Iran: Text of Mousavi's Statement to Supporters (1 July)

The Latest from Iran (1 July): The Opposition Regroups

Receive our latest updates by email or RSS- SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FEED

From the website of the National Iranian American Council:

As expected, the Guardian Council finally certified the election results after putting up a show that did not attract anyone’s attention, and ignoring all the fraud and violations that took place…From now on, we will have a government which is in the worst shape in terms of its relationship to the nation, and the majority of the people, including myself, do not accept its legitimacy. “…” It is feared that because of the numerous inherent weaknesses of [this government], it will fall in the trap of granting advantages to the aliens.

People’s trust [in the government] has been lost and denying this fact will not be beneficial. …A regime that relied on people’s trust for 30 year cannot replace that trust with military force overnight. … How can people trust a government that imprisons their friends, colleagues and children based on its own illusions? A military environment only hurts people’s feelings towards the regime. Free media are the respiratory channels of a healthy society; to regain people’s trust do not clog these channels…We alienate everyone from ourselves with smallest excuses…until we are all alone. This is not the way of the Islamic Revolution or Islam, which opens its arms to everyone.....

Despite what happened, we have not lost our great dreams…during the past few months.…All the efforts against you is to make you lose hope in the fruitfulness of your legal protests. It is our historic responsibility to continue our protest and not abandon our efforts to demand the rights of the people. It is our religious obligation not to allow the revolution and the regime to be transformed to something that is rejected by Islam. It is our revolutionary responsibility not to allow the blood of thousands of martyrs to be degraded to a military regime.…

I encourage all the decision-making bureaus not to act like the Guardian Council and leave room to repair mistakes. “…” Our story, no matter how bitter, is a family dispute. If we act prematurely and allow the foreigners to intervene, we will soon regret it. We are at a time when the solution to many of our problems is law. True! Law is not always without flaws. True! Common law is a social contract and like any agreement, it has to be obeyed as long as both parties are committed to it. True! Your (people’s) opposition undermines the constitution; it deprives you from your right to assemble; even if you tie a green piece of cloth to your wrist as a sign of protest, the same people who are responsible for security beat you up. “…” However, our efforts are not to get revenge. Our movement is an attempt to correct and improve our country. To reach this goal, we have to respect even the corpse of law because we know that tomorrow, when we reach our goals, the first thing we need to establish is a commitment to law. “…”

I invite all of you to brotherhood. Our victory depends on your collaboration and this includes the people who voted for other [candidates.] Even those who are against us now and resort to violence share our brotherhood. Because we seek a future where even the person who has beaten our sister and brother in the street [will have a better life.]

At first our goal was to return religious wisdom to the management of our country but in the process, we have been led to higher goals. “…” Today, the public demands the handling of the elections with competency in a way that it would gain national trust and leaves no room for lies and fraud. This has become an undeniable public request…

Several characters and groups have come to me and asked me to forgive what happened in the past. Perhaps they do not realize that I let go off my own personal rights from the beginning. But the issue of the elections was not and is not a personal matter. I cannot let go of or compromise people’s rights which have been violated. The issue is our regime’s republicanism and even its Islamic character. If we do not stand up, there will be no guarantee that what happened in recent elections will not happen in the future. A group of elite are going to come together and create a legal organization to safeguard the dishonored rights and votes of the people by publishing the documents and proofs of fraud and referring to judicial courts. They will regularly announce the results to the people. I will also join this group. This group will demand the enforcement of the constitutional articles that have been violated and in addition, it will pursue the following:

* Stop security and military involvement in electoral issues and return the country to its normal political environment
* Revise the electoral laws in order to eliminate the possibility of widespread fraud and guarantee the neutrality of the overseeing agencies
* Observance of article 27 of the constitution regarding freedom of assembly
* Freedom of the media
* Reactivate independent news websites
* Ban illegal government intervention in communication channels such as Internet, text messaging, and prevent the disconnection of phones and eavesdropping on people’s conversations
* Stop biased treatments, accusations, lies and insults on the state media
* Have independent TV channels inside and outside the country
* Issue permits for social, political, cultural and economic gatherings
* Release of all political prisoners, annulment of all forged security cases

In the end, I wish peace upon all the honorable people of our country, whether they voted for my or not, and especially those who were injured during the recent unfortunate events. I also pay tribute to the martyrs who rolled in their blood in pursuit of their rights and freedom and I ask the almighty god to give their families patience.

Iran: Scott Lucas Audio Interview with Fintan Dunne

The Latest from Iran (1 July): The Opposition Regroups

Receive our latest updates by email or RSS- SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FEED

Fintan Dunne, a freelance journalist who has already spoken with Professor Muhammad Sahimi of Tehran Bureau and with Professor Hamid Dabashi, was one of the most demanding interviews I've done recently but also one of the most rewarding, covering both the immediate and long-term conflicts and possibilities in the Iranian situation.

Iran: The Post-Election Challenge from Qom's Clerics

Iran: The “Ghaffari Tape” Criticising the Supreme Leader
The Latest from Iran (1 July): The Opposition Regroups

Receive our latest updates by email or RSS- SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FEED

In the furour over the Presidential election, the most intriguing political contest may have taken place, behind the street scenes, in Iran's religious centre, south of Tehran in the dusty city of Qom.

Within 72 hours of the 12 June vote, the clerics of Qom's seminaries had taken their place on the political stage. Former President Hashemi Rafsanjani tried to mobilise them for a public challenge to President Ahmadinejad's victory. That initial attempt failed; indeed it is a key reasons why Rafsanjani then kept a careful silence before an equally careful, "balanced" return to public life with his speech last Sunday. There would be no mass movement of the religious leadership behind any campaign. Instead, factions already aligned to particular political movements would reassert their positions. The Association of Combatant Clerics would ally itself with the efforts of former President Mohammad Khatami and, thus, Mir Hossein Mousavi; Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi, prominent on the Guardian Council, would bolster Ahmadinejad's position.

As the public demonstrations against the election swell, some Western media noted the possible significance of Qom, indeed over-dramatising a possible "split" in the Iranian system; conversely, as the public challenge has been contained, notions of a clerical challenge receded. That, too, is a mistake: the debate not only over the election but over the guardianship of Iran's Islamic Revolution continues.

While there still has been no significant show of support for the President (note Press TV's slightly strained attempt this morning, via an interview with a clerical member of Parliament, to say, "No one is talking about the election anymore), opposition has emerged in scattered but sometimes dramatic ways. The criticism of Ayatollah Montazeri, the one-time successor to Ayatollah Khomeini, was to be expected; the current regime, led by Montazeri's replacement, Ayatollah Ali Khameini, still keeps the cleric under house arrest. He is not alone, however. Ayatollah Bayat-Zanjani has claimed that the Iranian system is moving away from Khomeini's path and thoughts. Ayatollam Mousavi-Ardebili has criticised violence against the protestors and said recent events have weakened Iran's political and religious institutions. Ayatollah Javadi-Amoli has expressed displeasure. Ayatollah Makarem-Shirazi and Ayatollah Sane’i have made gentler interventions, and Ayatollah Haeri-Shirazi has written a careful but still challenging letter to the Supreme Leader. There are reports of "secret" meetings between Ayatollahs to consider developments and longer-term prospects.

The most dramatic challenge has come in a statement by Ayatollah Hadi Ghaffari on Ayatollah Khamenei. The leaked
audio on YouTube has created a stir with Ghaffari's criticism of the Supreme Leader's post-election conduct: Khamenei has ruined the honour of clerics with his handling of the political situation. (First reports said that Ghaffari had gone as far as to insult Khamenei as a "corpse-washer".) The ideals of Ayatollah Khomeini and the Islamic Revolution are not being defended but destroyed.

None of this points to a Qom-led coup against President Ahmadinejad and, more importantly, Khamenei. On the other hand, these concerns are part of a much wider, more significant story of years past and years to come.

The Western caricature of Iran is that of a "theocracy" in which the "mullahs" hold power, working with secular politicians. That misconception misses the reality that a large section of Iran's clerical establishment are no friends of Ahmadinejad, whose policies and pronouncements have been seen as a challenge to the Iran envisaged by Ayatollah Khomeini. Indeed, it is not even accurate to speak on a unified clerical movement behind the Supreme Leader, whose selection in 1989 was a surprise to many --- given his relative junior status --- and has been seen as a triumph of politicians (ironically, given recent events, as part of manoeuvres by Hashemi Rafsanjani for authority) rather than a religious succession.

No surprise then that another video has supposedly resurfaced, this one of Ayatollah Montazeri considering the Iranian system of clerical authority, Velayat-e-Faqih, as he criticises Ayatollah Khameini. The text is clear: religion's true and proper place in the growth of the Islamic Republic has become "politicised" and thus corrupted.

And that is why the Presidential vote has a lasting significance, whatever happens in the near future with the demonstrations. Those ballot boxes are a symbol of the wider corruption that Montazeri claimed was undermining the Revolution. And, long after they have been put away, their symbolism --- whatever actually happened on 12 June --- remains.

As pne of our correspondents noted, after a lengthy glance at Qom last week, "This is not over."

Iran Audio and Text: The "Ghaffari Tape" Criticising the Supreme Leader

Iran: The Post-Election Challenge from the Clerics of Qom
The Latest from Iran (1 July): The Opposition Regroups

Receive our latest updates by email or RSS- SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FEED

Last week, Ayatollah Hadi Ghaffari made a lengthy speech criticising the post-election conduct of the Iranian Government. That in itself was not surprising; other clerics have expressed unease with the events of the last three weeks. Ghaffari went further, however, with his direct challenge to the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Unsurprisingly, the leaked audio has created a stir inside and outside Iran. Another copy on YouTube is overlaid with less-than-flattering caricatures of Khamenei.

The audio is in Farsi, of course. Translated extracts, provided by the National Iranian American Committee, follow:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FvNOK3LJtMY[/youtube]

GHAFFARI: Khamenei, your recent actions and behavior has brought shame to us clerics. Our image in the streets and bazaars has been tarnished as everyone is placing us in the same category as Ahmadinejad....Khamenei, you are wrong, your actions are wrong. I believe in the Velayat-e-faqih [system of clerical authority] more than you....

I’m not preaching these messages so that I could be associated with the West. I loathe the West and will fight to the last drop of my blood before I or my land succumbs to the West. On the contrary, I’m preaching these messages on the count that the respect for our profession is gone....

Young people are not praying anymore, whose fault is that? It is your fault Mr. Khamenei, it’s your fault for placing us in the same line as that lunatic Ahmadinejad....Ahmadinejad is nobody, you should congregate with us instead of him.