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Entries in Iran Elections 2009 (82)

Saturday
Sep262009

Iran: The "Die Zeit" Article on Opposition and Change

The Latest from Iran (27 September): Is There a Compromise Brewing?
The Latest from Iran (26 September): The False Flag of the Nuke Issue

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IRAN GREENFor days, there has been a buzz about an article in the German newspaper Die Zeit. Most of it is a summary profile of the opposition in Iran, but deep in the article, there is the claim of "preparations for a new government", including "a group of five to eight clerics" on fixed terms to replace the Supreme Leader and President Ahmadinejad's resignation in favour of Tehran Mayor Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf. The translation is by Paleene on the Anonymous Iran site:


The Green is not fading out

Protest of the mothers and planning for the Day X: How the Iranian opposition organizes and continues to fight.

BY CHARLOTTE WIEDEMANN

In a live broadcast on Iranian state television a mullah gives spiritual advice. An in-caller is talking about her marital problems, then she suddenly says: "Coincidentally, my husband has the same name as our newly elected president, Mir Hussein Mousavi," The moderator silences, the program is interrupted.

On money you will nowadays often find a green victory sign or the words "Down with the dictatorship”. Or a thumbnail portrait of Neda, the best known dead from the unrest in the days after the election in June. The print works give a professional impression, instructions circulate on the internet.

A football match in Isfahan, many spectators wearing green. The television cameras are trying to avoid these images. However, Green is the colour of the football club in Isfahan; now the club is requested to find a different colour.

The movement for democracy is visible in Iran, despite of all repression, torture and show trials. It is not strong enough to stop the Ahmadinejad government. But it is strong enough to keep the country in tension. Because meetings are banned, official occasions are subverted, eg. last Friday: During the anti‐Israel Quds rallies tens of thousands held their fingers up forming the V‐sign, demanded the release of imprisoned reformers. On this day, an experience from June repeated and changed the psychology of society: It is possible to take to the streets and defy prohibitions. It is dangerous but possible.
Another hidden source of energy is feeding the green movement; it has conciliated generations in families, bridging the gap between the old, who revolted 30 years ago, and the young, suffering from the outcomes today. Thus, sons started talking with their fathers again.

Every Saturday afternoon, the mothers of the killed protestors gather silently in Tehran's Laleh Park, all dressed in black . Other women surround them in silent solidarity. On a list of 72 dead, who are known by name, there are also workers, shoe salesmen, small employees. How the battle lines harden can be observed by the violation of previously existing taboos. Mohammad Khatami, the ex‐president, was pushed to the ground last Friday, his black turban torn down. In the first place, the usually moderate Khatami had accused the regime of "fascist" methods.

There is almost no way back after such actions and words. The events in Iran roll forward with a tenacious implacability. But where to? And can anyone control this process?

The young look forward to the great turning point, the elders are afraid of the chaos

The young, the students whose creativity influenced the aesthetics of the movement, still burn for the hope of something great to happen, a radical change ‐ in the system as in their lives. More prudent Iranians fear the power vacuum of a regime falling apart rapidly.

The 68‐year‐old Mir Hussein Mousavi, a candidate in June, remains the figurehead for all sides; but it is the width of the movement which makes him virtually incapable of acting. Coming from the system himself, the former prime minister wants to win as many of Ahmadinejad's conservative opponents as possible. For the moderates within the nomenklatura, Mousavi offers a great advantage, an insider explaine: "You know, he might take away their power, but not their lives.” But at the same time Mousavi has to appear unyielding, if he doesn’t want to lose the support of the young, and of the modern middle classes.

On the street outside his home, the regime has installed surveillance cameras. When Mousavi leaves home, a double cordon accompanies him: his own people and a troop of the Revolutionary Guard. The danger of being arrested is become greater for the leading group, so earlier plans for founding a party or a mass organization were discarded. The movement for democracy is to expand as a "network" which can’t be banned.

“Everyone appreciating the Iranian and Islamic identity of the country as a value and the constitution as the fundament for action is welcome "said Alireza Beheshti, a close adviser Mousavi. “The framework of the Islamic Republic should remain, but with corrections”, can be heard in Mousavi’s vicinity. Especially the civil rights under the constitution should show to advantage, including freedom of expression and freedom of assembly.

In his statements "to the people of Iran”, which Mousavi only can send out on the internet, he calls for: a reform of the electoral law, press freedom, the licensing of private radio and television stations, a law prohibiting the military to intervene in economics and politics, the release of political prisoners and the penalisation of atrocities in the prisons. In Tehran, it is said that along with this minimum catalogue subject-specific sections have begun "with the preparations for a new government". Members of the current administration as well as Iranians living abroad are said to be involved in these groups.

Replacing the powerful revolutionary leader, a group of five to eight clerics should directly be elected by the people for a limited period of time. They should represent a religious pluralism equivalent to the freedom of choice in Shiite everyday life, where believers are free to choose the teachings of a scholar they want to follow. In future, nobody should be allowed to rely on divine authority. Mousavi: "Nobody has the right to say: How I look at the Islam is the one and only valid way."

This will be no quick go. Sustained pressure and a progressive wearing down of Ahmadinejad’s regime could force him to resign over the medium term, that is the hope. Mousavi does not insist in replacing him. To gain time for the elucidation of the population, an intermediate solution might be necessary. This could look like this: Ahmadinejad resigns in favour of the Tehran mayor Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf. The moderate, popular conservative had recognized the width of the People's Movement in June, when he estimated the demonstrators to be in the three millions.

Mousavi seems to be aware of being severly influenced by three decades of Islamic Republic, so not to be able to represent Iran's future. As a strict Muslim, he constantly would struggle inwardly to meet the youth’s demand of a liberalized lifestyle. Iranians drinking alcohol should have a place in the movement ‐ but Mousavi does not want to sit down at a table where the wine is drunk.

Mehdi Karroubi, the second reform candidate, is acting much more aggressive. In recent weeks, the fine-boned clergyman was the real challenger of the regime. He published that men and women were raped in detention ‐ which has deeply shaken many Iranians, even the more simple, religious people in Ahmadinejad's clientele. Karroubi wouldn’t make a leader who is appealing the masses, but he has made the cracks in the system visible.

Mousavi is resembling the figure of the king in chess: small moves, in case of danger retreat, always covered by his men. It is not cowardice. His fellow campaigners assume the movement to slide into the underground, to radicalize and to narrow dangerously, if Mussawi is detained. He sees himself as someone who can open an unbloody way to change. But then the people have to decide which system they want to live in.

For the first time since the Iranian revolution of 1979, the Iranian opposition abroad has found a common language with the forces of change within the country. This opens up options that were unthinkable only recently. In the case Mousavi and Karroubi are arrested, the leadership of the Green movement would automatically be taken over abroad. Soon a statement will be released in Tehran, saying a five‐member committee in the diaspora ‐ the names are not disclosed ‐ is authorized to replace the leadership in case needed. The symbolic gesture says a lot in a country where the fear of foreign agents is almost obsessive. And Mousavi signals the regime: Look out! If you arrested me, you obstruct the peaceful path to change.

In the diaspora, former bitter enemies have reconciled. The monarchists are relegated to irrelevance, while the advocates of a secular republic criticize Mousavi only mutedly as for the time being. Several prominent heads of the reformers are currently in the West, among them the former Culture Minister Ataollah Mohajerani in London, the film director Mohsen Makhmalbaf in Paris, and reform theologian Mohsen Kadivar in the US.

Kadivar, currently teaching at Duke University, appealed to "the Iranian bourgeoisie" to provide funds for a new, independent national television. "The cost of a green medium have to be borne by Iranian investors." The Iranian women are requested to donate their jewels as a patriotic gesture. Free, uncensored and genuine Iranian Radio and satellite television: That's what currently is worked for in four countries. In Amsterdam, Mehdi Jami as a former head of the Farsi-speaking Radio Zamaneh has a lot of experience with bloggers in Iran. Now he wants to establish citizen journalism as a new generation of broadcasting, giving the young Iranians, who constantly provide their clandestine videos on YouTube, a national platform.

Thus, networking, making various voices audible and being virtual, is the strength of the green movement ‐ and its weakness. It lacks a clearly audible voice, which eg comments on the resuming nuclear negotiations between Iran and the international community, beginning 1 Oct. Suspicion about Ahmadinejad buying legitimacy abroad which he is denied at home is rampant even among those who want the dialogue, basically. In Mousavi’s vicinity they say that "what ever is agreed now has no validity until it has been reviewed by a legitimate, new government of Iran." Mousavi does not want to seek confrontation in this highly sensitive issue.
Saturday
Sep262009

The Latest from Iran (26 September): The False Flag of the Nuke Issue

NEW Iran: The "Die Zeit" Article on Opposition and Change
NEW Iran Video: Ahmadinejad Interview on CNN’s Larry King
Iran's Nuclear Programme: The US State Department Line
Video: Ahmadinejad Interview with Time Magazine
Transcript: Obama and Sarkozy Statements on Iran Nuclear Programme
Iran: Obama’s “Get-Tough” Move for Engagement
Iran: Rafsanjani, Ahmadinejad, and the Multi-Sided Chess Match
The Latest from Iran (25 September): The Nuclear Distraction

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IRAN NUKES2140 GMT: We've now posted an English translation of the Die Zeit article, with its explosive rumours of significant change in the Iranian system.

2005 GMT: Rouydad carries an explosive story, from an inside source, that the Ministry of Guidance and Culture has created a five-person committee to create and spread disinformation, including the claim of a meeting between billionaire George Soros and former President Mohammad Khatami as part of the "velvet revolution". The committee allegedly includes the head of a news agency, an expert on the Internet, a television presenter, and an intelligence official. Millions of dollars are being devoted to the effort.

1955 GMT: President Ahmadinejad has returned from New York with an upbeat political assessment of his "satisfactory" and "successful" stay in the US. He has emphasised the need for change in the management of the United Nations, including the Security Council. No mention, however, of the nuclear issue.

1925 GMT: Report that activist and Mehdi Karroubi supporter Housein Mahdavi has been arrested in Khoramabad.

1730 GMT: Today's "Velvet Revolution" Showcase. It comes courtesy of the Supreme Leader's Advisor For Military Affairs, Major General Seyed Yahiya Rahim Safavi, who said on Saturday, "The (enemies') soft war is aimed at changing the (Iranian nation's) culture, views, values, national beliefs and belief in values. Soft warfare is a complicated type of political, cultural, information operations launched by the world powers to create favorable changes in the target countries."

1715 GMT: The Wall Street Journal, snarling for a confrontation with Iran, inadvertently exposes the weakness in the dramatic presentation of the second enrichment facility:

"Let's also not forget the boost Iran got in late 2007, when a U.S. national intelligence estimate concluded that Iran had stopped its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and kept it frozen. The U.S. spy agencies reached this dubious conclusion while apparently knowing about the site near Qom."

Probably for the chest-thumpers at the WSJ is that the conclusion is not dubious at all (see the State Department's defense of it in a separate entry). Even if the second facility had taken in shipments of uranium, which is not alleged even by the US Government, even if high-grade centrifuges had been installed, which is not established, even if those centrifuges had begun enriching uranium, which is not claimed anywhere, that would not establish a direct link with a resumed nuclear weapons program. It would merely establish that Iran now had some quantity of enriched uranium which might or might not be for military rather than civilian purposes.

However, the WSJ's railing do not have to be logical to show the problems for the Obama Administration's strategy. Opponents will now claim that the 2nd enrichment facility shows that all intelligence assessments from 2007 must be thrown out and will put by default the faith-based assertion that Iran is hell-bent on the Bomb and beyond diplomacy.

1650 GMT: The Institute for Science and International Security has posted images "of two possible locations of the gas centrifuge uranium enrichment facility under construction near Qom, Iran. Both are tunnel facilities located within military compounds approximately 30-40 kilometers away."

1620 GMT: Just to follow up on the biggest of rumours (see 1400 GMT) for change in the Iranian system, with the five-person committee to replace the Supreme Leader and the replacement of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad with Tehran Mayor Qalibaf. I've read the Die Zeit piece, and it reads like rumour, Chinese whispers, and wishful thinking rather than hard information on any plan from Hashemi Rafsanjani or another source.

1600 GMT: The Grand Rafsanjani Plan? While the details of Hashemi Rafsanjani's purported political compromise are in the category of rumour, its existence is verified by the number of politicians and clerics asking for its consideration. Reformist MP Darius Ghanbari has called for "more efforts...to achieve...consensus and a calm atmosphere" and said, "Hashemi has all these features to bring the sides together", although "this will be achieved only when conditions that allow the rebuilding of trust to eliminate extremism and hatred." Another MP has called on Parliament's National Security Commission to act on the lines set out by Rafsanjani's 14 July Friday Prayer speech as the "best solution for an exit from the current situation".

1445 GMT: Not-So-Dramatic Breaking News. Iran's chief official for the nuclear programme, Ali Akbar Salehi, says Tehran will allow the International Atomic Energy Agency to inspect the second uranium enrichment facility.

Look for the media to play this up as an important development. It's not. The logical strategy for Iran is to draw out the process of negotiation over access, appearing to be receptive to international demands for inspection while defending sovereignty and political position. That's why Salehi "didn't specify when inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency could visit the site" and said "the timing will be worked out with the U.N. watchdog".

1410 GMT: The Battle Among the Experts. Ayande News Agency has revealed the bitter division in the Assembly of Experts. Hussein Ka'abi criticised Ayatollah Ali Mohammad Dastgheib, who has been prominent in his condemnation of the "illegitimate" Ahmadinejad Government and the brutal suppression of post-election dissent, and started a petition amongst the members of the Assembly for Dastgheib's dismissal. It is claimed that the Supreme Leader rejected the petition.

1405 GMT: Political activist Maysam Roudak was detained on Tuesday. She was previously arrested in September 2007, charged with acting against national security, and then bailed for $50,000.

1400 GMT: Noting the Even More Intriguing Rumour. This morning (0455 GMT) we wrote about the unconfirmed story that Hashemi Rafsanjani is trying to bring a political resolution through the intervention of the Expediency Council, which he chairs.

Even that pales, however, before the stunning claims in the German Die Zeit. The scenario is that a new system of "Supreme Leaders" with set terms would replace the current overall Supreme Leader with office for life and, more specifically, that the current Mayor of Tehran, Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf, would replace Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as President.

We're looking for the original German article, but a Farsi summary is available via Deutsche Welle.

0930 GMT: Nonsense and War Talk. The "analysis" of the Iran in many of today's newspapers is simply awful. The Guardian of London's "Q and A Guide" bluntly informs, "[This] shows Iran has not been telling the truth about its nuclear activities," omitting little points such as Tehran's declaration to the International Atomic Energy Agency on Monday and the differing interpretations of its obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The journalist, Ian Black, blithely assures, "It seems unlikely that a revelation of such importance would have been made without rigorous checking of sources." Which sounds good unless you realise that Black's next paragraph, "It is known that two years ago the US managed to penetrate Iranian computer systems," refers to the highly suspect American claim of a magic Iranian laptop, supposedly obtained from a defector, which has yet to be seen by the IAEA.

All of this might be harmless if ludicrous, were it not for the inconvenience that it aids and abets talk of War, War, War. In The Wall Street Journal, Anthony Cordesman, exalted by the US media as a top military expert, explains, "Israel must consider not just whether to proceed with a strike against Iran—but how", and kindly offers his "Iran Attack Plan". And the BBC's flagship radio programme, Today, having just heard from the British Foreign Minister, David Miliband, that diplomacy must be pursued, immediately turned to Mark Fitzpatrick of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, who declared, well, no, the military option should be prepared.

0505 GMT: The Iranian (State) Line. Press TV frames President Ahmadinejad's political strategy, which is to downplay any dispute and offer on the surface an accommodation over the second enrichment facility: "Ahmadinejad: 2nd nuclear site open for inspection". It summarises the President's New York press conference, which was delayed yesterday, and features his stance that Iran is within the law (which we picked up in Friday updates): "According to the IAEA rules, countries must inform the Agency 6 months ahead of the gas injection in their uranium enrichment plants. We have done it 18 months ahead and this should be appreciated not condemned."

0455 GMT: And, if you're not caught up with the "secret nuclear plant", what are the internal developments in Iran? To be honest, in the last 48 hours, all parties have caught breath and assessed their positions. The most intriguing possibility is that Hashemi Rafsanjani is trying to seize the initiative by setting up the Expediency Council as the proposer and arbiter of a political settlement. The Council is a different body from the clerical Assembly of Experts, which Rafsanjani also heads: its official function in the Iranian system is to rule in disputes between the Parliament and the Guardian Council, but it works primarily as an advisory body to the Supreme Leader.

At this point, the story is still rumour, but it is prominent in Internet chatter. Our readers offer a useful introduction in their comments on yesterday's updates.

0420 GMT: A "false flag" ship is one that disguises its true origin by sailing under the colours of another country. The parallel for Iran today is a near-hysterical situation in which an issue far removed from the critical questions of the post-election conflict suddenly becomes the primary, and even the sole, criterion by which Tehran is judged.

The "Western" media run headlong, escorted and often led by a Government agency, towards a finish line of the most dramatic and damning tale. The Times of London turns itself into Boys' Own Intelligence Journal, "How secrecy over Iran's Qom nuclear facility was finally blown away".

The New York Times gets closer to the immediate politics in its opening paragraph, "On Tuesday evening in New York, top officials of the world nuclear watchdog agency approached two of President Obama’s senior advisers to deliver the news: Iran had just sent a cryptic letter describing a small “pilot” nuclear facility that the country had never before declared." Then, however, it takes the US Government's bait, substituting supposed anguish and hurt for Washington's balancing of "engagement" and pressure on Tehran (see Chris Emery's analysis, which is far beyond anything in mainstream media this morning), "The Americans were surprised by the letter, but they were angry about what it did not say. American intelligence had come across the hidden tunnel complex years earlier, and the advisers believed the situation was far more ominous than the Iranians were letting on."

CNN, meanwhile, hits a new low in its spiralling coverage of Iran, falling into the Iranian President's own public-relations campaign by putting him on The Larry King Show, which usually devotes itself to interviewing Hollywood celebrities, participants in headline crime stories, or anyone loosely connected with Michael Jackson. Ahmadinejad's far-from-stunning revelation? ""We simply didn't expect President Obama to say something that was baseless."

None of this hyperbole and alarm, fuelled by the US Government's need to put pressure on Tehran before talks begin in Geneva on 1 October, comes close to the complexity of the politics on the uranium enrichment facility near Qom. None of it appreciates what an EA correspondent points out:
Let's hold our horses on this one. The International Atomic Energy Agency has to certify that the plant is not new and that Iran has been working in it for years. Right now there is complete discordance between the Iranian and Western versions of events on this, but both curiously point out to one key factor: no enrichment is happening right now in the Qom installation, and construction is still in progress.

But all of the hyperbole and alarm replaces any consideration of and even attention to the internal developments in Iran.
Saturday
Sep262009

Latest Iran Video: Ahmadinejad Interviews on CNN's Larry King (September 2009 and September 2008)

The Latest from Iran (26 September): The False Flag of the Nuke Issue
Video: Ahmadinejad Interview with Time Magazine

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Many apologies that, in a bit of editorial haste this morning, an old Ahmadinejad interview was posted. An extract from yesterday's interview is now posted, along with the September 2008 full interview. The person responsible for the blunder was thrashed and sacked. Unfortunately, as that person is me, he has been rehired.

September 2009: Part 1 of 6

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmrszPpeP08&feature=channel[/youtube]

Part 2 of 4

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqI6GR_eHDU&feature=channel[/youtube]

Part 3 of 4

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AkjI1bxBsvs&feature=channel[/youtube]

Part 4 of 4

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Ekh5ofRMYE&feature=channel[/youtube]

Part 5 of 6



September 2008: Part 1 of 6

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjuCXuESyyA&feature=related[/youtube]

Part 2 of 6

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQezkb5MRsM&feature=related[/youtube]

Part 3 of 6

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxYT0PBPniY&feature=related[/youtube]

Part 4 of 6

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V415rE4WZ1M&feature=related[/youtube]

Part 5 of 6

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U5Qxoqq8ECo&feature=related[/youtube]

Part 6 of 6

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2YtiQOwdug&feature=related[/youtube]
Friday
Sep252009

Video: Ahmadinejad Interview with Time Magazine

Latest Iran Video: Ahmadinejad Interview on CNN’s Larry King
The Latest from Iran (25 September): The Nuclear Distraction

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Buy Us A Cup of Coffee? Help Enduring America Expand Its Coverage and Analysis

Doing his rounds of US media, including talks with NBC, The Washington Post, and Newsweek, Iran's President Ahmadinejad spoke with Time staff just after The New York Times "revelation" of the "secret nuclear plant" but before President Obama's statement.

Friday
Sep252009

The Latest from Iran (25 September): The Nuclear Distraction

NEW Video: Ahmadinejad Interview with Time Magazine
NEW Transcript: Obama and Sarkozy Statements on Iran Nuclear Programme
NEW Iran: Obama's "Get-Tough" Move for Engagement
Iran: Rafsanjani, Ahmadinejad, and the Multi-Sided Chess Match
Latest Video: Full Speech of Ahmadinejad at UN General Assembly
Iran: English Text of Letters between Mousavi and Montazeri (13 and 22 September)

KHAMENEI RAFSANJANI1835 GMT: Report that Azar Mansouri, deputy head of the Islamic Iran Participation Front, has been arrested after an interview with Norooz.

1735 GMT: Is Iran's "Secret Nuclear Plant" Legal? The quick soundbite for Time from its interview with President Ahmadinejad is ""This does not mean we must inform Mr. Obama's administration of every facility that we have."

However, Ahmadinejad may have a point, one which is relevant to the current case. Iran notified the IAEA on Monday that it was constructing a new pilot enrichment plant. If Tehran has not put nuclear material into this facility, Iran is in compliance with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty's Comprehensive Full Scope Safeguards Agreement, which requires it to a six-month notification period before nuclear material is put in the facility. (Iran withdrew from the more Subsidiary Agreement 3.1, which requires more detailed and timely notification, after the International Atomic Energy Agency referred Iran's nuclear program to the U.N. Security Council.

So the case to prosecute Iran under the Non-Proliferation Treaty is not clear-cut. Of course, the US can and will rely upon the U.N. Security Council resolutions demanding that Iran cease all enrichment. Whether other countries (China, Russia) take the same line remains to be seen.

1730 GMT: President Ahmadinejad may have backed out of an encounter with the New York media, but he did give a one-on-one video interview to Time magazine. We've posted in a separate entry.

1700 GMT: President Ahmadinejad has replaced his New York press conference with an interview with Press TV.

1500 GMT: We've just posted Chris Emery's shrewd analysis of the politics of the US revelation of the "secret nuclear plant" and the Obama statement: "This high-profile initiative by Obama was designed to get movement on engagement."

1425 GMT: Amidst the continuing chatter on the Obama statement --- no additional information, just the theme of "He was Really Tough" --- news services drop in this interesting twist "Ahmadinejad cancels his 5 pm EST (2100 GMT) speech in NYC [New York City]".

1245 GMT: The Obama Line. The President has just made his statement on the Iran "secret nuclear plant". The message? This demonstrates Iran's "continuing unwillingness" to meets its "international obligations" on development of nuclear capability. This showed the "urgency" of resolution at talks with Iran on 1 October in Geneva.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has backed this up by saying "everything must be put on the table", and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has proclaimed this "the most urgent problem" of today.

This feels more and more like a scripted play. The "West" has known for some time that Iran was constructing a second uranium enrichment plant but had not announced this to the International Atomic Energy Agency. Tehran figured out that the US had learned of the plant and was preparing a big setpiece, ahead of the 1 October talks, to reveal the Iranian duplicity. So Iran went to the IAEA on Monday to put its plans above-board. This, however, was  not going to deflect the US-UK-France scheme to put Iran on the defensive in advance of the first direct discussions between Washington and Tehran.

1220 GMT: By the way, there was a Friday Prayer address today. After the drama of recent weeks, this one, by hard-line Government supporter and head of the Guardian Council Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, went almost unnoticed.

Nothing much new here. Jannati talks about triumph over "the enemy" through the political, military, and regional power of Iran and invokes the Holy Defense of the 1980-1988 war against Iraq. Like the Supreme Leader, he portrayed the demonstrations of Qods Day and Eid-ul-Fitr as Iranian support for the world's oppressed, and he condemned the tragedy of the assassination of the Kurdestan member of the Assembly of Experts.

1210 GMT: And Here's You Obama Administration  Line. A "senior Administration source" uses one of the reliable channels (i.e. will put out the message as presented, will not look behind or beyond it), ABC's Jake Tapper: "[Obama] to express 'great and increasing doubts about the strictly peaceful nature' of Iran's nuclear program"

1200 GMT: NBC's Ann Curry nails the politics on the "secret nuclear plant" story, and she only needs 1 Tweet to do it: "Remember the US and Iran about to negotiate. The West has an interest in increasing the pressure now."

1145 GMT: The Iran State Line. Press TV, in an article posted this morning, does not address the "secret nuclear plant" story but refers to French and British allegations of an Iranian nuclear progamme, made during the exchanges at the United Nations this week, as "totally baseless and untrue". The Iranian UN mission added that remarks by French President Nicolas Sarkozy were a "futile attempt aimed to cover up [French] non-compliance with its international disarmament obligations".

1050 GMT: So the story of Iran's "secret nuclear plant" (which isn't secret, since Tehran informed the International Atomic Agency of the construction of the uranium enrichment facility on Monday) is going to dominate the news cycle, as every US and many international outlets rush lemming-like to the tale and President Obama makes a statement at 1230 GMT.

If only someone takes a step back to note this comment from CNN's Fareed Zakaria, made after President Ahmadinejad's UN speech: "Ahmadinejad has been on a campaign over the last few weeks to change the subject. His great fear was that he would come to New York and the subject would be the Iranian regime and his massive repression of the Iranian democracy movement, the street protests, all the allegations being made by Iranians of what is happening in Iran --- rape, torture, abuse. What he wanted to do was to talk about anything but that."

0900 GMT: Ahmadinejad's Useful US Idiots. I was going to write the following analysis for Saturday, but events prompt me to offer a preview:
Ahmadinejad was on verge of major mis-step by playing New York trip as sign that all now resolved at home. 'West', however, played into his hands by raising Iran (and Ahmadinejad) to iconic threat on nuke issue. And Netanyahu gives kiss of death to opposition by praising their supposed aim of regime change. So the President gets to do his aggressive defend-Iran thing, getting more legitimacy out of West than he has many of his own people.

Five minutes after jotting this down, I read the Administration's latest strategic masterpiece in The New York Times, courtesy of David Sanger (who seems to have no recognition that he is a messenger-boy);
President Obama and the leaders of Britain and France will accuse Iran Friday of building a secret underground plant to manufacture nuclear fuel, saying it has hidden the covert operation for years from international weapons inspectors, according to senior administration officials.

Well done, guys. Instead of keeping your mouths shut and letting Ahmadinejad return to political complications at home, you've given him the ideal platform to pose as defender of Iranian sovereignty. And watch how your PR stick, wielded just before talks with Iran on 1 October, is turned into a stick by the President, his allies, and his supportive State media to bash "foreign-directed" reformists and the Green movement at home.

Idiots.

0650 GMT: Catching up, indeed. Even though the EA roadtrip was less than 72 hours, there appears to be a month's worth of incidents to consider. Forget the Ahmadinejad sideshow in New York; the events in and around the Assembly of Experts offer a plethora of possibilities. We've attempted an analysis,
"Rafsanjani, Ahmadinejad, and the Multi-Sided Chess Match", this morning.

Of course, state media features Ayatollah Khamenei's address to the Assembly of Experts, but it also keeps playing up President Ahmadinejad's defiance of the "West", from his warning against sanctions to his explanation that "Down with the US" refers to the "ugly behavior" of the American Government.