineh@gmail.com.
Warmest wishes
Maryam
Maryam Namazie
PLEASE ACT NOW!"
http://stopstonningnow.com/wpress/3809
The mass execution of political prisoners in the summer of 1988 was genocide
During the summer of 1988, as a continuation of the massacres and political executions that had taken place from the moment that the regime took power [in 1979], the Islamic Republic perpetrated mass executions of political prisoners. In a hasty operation, several thousand imprisoned opponents of the Islamic Republic were “tried” in minute courts (1) without any legal defense, sentenced to death, and immediately executed. What happened in the summer of ’88 was not only a new wave of political executions, but a genocide (2) against the Islamic Republic’s imprisoned opponents that was designed to systematically decimate and physically eradicate all who opposed the Islamic Republic.
The Iranian Revolution [which marks its beginning in June 2009] turned the eyes of the world towards Iran and blew the dust away from the hazy picture of 31 years of crime and genocide that people have suffered under the rule of the Islamic Republic. Today, the whole world is witness to the bloodthirsty political system confronting Iranian people. The International Campaign to Save Sakineh Ashtiani has drawn the attention of people worldwide to this reality: the Islamic Republic is a regime of stoning, execution, flogging, torture, enslavement of women, and utter denial of peoples’ rights.
Today, 22 years after the tragic genocide carried out against the Islamic Repblic’s opposition in the summer of ’88, and in the midst of efforts to save the life of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani and others sentenced to stoning and execution in Iran, we declare that all leaders of the Islamic Republic must be prosecuted and tried immediately. None of the heads of the Islamic Republic should be permitted to visit other countries. None of them should be permitted to stand behind a podium in front of international bodies and claim to be a representative of Iranian people. All political relationships with the Islamic Republic should be severed, and embassies of this regime of genocide should be closed.
On the 18th of September, people should demonstrate everywhere, and demand the freedom of Sakineh, as well as the legal and practical abolition of stoning, flogging, torture, and execution. Loudly declare that you stand with Iranian people in their endeavor to bring down this regime.
This regime is the murderer of the Iranian people, and it is the shame of all humanity. This regime should be brought to an end.
(1) “Minute courts” is the name given to these summary trials, which lasted less than 5 minutes in total and were followed by immediate execution.
(2) “The Genocide Convention of 1948, to which Iran has been a party since 1949, applies to killings of, or causing serious mental or physical harm to, members of a racial or religious group as such, with intent to destroy that group in whole or in part. The “religious group” that the Iranian regime intended to destroy in the second wave were those in its prisons who had been born Muslim but who had later renounced Islam. Whether or not atheists should count as a “religious group” for the purposes of the Convention, it is clear that persons who are born into a particular faith that they later renounce can be so categorised. This is a feature of the second wave of killings and is one reason why they must, in international law, engage continuing attention. And it must never be forgotten that the first wave of killings, although triggered by fury at the “Mersad” incursion, was based on the conclusion
that the MKO version of Islam was a blasphemy. Both the MKO and the leftists were condemned as moharebs, warriors against God, whose divinely ordained punishment was to be enforced by the state.”
The legal argument for judging the regime to be guilty of genocide begins on page 106.
Robertson, G. 2010. The Massacre of Political Prisoners in Iran, 1988: Report of an Inquiry Conducted by Geoffrey Robertson, Q.C. Washington DC: The Abdorrahman Boroumand Foundation.
به مناسبت بیست ودومین سالگرد قتل عام هزاران زندانی سیاسی توسط رژیم جنایتکار اسلامی
در بیست دومین سالگرد قتل عام زندانیان سیاسی یاد هزاران زندانی سیاسی که در زندانهای جمهوری
اسلامی به قتل رسیده اند ، بخصوص کشتار دسته جمعی زندانیان در دهه 60 و نسل کشی تابستان 76 را
گرامی میداریم
با ردیگر همراه با میلیونها انسان آزادی خواه و دها هزار خانواده جانباختگان برای برچیده شدن بساط
زندان ، شکنجه ،اعدام و رژیم جنایتکار جمهوری اسلامی ایران تلاش میکنیم ، و باردیگر با آرمانهای
بزرگ وانسانی همه جانباختگان راه آزادی ،برابری ، عدالت خواهی و سوسیالیسم تجدید عهد میکنیم
کشتار زندانیان سیاسی ونسل کشی دهه شصت را نه فراموش میکنیم ونه می بخشیم و تا برچیده شدن
پدیده زندان ، شکنجه ،اعدام ومحاکمه همه دست اندرکاران این جنایت هولناک مبارزه وتلاش پیگیری
این خواست برحق دهاهزار خانواده داغدار ادامه خواهد داشت . به همین مناسبت کمیته دفاع از زندانیان
سیاسی ایران مراسم ویژه ای را تدارک دیده است .
زمان . شنبه 18 سپتامبر 2010 از ساعت 17 تا 20
مکان . KULTRHUSET INDRE BY
آدرس . (Ahlefeldtsgade) CHAROTTE AMMUNDSENS PLADS 3
8531 KØBENHAVN K
برگزار کننده .کمیته دفاع از زندانیان سیاسی ایران )دانمارک)
lørdag den 11. september 2010
Saturday 18. Sept. 2010, 14:00-16:00, Glentevej-Vibevej, Copenhagen NV - police permission confirmed. Join September days of action against stoning, execution and flogging
Join September days of action against stoning, execution and flogging
‘Our mother is innocent and should be released unconditionally’
Hello
Since I last wrote to you Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has again been flogged 99 times for an unveiled photo mistakenly attributed to her . She has also been threatened with execution, and denied visitation rights. Even, her lawyer’s home (Hatoun Kian) has been ransacked and his computer and documents seized. Court documents pertaining to Ms Ashtiani’s husband’s closed murder case have also gone missing.
Her 22-year-old son Sajjad is extremely concerned that the Iranian authorities are trying to frame Ms Ashtiani for his father’s murder by constructing a ‘new’ murder case to refute the stoning sentence. Unfortunately a number of media outlets have bought into the lie (see for example BBC Sunday Morning Live’s bias here). In fact, the press have been given a copy of the actual court judgment of stoning for adultery at a 30 July press conference in London. Also, even the man who has been found guilty of murdering her husband has not been executed. In Iran, under Diyeh laws, the family of the victim can ask for the death penalty to be revoked. Ms Ashtiani’s son explains why he and his 17 year old sister spared the man’s life in an interview with French writer and philosopher, Bernard-Henri Levy.
Despite all the regime’s outrages against Ms Ashtiani, her lawyers and family, on 8 September, a government official had the audacity to deceivingly claim that Ms Ashtiani had not been denied visitation rights, that her televised confession was not made under duress, and that she had not been flogged again. He also went on to say that her execution had been halted when no official documents halting her stoning or execution have been given to her lawyer or family.
Clearly this is yet another one of the regime’s ploys to push back the international campaign in her defence by giving the false impression that Ms Ashtiani is safe.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
On 18 September, we call on citizens everywhere to come out in defence of Ms Ashtiani and against the regime of flogging, stoning and execution. We are also calling for protests during 23-24 September when Ahmadinejad will be addressing the UN General Assembly.
Nothing can and will stop us from defending Sakineh’s precious life and bringing an end to the medieval and barbaric punishments of stoning and execution.
Let’s keep the pressure on.
We look forward to receiving news of your actions and events at actionforsakineh@gmail.com.
Warmest wishes
Maryam
Maryam Namazie
PLEASE ACT NOW! http://stopstonningnow.com/wpress/3695
‘Our mother is innocent and should be released unconditionally’
Hello
Since I last wrote to you Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has again been flogged 99 times for an unveiled photo mistakenly attributed to her . She has also been threatened with execution, and denied visitation rights. Even, her lawyer’s home (Hatoun Kian) has been ransacked and his computer and documents seized. Court documents pertaining to Ms Ashtiani’s husband’s closed murder case have also gone missing.
Her 22-year-old son Sajjad is extremely concerned that the Iranian authorities are trying to frame Ms Ashtiani for his father’s murder by constructing a ‘new’ murder case to refute the stoning sentence. Unfortunately a number of media outlets have bought into the lie (see for example BBC Sunday Morning Live’s bias here). In fact, the press have been given a copy of the actual court judgment of stoning for adultery at a 30 July press conference in London. Also, even the man who has been found guilty of murdering her husband has not been executed. In Iran, under Diyeh laws, the family of the victim can ask for the death penalty to be revoked. Ms Ashtiani’s son explains why he and his 17 year old sister spared the man’s life in an interview with French writer and philosopher, Bernard-Henri Levy.
Despite all the regime’s outrages against Ms Ashtiani, her lawyers and family, on 8 September, a government official had the audacity to deceivingly claim that Ms Ashtiani had not been denied visitation rights, that her televised confession was not made under duress, and that she had not been flogged again. He also went on to say that her execution had been halted when no official documents halting her stoning or execution have been given to her lawyer or family.
Clearly this is yet another one of the regime’s ploys to push back the international campaign in her defence by giving the false impression that Ms Ashtiani is safe.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
On 18 September, we call on citizens everywhere to come out in defence of Ms Ashtiani and against the regime of flogging, stoning and execution. We are also calling for protests during 23-24 September when Ahmadinejad will be addressing the UN General Assembly.
Nothing can and will stop us from defending Sakineh’s precious life and bringing an end to the medieval and barbaric punishments of stoning and execution.
Let’s keep the pressure on.
We look forward to receiving news of your actions and events at actionforsakineh@gmail.com.
Warmest wishes
Maryam
Maryam Namazie
PLEASE ACT NOW! http://stopstonningnow.com/wpress/3695
torsdag den 9. september 2010
Fidel to Ahmadinejad: 'Stop Slandering the Jews' + Ahmadi goes to Lebanon
* Published 17:31 09.09.10
* Latest update 17:31 09.09.10
Report: Ahmadinejad to visit Lebanon's border with Israel
Iran announces official presidential visit to Lebanon next month, Ahmadinejad's first since taking office in 2005.
By Jack Khoury Tags: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Iran IAEA Lebanon Saad Hariri
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will make an official visit to Lebanon next month, the Iranian administration said in an official announcement on Thursday.
The visit will be Ahmadinejad's first official visit to Lebanon in the five years since he was elected to office.
Lebanese media reported that Ahmadinejad, who is scheduled to arrive in Lebanon on October 13, was expected to tour the southern part of the country and to visit the county's shared border with Israel.
Lebanese media further reported that during his visit, the Iranian president was expected to meet with his Lebanese counterpart, Michel Suleiman, Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri and senior Hezbollah officials.
Last month, tension between Israel and the Lebanon came to a head when Lebanese soldiers fired at Israeli troops across the border, killing an officer and wounding another. A clash ensued in which two Lebanese soldiers and a journalist were killed.
Ahmadinejad met Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah during a visit to Damascus in February. Hezbollah is an Iranian-backed group which fought a month-long war with Israel in southern Lebanon in 2006.
Earlier this week, the International Atomic Energy Agency revealed in a report that Iran had accelerated its nuclear program and currently possesses a sufficient supply of enriched uranium to make three nuclear devices, assuming it speeds up enrichment to 90 percent.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/un-report-iran-has-enough-uranium-for-three-nuclear-devices-1.312614?localLinksEnabled=false
According to the UN nuclear watchdog, Iran currently has 22 kilograms of uranium enriched at levels of 20 percent, and a total of 2.8 tons of uranium enriched at 3.5 percent. All the uranium is under IAEA supervision and Iran cannot make use of it for military purposes without alerting the international community.
http://www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page/report-ahmadinejad-to-visit-lebanon-s-border-with-israel-1.313064?trailingPath=2.169%2C2.216%2C2.217%2C
Jeffrey Goldberg - National Correspondent for The Atlantic.
Fidel to Ahmadinejad: 'Stop Slandering the Jews'
Sep 7 2010, 12:06 PM ET
(This is Part I of a report on my recent visit to Havana. I hope to post Part II tomorrow. And I also hope to be publishing a more comprehensive article about this subject in a forthcoming print edition of The Atlantic.)
A couple of weeks ago, while I was on vacation, my cell phone rang; it was Jorge Bolanos, the head of the Cuban Interest Section (we of course don't have diplomatic relations with Cuba) in Washington. "I have a message for you from Fidel," he said. This made me sit up straight. "He has read your Atlantic article about Iran and Israel. He invites you to Havana on Sunday to discuss the article." I am always eager, of course, to interact with readers of The Atlantic, so I called a friend at the Council on Foreign Relations, Julia Sweig, who is a preeminent expert on Cuba and Latin America: "Road trip," I said.
MORE ON Fidel Castro:
Jeffrey Goldberg: Castro: "The Cuban model doesn't even work for us anymore."
I quickly departed the People's Republic of Martha's Vineyard for Fidel's more tropical socialist island paradise. Despite the self-defeating American ban on travel to Cuba, both Julia and I, as journalists and researchers, qualified for a State Department exemption. The charter flight from Miami was bursting with Cuban-Americans carrying flat-screen televisions and computers for their technologically-bereft families. Fifty minutes after take-off, we arrived at the mostly-empty Jose Marti International Airport. Fidel's people met us on the tarmac (despite giving up his formal role as commandante en jefe after falling ill several years ago, Fidel still has many people). We were soon deposited at a "protocol house" in a government compound whose architecture reminded me of the gated communities of Boca Raton. The only other guest in this vast enclosure was the president of Guinea-Bissau.
I was aware that Castro had become preoccupied with the threat of a military confrontation in the Middle East between Iran and the U.S. (and Israel, the country he calls its Middle East "gendarme"). Since emerging from his medically induced, four-year purdah early this summer (various gastrointestinal maladies had combined to nearly kill him), the 84-year-old Castro has spoken mainly about the catastrophic threat of what he sees as an inevitable war.
I was curious to know why he saw conflict as unavoidable, and I wondered, of course, if personal experience - the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 that nearly caused the annihilation of most of humanity - informed his belief that a conflict between America and Iran would escalate into nuclear war. I was even more curious, however, to get a glimpse of the great man. Few people had seen him since he fell ill in 2006, and the state of his health has been a subject of much speculation. There were questions, too, about the role he plays now in governing Cuba; he formally handed off power to his younger brother, Raul, two years ago, but it was not clear how many strings Fidel still pulled.
The morning after our arrival in Havana, Julia and I were driven to a nearby convention center, and escorted upstairs, to a large and spare office. A frail and aged Fidel stood to greet us. He was wearing a red shirt, sweatpants, and black New Balance sneakers. The room was crowded with officials and family: His wife, Dalia, and son Antonio, as well as an Interior Ministry general, a translator, a doctor and several bodyguards, all of whom appeared to have been recruited from the Cuban national wrestling team. Two of these bodyguards held Castro at the elbow.
We shook hands, and he greeted Julia warmly; they have known each other for more than twenty years. Fidel lowered himself gently into his seat, and we began a conversation that would continue, in fits and starts, for three days. His body may be frail, but his mind is acute, his energy level is high, and not only that: the late-stage Fidel Castro turns out to possess something of a self-deprecating sense of humor. When I asked him, over lunch, to answer what I've come to think of as the Christopher Hitchens question - has your illness caused you to change your mind about the existence of God? - he answered, "Sorry, I'm still a dialectical materialist." (This is funnier if you are, like me, an ex-self-defined socialist.) At another point, he showed us a series of recent photographs taken of him, one of which portrayed him with a fierce expression. "This was how my face looked when I was angry with Khruschev," he said.
Castro opened our initial meeting by telling me that he read the recent Atlantic article carefully, and that it confirmed his view that Israel and America were moving precipitously and gratuitously toward confrontation with Iran. This interpretation was not surprising, of course: Castro is the grandfather of global anti-Americanism, and he has been a severe critic of Israel. His message to Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, he said, was simple: Israel will only have security if it gives up its nuclear arsenal, and the rest of the world's nuclear powers will only have security if they, too, give up their weapons. Global and simultaneous nuclear disarmament is, of course, a worthy goal, but it is not, in the short term, realistic.
Castro's message to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the President of Iran, was not so abstract, however. Over the course of this first, five-hour discussion, Castro repeatedly returned to his excoriation of anti-Semitism. He criticized Ahmadinejad for denying the Holocaust and explained why the Iranian government would better serve the cause of peace by acknowledging the "unique" history of anti-Semitism and trying to understand why Israelis fear for their existence.
He began this discussion by describing his own, first encounters with anti-Semitism, as a small boy. "I remember when I was a boy - a long time ago - when I was five or six years old and I lived in the countryside," he said, "and I remember Good Friday. What was the atmosphere a child breathed? `Be quiet, God is dead.' God died every year between Thursday and Saturday of Holy Week, and it made a profound impression on everyone. What happened? They would say, `The Jews killed God.' They blamed the Jews for killing God! Do you realize this?"
He went on, "Well, I didn't know what a Jew was. I knew of a bird that was a called a 'Jew,' and so for me the Jews were those birds. These birds had big noses. I don't even know why they were called that. That's what I remember. This is how ignorant the entire population was."
He said the Iranian government should understand the consequences of theological anti-Semitism. "This went on for maybe two thousand years," he said. "I don't think anyone has been slandered more than the Jews. I would say much more than the Muslims. They have been slandered much more than the Muslims because they are blamed and slandered for everything. No one blames the Muslims for anything." The Iranian government should understand that the Jews "were expelled from their land, persecuted and mistreated all over the world, as the ones who killed God. In my judgment here's what happened to them: Reverse selection. What's reverse selection? Over 2,000 years they were subjected to terrible persecution and then to the pogroms. One might have assumed that they would have disappeared; I think their culture and religion kept them together as a nation." He continued: "The Jews have lived an existence that is much harder than ours. There is nothing that compares to the Holocaust." I asked him if he would tell Ahmadinejad what he was telling me. "I am saying this so you can communicate it," he answered.
Castro went on to analyze the conflict between Israel and Iran. He said he understood Iranian fears of Israeli-American aggression and he added that, in his view, American sanctions and Israeli threats will not dissuade the Iranian leadership from pursuing nuclear weapons. "This problem is not going to get resolved, because the Iranians are not going to back down in the face of threats. That's my opinion," he said. He then noted that, unlike Cuba, Iran is a "profoundly religious country," and he said that religious leaders are less apt to compromise. He noted that even secular Cuba has resisted various American demands over the past 50 years.
We returned repeatedly in this first conversation to Castro's fear that a confrontation between the West and Iran could escalate into a nuclear conflict. "The Iranian capacity to inflict damage is not appreciated," he said. "Men think they can control themselves but Obama could overreact and a gradual escalation could become a nuclear war." I asked him if this fear was informed by his own experiences during the 1962 missile crisis, when the Soviet Union and the U.S. nearly went to war other over the presence of nuclear-tipped missiles in Cuba (missiles installed at the invitation, of course, of Fidel Castro). I mentioned to Castro the letter he wrote to Khruschev, the Soviet premier, at the height of the crisis, in which he recommended that the Soviets consider launching a nuclear strike against the U.S. if the Americans attack Cuba. "That would be the time to think about liquidating such a danger forever through a legal right of self-defense," Castro wrote at the time.
I asked him, "At a certain point it seemed logical for you to recommend that the Soviets bomb the U.S. Does what you recommended still seem logical now?" He answered: "After I've seen what I've seen, and knowing what I know now, it wasn't worth it all."
I was surprised to hear Castro express such doubts about his own behavior in the missile crisis - and I was, I admit, also surprised to hear him express such sympathy for Jews, and for Israel's right to exist (which he endorsed unequivocally).
After this first meeting, I asked Julia to explain the meaning of Castro's invitation to me, and of his message to Ahmadinejad. "Fidel is at an early stage of reinventing himself as a senior statesman, not as head of state, on the domestic stage, but primarily on the international stage, which has always been a priority for him," she said. "Matters of war, peace and international security are a central focus: Nuclear proliferation climate change, these are the major issues for him, and he's really just getting started, using any potential media platform to communicate his views. He has time on his hands now that he didn't expect to have. And he's revisiting history, and revisiting his own history."
There is a great deal more to report from this conversation, and from subsequent conversations, which I will do in posts to follow. But I will begin the next post on this subject by describing one of the stranger days I have experienced, a day which began with a simple question from Fidel: "Would you like to go to the aquarium with me to see the dolphin show?"
About the journalist: Jeffrey Goldberg is a National Correspondent for The Atlantic. Before joining The Atlantic in 2007, he was Middle East correspondent, and Washington correspondent, for the New Yorker. Previously, he served as a correspondent for the New York Times Magazine, and New York Magazine. He has also written for the Forward, and was a columnist for The Jerusalem Post.
His book Prisoners has been hailed as one of the best books of 2006 by the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Slate Magazine, the Progressive, Washingtonian Magazine, and Playboy. Goldberg is the recipient of the 2003 National Magazine Award for Reporting for his coverage of Islamic terrorism. He is also the winner of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists prize for best international investigative journalist; the Overseas Press Club award for best human rights reporting; and the Abraham Cahan Prize in Journalism. He is also the recipient of 2005's Anti-Defamation League Daniel Pearl Prize.
In 2001, Goldberg was appointed the Syrkin Fellow in Letters of the Jerusalem Foundation and was appointed in 2002 to be a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C.
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* Latest update 17:31 09.09.10
Report: Ahmadinejad to visit Lebanon's border with Israel
Iran announces official presidential visit to Lebanon next month, Ahmadinejad's first since taking office in 2005.
By Jack Khoury Tags: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad Iran IAEA Lebanon Saad Hariri
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will make an official visit to Lebanon next month, the Iranian administration said in an official announcement on Thursday.
The visit will be Ahmadinejad's first official visit to Lebanon in the five years since he was elected to office.
Lebanese media reported that Ahmadinejad, who is scheduled to arrive in Lebanon on October 13, was expected to tour the southern part of the country and to visit the county's shared border with Israel.
Lebanese media further reported that during his visit, the Iranian president was expected to meet with his Lebanese counterpart, Michel Suleiman, Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri and senior Hezbollah officials.
Last month, tension between Israel and the Lebanon came to a head when Lebanese soldiers fired at Israeli troops across the border, killing an officer and wounding another. A clash ensued in which two Lebanese soldiers and a journalist were killed.
Ahmadinejad met Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah during a visit to Damascus in February. Hezbollah is an Iranian-backed group which fought a month-long war with Israel in southern Lebanon in 2006.
Earlier this week, the International Atomic Energy Agency revealed in a report that Iran had accelerated its nuclear program and currently possesses a sufficient supply of enriched uranium to make three nuclear devices, assuming it speeds up enrichment to 90 percent.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/un-report-iran-has-enough-uranium-for-three-nuclear-devices-1.312614?localLinksEnabled=false
According to the UN nuclear watchdog, Iran currently has 22 kilograms of uranium enriched at levels of 20 percent, and a total of 2.8 tons of uranium enriched at 3.5 percent. All the uranium is under IAEA supervision and Iran cannot make use of it for military purposes without alerting the international community.
http://www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page/report-ahmadinejad-to-visit-lebanon-s-border-with-israel-1.313064?trailingPath=2.169%2C2.216%2C2.217%2C
Jeffrey Goldberg - National Correspondent for The Atlantic.
Fidel to Ahmadinejad: 'Stop Slandering the Jews'
Sep 7 2010, 12:06 PM ET
(This is Part I of a report on my recent visit to Havana. I hope to post Part II tomorrow. And I also hope to be publishing a more comprehensive article about this subject in a forthcoming print edition of The Atlantic.)
A couple of weeks ago, while I was on vacation, my cell phone rang; it was Jorge Bolanos, the head of the Cuban Interest Section (we of course don't have diplomatic relations with Cuba) in Washington. "I have a message for you from Fidel," he said. This made me sit up straight. "He has read your Atlantic article about Iran and Israel. He invites you to Havana on Sunday to discuss the article." I am always eager, of course, to interact with readers of The Atlantic, so I called a friend at the Council on Foreign Relations, Julia Sweig, who is a preeminent expert on Cuba and Latin America: "Road trip," I said.
MORE ON Fidel Castro:
Jeffrey Goldberg: Castro: "The Cuban model doesn't even work for us anymore."
I quickly departed the People's Republic of Martha's Vineyard for Fidel's more tropical socialist island paradise. Despite the self-defeating American ban on travel to Cuba, both Julia and I, as journalists and researchers, qualified for a State Department exemption. The charter flight from Miami was bursting with Cuban-Americans carrying flat-screen televisions and computers for their technologically-bereft families. Fifty minutes after take-off, we arrived at the mostly-empty Jose Marti International Airport. Fidel's people met us on the tarmac (despite giving up his formal role as commandante en jefe after falling ill several years ago, Fidel still has many people). We were soon deposited at a "protocol house" in a government compound whose architecture reminded me of the gated communities of Boca Raton. The only other guest in this vast enclosure was the president of Guinea-Bissau.
I was aware that Castro had become preoccupied with the threat of a military confrontation in the Middle East between Iran and the U.S. (and Israel, the country he calls its Middle East "gendarme"). Since emerging from his medically induced, four-year purdah early this summer (various gastrointestinal maladies had combined to nearly kill him), the 84-year-old Castro has spoken mainly about the catastrophic threat of what he sees as an inevitable war.
I was curious to know why he saw conflict as unavoidable, and I wondered, of course, if personal experience - the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 that nearly caused the annihilation of most of humanity - informed his belief that a conflict between America and Iran would escalate into nuclear war. I was even more curious, however, to get a glimpse of the great man. Few people had seen him since he fell ill in 2006, and the state of his health has been a subject of much speculation. There were questions, too, about the role he plays now in governing Cuba; he formally handed off power to his younger brother, Raul, two years ago, but it was not clear how many strings Fidel still pulled.
The morning after our arrival in Havana, Julia and I were driven to a nearby convention center, and escorted upstairs, to a large and spare office. A frail and aged Fidel stood to greet us. He was wearing a red shirt, sweatpants, and black New Balance sneakers. The room was crowded with officials and family: His wife, Dalia, and son Antonio, as well as an Interior Ministry general, a translator, a doctor and several bodyguards, all of whom appeared to have been recruited from the Cuban national wrestling team. Two of these bodyguards held Castro at the elbow.
We shook hands, and he greeted Julia warmly; they have known each other for more than twenty years. Fidel lowered himself gently into his seat, and we began a conversation that would continue, in fits and starts, for three days. His body may be frail, but his mind is acute, his energy level is high, and not only that: the late-stage Fidel Castro turns out to possess something of a self-deprecating sense of humor. When I asked him, over lunch, to answer what I've come to think of as the Christopher Hitchens question - has your illness caused you to change your mind about the existence of God? - he answered, "Sorry, I'm still a dialectical materialist." (This is funnier if you are, like me, an ex-self-defined socialist.) At another point, he showed us a series of recent photographs taken of him, one of which portrayed him with a fierce expression. "This was how my face looked when I was angry with Khruschev," he said.
Castro opened our initial meeting by telling me that he read the recent Atlantic article carefully, and that it confirmed his view that Israel and America were moving precipitously and gratuitously toward confrontation with Iran. This interpretation was not surprising, of course: Castro is the grandfather of global anti-Americanism, and he has been a severe critic of Israel. His message to Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, he said, was simple: Israel will only have security if it gives up its nuclear arsenal, and the rest of the world's nuclear powers will only have security if they, too, give up their weapons. Global and simultaneous nuclear disarmament is, of course, a worthy goal, but it is not, in the short term, realistic.
Castro's message to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the President of Iran, was not so abstract, however. Over the course of this first, five-hour discussion, Castro repeatedly returned to his excoriation of anti-Semitism. He criticized Ahmadinejad for denying the Holocaust and explained why the Iranian government would better serve the cause of peace by acknowledging the "unique" history of anti-Semitism and trying to understand why Israelis fear for their existence.
He began this discussion by describing his own, first encounters with anti-Semitism, as a small boy. "I remember when I was a boy - a long time ago - when I was five or six years old and I lived in the countryside," he said, "and I remember Good Friday. What was the atmosphere a child breathed? `Be quiet, God is dead.' God died every year between Thursday and Saturday of Holy Week, and it made a profound impression on everyone. What happened? They would say, `The Jews killed God.' They blamed the Jews for killing God! Do you realize this?"
He went on, "Well, I didn't know what a Jew was. I knew of a bird that was a called a 'Jew,' and so for me the Jews were those birds. These birds had big noses. I don't even know why they were called that. That's what I remember. This is how ignorant the entire population was."
He said the Iranian government should understand the consequences of theological anti-Semitism. "This went on for maybe two thousand years," he said. "I don't think anyone has been slandered more than the Jews. I would say much more than the Muslims. They have been slandered much more than the Muslims because they are blamed and slandered for everything. No one blames the Muslims for anything." The Iranian government should understand that the Jews "were expelled from their land, persecuted and mistreated all over the world, as the ones who killed God. In my judgment here's what happened to them: Reverse selection. What's reverse selection? Over 2,000 years they were subjected to terrible persecution and then to the pogroms. One might have assumed that they would have disappeared; I think their culture and religion kept them together as a nation." He continued: "The Jews have lived an existence that is much harder than ours. There is nothing that compares to the Holocaust." I asked him if he would tell Ahmadinejad what he was telling me. "I am saying this so you can communicate it," he answered.
Castro went on to analyze the conflict between Israel and Iran. He said he understood Iranian fears of Israeli-American aggression and he added that, in his view, American sanctions and Israeli threats will not dissuade the Iranian leadership from pursuing nuclear weapons. "This problem is not going to get resolved, because the Iranians are not going to back down in the face of threats. That's my opinion," he said. He then noted that, unlike Cuba, Iran is a "profoundly religious country," and he said that religious leaders are less apt to compromise. He noted that even secular Cuba has resisted various American demands over the past 50 years.
We returned repeatedly in this first conversation to Castro's fear that a confrontation between the West and Iran could escalate into a nuclear conflict. "The Iranian capacity to inflict damage is not appreciated," he said. "Men think they can control themselves but Obama could overreact and a gradual escalation could become a nuclear war." I asked him if this fear was informed by his own experiences during the 1962 missile crisis, when the Soviet Union and the U.S. nearly went to war other over the presence of nuclear-tipped missiles in Cuba (missiles installed at the invitation, of course, of Fidel Castro). I mentioned to Castro the letter he wrote to Khruschev, the Soviet premier, at the height of the crisis, in which he recommended that the Soviets consider launching a nuclear strike against the U.S. if the Americans attack Cuba. "That would be the time to think about liquidating such a danger forever through a legal right of self-defense," Castro wrote at the time.
I asked him, "At a certain point it seemed logical for you to recommend that the Soviets bomb the U.S. Does what you recommended still seem logical now?" He answered: "After I've seen what I've seen, and knowing what I know now, it wasn't worth it all."
I was surprised to hear Castro express such doubts about his own behavior in the missile crisis - and I was, I admit, also surprised to hear him express such sympathy for Jews, and for Israel's right to exist (which he endorsed unequivocally).
After this first meeting, I asked Julia to explain the meaning of Castro's invitation to me, and of his message to Ahmadinejad. "Fidel is at an early stage of reinventing himself as a senior statesman, not as head of state, on the domestic stage, but primarily on the international stage, which has always been a priority for him," she said. "Matters of war, peace and international security are a central focus: Nuclear proliferation climate change, these are the major issues for him, and he's really just getting started, using any potential media platform to communicate his views. He has time on his hands now that he didn't expect to have. And he's revisiting history, and revisiting his own history."
There is a great deal more to report from this conversation, and from subsequent conversations, which I will do in posts to follow. But I will begin the next post on this subject by describing one of the stranger days I have experienced, a day which began with a simple question from Fidel: "Would you like to go to the aquarium with me to see the dolphin show?"
About the journalist: Jeffrey Goldberg is a National Correspondent for The Atlantic. Before joining The Atlantic in 2007, he was Middle East correspondent, and Washington correspondent, for the New Yorker. Previously, he served as a correspondent for the New York Times Magazine, and New York Magazine. He has also written for the Forward, and was a columnist for The Jerusalem Post.
His book Prisoners has been hailed as one of the best books of 2006 by the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Slate Magazine, the Progressive, Washingtonian Magazine, and Playboy. Goldberg is the recipient of the 2003 National Magazine Award for Reporting for his coverage of Islamic terrorism. He is also the winner of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists prize for best international investigative journalist; the Overseas Press Club award for best human rights reporting; and the Abraham Cahan Prize in Journalism. He is also the recipient of 2005's Anti-Defamation League Daniel Pearl Prize.
In 2001, Goldberg was appointed the Syrkin Fellow in Letters of the Jerusalem Foundation and was appointed in 2002 to be a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C.
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