Iran Live Coverage: "Free Elections" and Detained Journalists

See also Iran Analysis: Nervous About Elections, The Regime Imprisons Journalists
Iran Breaking: The Space Monkey Could Be A Nuclear Warhead
Monday's Iran Live Coverage: This Weekend's Crackdown on the Press --- Why?

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2000 GMT: Press Watch. The conservative sites Tabnak and Baztab, as well as Iranian History, have been blocked inside Iran.

Tabnak, linked to leading politician Mohsen Rezaei, was suspended on Sunday amid a crackdown on the press. Baztab has been notable for its criticism of the Ahmadinejad Government.

It is unclear why Iranian History has been blocked.

1946 GMT: Corruption Watch. Farshad Heydari, the managing director of the Central Bank, has explained the real reason why news emerged in autumn 2011 of a $2.6 billion bank fraud: traitors published it to stain the Ahmadniejad Government.

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Iran Story: The Movie, The President, and the "Hidden Imam"

The "End Times" film about the Hidden Imam --- translation is by Reza Kahlili, a US-based critic of the Iranian regime

We begin this morning with a look at a curious, tangled story which has run for several weeks --- it includes a movie, President Ahmadinejad, and the "Hidden Imam", the 12th Imam of Shi'a who will return at some point.

This weekend Ali Asghar Sijani, the producer of a film about the Hidden Imam which has widely circulated on CD in Iran, declared that the epiphany of the 12th Imam is near. He added that the Supreme Leader led the movement welcoming the imminent return, and Ahmadinejad was the prophet Shoaib (a rough parallel in Christianity would be of John the Baptist paving the way for Jesus the Messiah). Sijani said that part of the $15 million cost of the film was funded by the Revolutionary Guards.

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