'We Are Ganji'

There are worrying reports that the life of Iran’s longest imprisoned journalist Akbar Ganji is in serious danger. Celebrated by his supporters as the Islamic world’s Vaclav Havel, Ganji is six years into a long prison sentence, although in captivity he has managed to produce a manifesto on ‘Republicanism’. Naturally it was banned by the authorities, but it has been posted on the Internet and hotly debated by bloggers. In ‘Republicanism’ Ganji advocates the separation of religion and the State.

Yet Ganji is not forgotten. In a move that one blogger likened to the famous scene from the film Spartacus where the slaves stand up to the Romans by saying ”I am Spartacus”; during the April 2005 in coordinated protest (on the anniversary of his imprisonment) a great number of bloggers renamed their blogs Akbar Ganaji for a week. ‘We are Ganji’, was the cry.

Translated from the Iranian blog, ‘F.M. Sokhan:

‘From today for a week I will rename my blog Akbar Ganji. Just to have the name of this champion of the pen on top of my writing is a great personal honour‘

As editor of the Sobhe-Emruz newspaper, Akbar Gangi daringly exposed a ‘power mafia’ network behind the murders of writers and intellectuals. It was organized via key figures in the merchant class, the religious seminaries, the Council of Guardians, the Revolutionary Guards, the judiciary and the state-run radio and television. The murders also had backing from those in high office. Gangi refers to Iranian ex-president Rafsanjani as the ‘Red Eminence‘ – alluding to Cardinal Richelieu, the power behind Catherine de Medici’s rule and chief architect of the slaughter of the Huguenots.

Unlike anything ever seen before in Iran, people formed long lines outside the newspaper kiosks just to read Ganji’s latest revelations. He made the previously shadowy Haghani Islamic School in Qom a household name when he pointed out that most members of the ‘power mafia’ were former pupils.

At his prosecution Ganji was confronted by one of the young rising stars of the Hagahni School, Judge Saeed Mortazavi, who can be credited with the closure of more than 100 pro-democracy publications and the harassment and imprisonment of many writers and political activists in recent years. Mohsen Armin, a reformist ex-MP in the Iranian Parliament, has even accused Mortazavi of being directly involved in the death of Dr Zahra Kazemi, who was beaten into a coma while in the custody of the judiciary. As a show of gratitude for Judge Mortazavi’s services to the Islamic Republic of Iran, in April 2004 the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei awarded him the title of ‘Best Leader of the Year‘, an annual award given to exceptionally high-preforming officials and the superstars of the ideological state.

Translated from the Iranian blog, ‘The Hungry Philosopher‘:

‘In my life there have been times when, consumed with rage, I have felt infinite helplessness and loss. . . A time when you feel that an injustice is crushing your mind. . . you want to scream and shout and all you can see is the sneering face of your enemy. . . an opponent who seems only to get turned on even more at the spectre of your wet eyes and red cheeks. . . times when you feel that God must feel ashamed to have created man. . .

Being confronted with the photo of Akbar Ganji facing Saeed Mortazavi [head prosecutor of Tehran’s revolutionary court] was one of those times . . . It is a foul symbol of a terrorized people forced to look at the smirking faces of the powerful. . .

I have lived for 27 years. . . 25 years of them under revolution, repression, assassinations, hangings and war. . . My youth and childhood passed away during bombings in underground shelters gazing at the trembling hands of my elders. . .

I am stunned that we walk past injustices so indifferently. . . Sometimes I think this place is the land cursed by God. . . Sometimes a photograph of an injustice and that smirk, keeps you awake till dawn…‘

به خود آییم

یک قرن برای آزادی دویده ایم، یکصد سال فریادِ داد کشیده ایم، یکصد سال مبارزه کرده ایم، همیشه در حضر تبعیدی و غریب بودیم و در سفر دلگیرِ خانه. اکنون اینجا که هیچ کجا نیست ایستاده ایم. سرگشته تر از پیشیم و از چرخ روزگار در شگفت. 27 سال است که حرامیان و اراذل واوباش به شیوه ددمنشانه اسلاف عربشان، خانه را غصب کرده اند و شغالان در سرای ما عروسی گرفته اند. ادنا طبقات و پست ترین مردم چون کابوس بر سرزمین رویاها آوار گشتند. شکنجه کردند، کشتند، سنگسار کردن، دزدیدند وهر ستم و پستی و زشتی که به تصور درآید بر ما روا داشتند وبا بی شرمی برما حکومت راندند. جّن و جادو و خرافه را در عوض حقیقت به ما فروختند ومغز جوانان ما را خوراک مارهای سیری ناپذیر دوش ضحاک کردند. میان مردم دنیا رسوای عام و خاص و بی آبرو شدیم وامروز در فقر و فلاکت و دربه دری هنوز ساده لوحانه چشم امید به دستان اهریمن داریم.

رئیس کدام جمهوری را می خواهیم انتخاب کنیم؟ اگر این برفرض جمهوری، رئیس دارد پس ولی فقیه، دیو عربده ای مثل خامنه ای این وسط چه کاره است؟ حتما ایشان رئیسِ رئیس جمهوری هستند. جمهور مردم در اسلام و نزد آخوند توده بی شکل گوسفندانی است کر و کور و لال، که از پی پیامبر و امام و ولی فقیه، راضی به رضای خدا به سوی کشتارگاه روانند. فریب خوردن نیز اندازه ای دارد. وقتی رهبر حکومت اسلامی به صراحت می گوید:« شرکت در انتخابات، رأی به اسلام، رأی به جمهوری اسلامی و رأی به اصول تغییر ناپذیر قانون اساسی است.» پس هیچ چیزی با رأی ما تغییر نخواهد کرد و تکلیف ما بسیار روشن است. رأی ما رأی به تثبیت وضعیتی و شرایطی است که طی این سالها دچارش بوده ایم. رأی ما رضای ماست به خوابیدن و خرامیدن قاتلانی چون خامنه ای و فلاحیان و رفسنجانی و هزار هزار آخوند پست تر از مگس در کاخ نیاوران و کاخ مرمر و ... رأی ما رضای ماست به فقر و گرانی، به فحشا و کارتن خوابی. رأی ما رضای ماست به اعتیاد جوانان، به عقب مانده گی از قافله تمدن و تکنولوژی. با رأی ما امثال محسن قرائتی، رحیم پور ازغدی و الهی قمشه ای نسناس و ... سالهایی بیشتر در خدمت اهریمن دهان می گشایند تا مغز تازه و بکر و نورس فرزندانمان را لجن زار اسلام کنند.
دیگر خوابگردی بس است. به خود آییم که اهریمن در ضعف و ناتوانی کامل دست و پا می زند. با ضربه ای جانانه به پرتگاهش اندازیم. به زباله دان تاریخ که تنها زباله شایسته آن آخوند و اسلام است

The choice for Iranians tomorrow in the presidential runoff is between "bad and worse..

Purgatory or Hell, That is the Question

Many Iranian voters have boycotted the presidential election. Many others are going to the polls on Friday to vote for someone they know is dishonest in order to avoid someone they know is going to turn their lives into a living nightmare. The Herald Tribune of June 20 reports: "warning that Iran's citizens faced the prospect of military interference in selecting their next president, the reform movement in Iran issued a statement Sunday night indicating that it planned to oppose the candidacy of of the mayor of Tehran when he faces Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani in runoff for the presidency."

To cast a ballot in favor of purgatory or hell, this is the dire choice offered to Iranian citizens. They are going to the ballot box not to exercise an electoral democratic right -that does not exist in Iran- but in order to evade a more draconian form of fascism. Their vote by no means is an endorsement of the regime, but a response to an apprehension that things could get even worse. Not only the ordinary masses are driven by this fear, but also the hard-nosed political activists and thinkers justify their choice of candidates and their participation in the election on the basis of their fear.

The decision of Abdolkarim Soroush is a good example of this general consternation. He is a man who at the beginning of the revolution played a role as Khomeini's intellectual henchman in the cultural revolution and helped in closing down the universities. The unfastidious Time Magazine has called him an Islamic philosopher. Soroush however has come to realize that government and religious establishment should be kept apart. In an interview with an Iranian internet publication Rooz, Mr. Soroush declared his support for Mr. Karoubi's candidacy on the basis of dreading the election of even more harmful candidates. In other words, he voiced support for Mr. Karoubi not because in his view he will make a good or competent president, but because the rest of the candidates are even worse, or present a more dangerous prospect for the nation.

Fatemeh Haghighatjo, ex-member of the Iranian parliament is another typical victim of voting under duress. She has resigned from her parliamentary seat protesting against the tyrannical tendencies of the regime and is quite active in defense of human rights and campaigning for women equality. In a recent speech to "Progressive Reformists" she argued that the country needs something more than reform. This of course is a way of declaring the whole system and its constitution otiose and bankrupt. In the same occasion she stressed her fear that the country might plunge deeper into dictatorship and become prey to military repression if a hard-line candidate gets elected. Based on this premise, and in spite of her total disillusionment with the reformability of the system, she declared her support for Mostafa Moin the ex-minister of Higher Education under president Khatami. The political position regarding the presidential election adopted by Abdolkarim Soroush and Fatemeh Haghighatjo underlines the cynical and diabolic nature of the choice offered to Iranians: the people of Iran are voting in an atmosphere where they think the very survival and security of their country can be taken hostage by even blinder forces of extremism within the regime.

In the meanwhile, the international community is not made any wiser by the shallow press coverage of foreign correspondents in Iran. The B.B.C reports a "respectable" turn out for the election, but little mention is made in its coverage of the unrespectable and moreover shameful conditions under which Iranians are forced to choose. Little mention is made of the total absence of freedom of press and freedom of speech which are sacred to democracy and without which any electoral exercise will be totally illegitimate. Freedom of speech is sacred because without it, no one can win over and persuade others to one's point of view. Without a peaceful atmosphere free of tension and apprehension, no one can appeal to reason to influence the outcome of citizens vote and decision. In Iran of the mullahs there is only a free flow of terror and the electoral right offered to people is a right to choose between various regions of purgatory or inferno.

Many Iranians today, especially those who boycotted the election are feeling disheartened, thinking that the election should have been more forcefully boycotted by the majority of Iranians who can have nothing to hope from the present system. They do not realize that the ordinary Iranian citizens today are not driven to the polls by what they hope for in the discredited regime of the Islamic Republic, but as a result of their unmitigated fear of even a more dreadful future.

What is important is that the campaign of civil disobedience in Iran is becoming further consolidated and moving in the right direction. Under constant terror promoted by the Islamic regime, Iranian political activists are becoming seasoned soldiers in their non-violent struggle against dictatorship . As Iran's Reza Pahlavi said in a recent interview: we are here for a long haul and we know that success in our campaign to free our country depends on our untiring efforts and the unshakable confidence we have on the justness of our cause

Opinion: His excellency's voting machine

So here it was. The robots of the supreme leader came in from behind and when nobody was expecting it, voted for Ahmadinejad, a populist conservative with a socialist economy.

Basij and Sepah forces, added to millions of the Guardian Council‘s representatives who were at the polling stations all five millions of them, voted for Ahamdinejad and made it possible for the supreme leader to actually run the country, directly, for the first time.

Even if Rafsanjani goes to the second round with Ahmadinejad, Khamanei‘s voting machine will act again and will make Ahmadinejad the new president of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The pro-reform youth are so disappointed and depressed. Nobody knows what will happen next. But Khamenei is the biggest winner of this game. He now has both the big turn-out (plus a middle-finger to Bush), and a quasi-president who is only a cover for his excellency.

Is it possible the Iranian leader has learned this from Mr. Bush‘s win?

Election in Iran

No more...

Hundreds of Women Protest Sex Discrimination in Iran

The protest was the first public display of dissent by women since the 1979 revolution.

سانسور اینتترنت را فراموش نکنیم

رفسنجانی که برای رای آوردن کم مانده برود و با شادمهر عقیلی دوئت اجرا کند در دیدار با «هنرمندان» گفته: «اكنون كه در عصر انفجار اطلاعات هستيم ابزار اطلاع‌رساني در همه جا حضور دارد و هيچ كس نمي‌تواند بر سر راه انتشار اطلاعات مانع ايجاد كند. به معناي ديگر ديوار سانسور و حراست فيزيكي پاسخگو نيست.»

این حرف شروع خوبی برای این است که موضوع سانسور اینترنت و فیلترینگ را پیش بکشیم و آن را تبدیل کنیم به یکی از مهم‌ترین خواسته‌های کسانی که این‌ها به دنبال گرفتن رای‌شان حاضرند هر کاری یکنند. شما را بخدا بجنبید که فرصت از دست می‌رود.

کافی است یک گروه مثلا به اسم مدافعان آزادی بیان در اینترنت یا مدافعان حقوق کاربران اینترنت درست کنیم و با آن نامزدها را مجبور کنیم که بطور جزیی درباره‌ی سانسور اینترنت جواب بدهند.

از خبرنگارها تعجب می‌کنم که چرا درباره‌ی این موضوع از نامزدها سوال نمی‌کنند. ناسلامتی خودشان از همه بیشتر باید از سانسور شاکی باشند، چون جزو مهم‌ترین منابع کارشان است.

Excerpt: For God's sake please push the issue of Internet censorship into the political debate and make the candidates express their views about it in detail. I'm surprised how this important issue is totally ignored by the independent journalists and activists.