The Latest from Iran (9 October): Threats and Two Responses

1725 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Several students at Amir Kabir University have received a total of 20 years of prison sentences.

Parvin Javadzadeh, arrested after an Ashura procession in December, has been released on $300,000 bail. 

Blogger Hossein Ronaghi-Maleki (Babak Khorammdin), sentenced this week to 15 years in prison, is reportedly in poor health because of a hunger strike. 

1720 GMT: Economy Warning. In advanced of planned subsidy cuts, Mehr warns that prices will rise in Aban (October/November) for seven energy items: gasoline, gasoil, white oil, blast-furnace gas, liquid gas, natural gas, and electricity.

On another front, Mohammad Atarodian, secretary general of employer's association, has said the official figure on unemployment of 14.6% is surely too low, because it counts people as "employed" if they work one hour per week.

1700 GMT: A Key Conservative Lashes Out. The words of Mohsen Rezaei, former Presidential candidate and Secretary of the Expediency Council, may be awkwardly coded: "A group is stopping the Revolution highway, another group is getting out of it....Some want to leave this highway in the name of freedom."

However, his target soon emerges: "The government has no plan, it fails to settle major problems like unemployment. Monopoly doesn't solve domestic problems; it is nothing but populism at best and idiocy at worst."

1650 GMT: I'm Taking on Everybody. Ayatollah Mohammad Yazdi is in a fighting mood....

The prominent cleric said that his differences with former President Hashemi Rafsanjani are "insurmountable". However, given his "hard-line" status, his comments on the President and his men were even more striking. Mohammad Yazdi said some Ahmadinejad actions were wrong, especially those connected with Presidential Chief of Staff Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai.

The ayatollah continued that Rahim Mashai is so obsolete that "I and other members of Jame'eye Modarressin (the Association of Teachers and Researchers of Qom)don't even want to meet him", even as Mashai spends a lot of money to the become next President.

On more conventional ground, Mohammad Yazdi claimed that sedition was supported by domestic and foreign sources but had failed and its leaders were now alone: "The Supreme Leader had managed to stop regime change."

1645 GMT: Tough Talk of the Day. Our favourite foreigner-bashing Vice President, Mohammad Reza Rahimi, has excelled again. Closing the 10th International Industrial Fair in Tehran, he said, "We are able to punish the economies of states depending on USA severely. The French economy will fall with a frown from us, for example, we can cancel $2.5 billion of imports of Peugeot parts and return France to the situation of 100 years ago."

1635 GMT: The Budget Dispute. Khabar Online reports that 60% of the 5th Budget Plan (2010-2015) had been contested between Parliament and the Government, especially the framework for the government's spending.

However, in a shift in tone from the previous hostility of Khabar --- linked to Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani --- towards the Government, the website asserts that both sides are ready to compromise and a mediation commission is working hard to find a solution. 

1630 GMT: Sorry, Mahmoud Will Not Throw Stones. Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast has said, "The circulated story that the Iranian President [planning to] throw stones at the Israeli border is not true. [This rumor] is the latest in a series of attempts to undermine President Ahmadinejad's visit to Lebanon."

The President's office has said the trip to Lebanon is imminent, though details have not been publicly announced.

The London-based al-Quds al-Arabi had reported --- as we noted on EA --- that Ahmadinejad intended to "make a symbolic gesture and throw stones towards the Zionist entity".

1450 GMT: Currency Watch. Khabar Online reports that some traders are refusing to sell foreign currency to individual buyers because of shortages.

1430 GMT: Supreme Leader Watch. So what's Ayatollah Khamenei up to today? Well, he's putting out this message to Iranian officials in a speech: "Islamic nations and governments should be careful of the plotting of the enemy."

1405 GMT: Breaking the Reformists? The latest salvo in the battle over whether the Islamic Iran Participation Front has been banned....

Kalemeh has published what it claims is the court order in favour of the IIPF's continued activities.

1140 GMT: Nuke Talks Soon? Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki has said that Iran is ready to hold talks with the "5+1" powers (US, Britain, France, Germany, China, Russia) over uranium enrichment: "We think late October or early November will be an appropriate date for the talks by the representatives of Iran and 5+1 countries." 

0950 GMT: Making Friends in Beirut. A week before President Ahmadinejad's planned visit to Lebanon, Tehran has agreed to provide $450 million in financing to the Lebanese electricity, water, and oil sectors.

The agreement was signed by the Iranian and Lebanese Ministers of Energy on Friday.

0930 GMT: Philosophical Debates. Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Evan Goldstein reviews the argument over the plans of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization to hold World Philosophy Day in Tehran in November. More than 50 philosophers, including Iranian exile Ramin Jahanbegloo and Jurgen Habermas, have written an open letter to UNESCO that philosophical exchange is impossible in a country where "one can be imprisoned and risk one's life...because of one's ideas".

Despite the protest, UNESCO is standing firm. A spokeswoman, asked if Iranian philosophers will be able to speak freely in Tehran, replied, "We haven't had any feedback suggesting that this will not be the case."

0645 GMT: Labour Front. Workers at Kaghaz Pars Haftapeh, a paper mill in southwestern Iran, and a petrochemical plant in Asaluyeh have gone on strike this week over unpaid wages.

One worker at the paper mill said, "The plant's retired workers have not received their pensions since last year -- they live in absolute poverty."

0630 GMT: Today's All-is-Well Alert. Minister of Economy Shamseddin Hosseini, in Washington for meetings of the International Monetary Fund, has declared at a press conference, "After these sanctions we are a much stronger country."

Hosseini acknowledged that the sanctions "cause some kind of problem for us...[but] when people solve problems, they get stronger".

Amidst reports of Iran's currency and trading difficulties, the minister insisted, "The world is big and the people who are trading (with us) find ways to transfer money," and said "there is no substantive obstacle" to Tehran finding dollars.

Hosseini was a bit miffed, however, that the World Bank has declined loans to Tehran, refusing since 2005 to consider a new lending strategy: "The shocking point is that, based on inquiry made from the legal department of the World Bank, the developmental and humanitarian projects are excluded from the imposed sanctions on Iran."

0600 GMT: We start this morning with stories of threats and two responses.

The US State Department has updated its travel advisory for American citizens who may be considering a visit to Iran. It is a classic of bureaucratic understatement. Consider, for example, "dual national Iranian-American citizens may encounter difficulty in departing Iran", given that Iranian-American economist Kian Tajbakhsh is still under house arrest after his five-year sentence (originally it was 15). Or, "U.S. citizens may be subject to harassment or arrest while traveling or residing in Iran", given the ongoing detention of two of the three American hikers --- Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer --- arrested in July 2009.  

But, of course, the more widespread threat is not to Americans but to Iranians. On the political prisoner front, news comes in that attorney Hassan Sarchahi, detained during the Ashura demonstrations of December, has been sentenced to two years in prison. 

What then can be done? We post two responses today in separate entries: Heshmatollah Tabarzardi, journalist and activist, speaks out as he is sentenced to nine years in prison, and Mehdi Karroubi tells Iranian youth: "This situation of governing the country will not last as is. These events will pass and  pride and victory will belong to the Iranian nation."