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Presidential Election & Uprising in Iran June 2009

From the article:

According to the Economist, Iran’s economy grew just 0.5 percent in the past year, as oil revenue slumped from $82 billion in 2008 to less than $60 billion. Official figures place inflation at over 15 percent and unemployment at more than 11 percent.

In 2005, Ahmadinejad captured the presidency by posing as an opponent of the neo-liberal policies pursued by his predecessors, Khatami and Rafasanjani. In fact he pressed forward with privatization, selling off some $63 billion in government assets, although, to the chagrin of Rafsanjani and other bazaar capitalists, much of the bounty went not to them, but to businessmen with close ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

To offset pressure from below, Ahmadinejad used the increased state revenues that resulted from the 2005-2008 oil boom to boost social spending. This policy was bitterly resented by powerful sections of the Iranian bourgeoisie, and under the impact of the economic crisis Ahmadinejad has been forced to announce plans for radical economic restructuring, involving the phasing out of food, energy, water, transport and other subsidies. This has failed to satisfy his critics within the Iranian elite, who denounce him for promoting welfare dependency.
 
The guys at the top are increasingly becoming comedians....
a representative of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said on state television Tuesday that opposition leaders were “enemies of God” who should be executed. Iran’s public prosecutor told a closed session of parliament that opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi “are on the wanted list.” Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, called the anti-government protests “a theater play by the Zionists and the Americans.”
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http://www.democracynow.org/2009/12/30/headlines#3
 
These sort of very public condemnations (which is the real theatrics here) has been part of Iranian poltical life for decades now - at least from the time when Mousavi was prime Minister and had tens of thousands of left-wingers executed after forcing them to confess to their anti-regime crimes on state tv.
 
butchersapron said:
These sort of very public condemnations (which is the real theatrics here) has been part of Iranian poltical life for decades now - at least from the time when Mousavi was prime Minister and had tens of thousands of left-wingers executed after forcing them to confess to their anti-regime crimes on state tv.
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Yes. it bodes ill for how the regime is going to respond to the second wave of demonstrations. Painting the regimes opponents as traitors is a precondition for apect an increasingly brutal crackdown and executions etc.

The bravery of the Iranian people is really humbling. They have come through the forst wave of repression and are still standing and fighting back.

The regime is looking more and more illegitimate. Attacking moques and clerics doesn't look good on the Iranian street. I think this regime could be in trouble.
 
This titbit is interesting, but isn't especially good news.

"Peyke Iran says that regular police forces are installed at central places like 7 Tir, Vali Asr and Enghelab squares. About an hour ago tanks and armed anti-riot vehicles have started from Karaj (West of Tehran) as well as hundreds of armed forces. The term “nezami” can mean both artesh or sepah, must wait and see… http://www.peykeiran.com/Content.aspx?ID=11540"

from the comments section here
http://enduringamerica.com/2009/12/...-30-december-is-that-all-there-is/#more-25004
 
ohmyliver said:
This titbit is interesting, but isn't especially good news.

"Peyke Iran says that regular police forces are installed at central places like 7 Tir, Vali Asr and Enghelab squares. About an hour ago tanks and armed anti-riot vehicles have started from Karaj (West of Tehran) as well as hundreds of armed forces. The term “nezami” can mean both artesh or sepah, must wait and see… http://www.peykeiran.com/Content.aspx?ID=11540"

from the comments section here
http://enduringamerica.com/2009/12/...-30-december-is-that-all-there-is/#more-25004
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ok is tonight anything ( like here) in Iran??
 
Sorry about the C and P but this is interesting



Rahe Sabz | Dec. 31, 2009

Students at Azad University of Mashhad have issued a statement expressing their hatred for the events that took place at the University Thursday [clashes with pro-government forces]. The students will boycott their classes today in protest.

The text of the statement says:

Wednesday 9 Dey 1388 [Dec. 30, 2009] was a day that was recorded in history of Mashhad's Azad University as a day when the ugly face of ignorance reappeared in the shape of righteousness carrying daggers and knives.

On this tense Wednesday, the University classes were ended at 1400 [1030 GMT] and faculties were evacuated because of the barbaric attacks of thugs who were assaulting students with daggers and knives. No one in his right mind would expect more from those primitive thugs; one would have been surprised if they acted otherwise. They beat up students and drew their knives against them. They disrespected the university and did whatever they wanted to do.

But the [Islamic] guards at the University played a key role there. The guards, which usually watch out if the students' outfits are appropriate and if girls' hairs are showing, in sheer disgrace allowed the thugs to enter the University and beat up the students. And all the while they watched the situation. Shame on the guards that cooperate with the thugs and act against the students and honor of the University, instead of protecting them.

We, on behalf of all the students, hereby announce that we will boycott all classes on Thursday in protest against the shameful action of the guards. We will hold a silent protest at the Technical faculty of the University. We will not give up our stance as long as the reasons for such disrespect are made clear.
 
He works for the Theocracies state tv channel.

(I may be imagining it, but i'm think John Rees also made a program with/for them. It's possible that it was made independently and they just showed it.)
 
here's george galloway leading a pro regime rally which nicely segregates men and women and bizarrely hadn't yet been shot at by the police
 
He's there, shouting in Persian? I'm somewhat impressed by that... thought he just lazily repeated pro-regime lines over here.
 
I suspect said bomb blast was done by elements attached to the regime. It's definitely not monarchists/MKO (if they had the operational ability to car bomb in Tehran, why wouldn't they have picked a target closer to the regime?). I doubt it's Mossad/C.I.A. as again the target makes little sense, why wouldn't they have picked a scientist directly involved in the nuclear program), and it would actually be a huge admission of vulnerability by Iran.

The scientist in question was a known Mousavi supporter, and put his name to public letters to the government complaining about harsh treatment of students etc, he turns out to have been a particle physicist, and not directly involved in Iran's quest for nuclear power, and well liked in academia, and amongst his students. I think, like the killing of Mousavi's nephew it's an attempt to frighten, and scare, without striking directly at opposition leaders.

http://enduringamerica.com/2010/01/...gue-elements-and-professor-mohammadis-murder/

*eta* and on an unrelated note, this interview with an Iranian trade unionist is interesting
http://www.astreetjournalist.com/20...with-iranian-trade-unionist-homayoun-pourzad/
 
Here's something from the theocracy that seems almost designed to anger the rural poor and bring them closer to the urban opposition - they decided to abandon the $100 billion annual subsidies on bread, milk, sugar, rice and wheat, electricity, water, fertilizer, telephone services, public transport, education, gasoline etc - something which has kept large sections of the population afloat since 1979 - and introduce market prices post haste.This, of course is the Green oppositions policy as well...
 
Really interesting and useful hard headed look at where we are one year on from the reliable Middle East Report.:

The Green Movement Awaits an Invisible Hand

There are three possible short-term scenarios concerning the position of Iranian labor in the second year of the post-election crisis. Fulfillment of the Supreme Leader’s Nowruz wishes would seem to be the most improbable scenario. In order for 1389 to be the year of “doubling work,” and Iranian workers obediently to ramp up production, there would need to be national reconciliation that puts the trauma of the last year in the past. Nor is it probable, however, that the new Persian year will be the year of halved work due to endemic strikes.

The most likely scenario is that 1389 -- corresponding to the Gregorian year March 2010-March 2011 -- will be the year of underwork, as intermittent street confrontations, additional scattered job actions, recession and fresh US and international sanctions exert a drag on productivity. This short-term future is not what the Greens dream of but it can serve the strategy posed by their symbolic leader Mir-Hossein Mousavi, who has designated the new year as the “year of patience and perseverance.” Although time seems to be on the Green Movement’s side, opportunity knocks but once.
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Miles better than the pro-theocracy crap pouring out of places like MRzine - the Leveretts especially.
 
Thought provoking analysis of the methods of the 'green movement' here.

In a society in which the collective struggle for change - for any number of reasons - is on the wane, conditions are created for hero-worship. Heroes are those who, in their own way and with a particular approach, express and reflect a part of the people's grievances and demands. Lack of social movements and lack of the processes of collective dissent creates a situation, in which, faced with the significance of reflecting and expressing (a part of) the collective grievances, it is not noticed how this 'incidental representation' came about or what its effective content is.

[...]

The most important criteria for the emergence of tendency toward heroic actions and its social acceptance (hero worship) is the supposition that it's as if the heroes, through their individual acts of sacrifice, open up a new battle front against a tyrannical system, a path that was deemed impenetrable through collective actions. In this trend of social struggles becoming individualized, not only does the struggling subjectivity is reduced to an individual or select figures, but the tyrannical system too inevitably is expressed and personified in the individual faces; for example, Mohammad Nourizad versus Seyed-Ali Khamenei; or a short while ago Moussavi versus Ahmadi-nejad.
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Wahey, great find, cheers. Sadly I don't have time to read the lot at the moment but I read that article you linked to in your 2nd post. Wow, some analysis from a useful angle, that manages to survive translation without going blunt. I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised as I've long been rather interested in Iranians. Tend to assume that their country has enough heavy political history, including much beyond its borders,, and relatively recent history of multiple revolutionary struggles, along with ex-empire hangups and scars from imperialist oppression, to have produced a fair number of minds that are going to analyse stuff in a way that may strike a chord with some of us. Theres certainly people there who know the value of institutional analysis.

Sharp and cynical enough to keep an eye on the real prize despite the thick layers of distracting bullshit they have to deal with. And like us, with the cynicism comes both freedom from making the same old mistakes so easily, yet also the hampering downsides that make divisions between people more likely and rob potential movements of the power of the masses blindly getting behind someone. So its quite fascinating to see that article about the hijacking of the movement and the hero stuff, especially as we've been watching people in some other countries going down the headless movement route, with its rather different range of pitfalls. Well the Iranians aren't Arabs, and they've got their own history to inform them of what happens to even multi-headed revolutions after the toppling of the old regime, let alone headless ones. But given certain possible scenarios that may unfold this century, I rule very little out, either Iran or Britain could one day wake to find that the old balance is really over, and that cynicism, despair and lack of convincing options to struggle for with absolute belief, are no longer enough to prevent us doing something big that brings about sudden and dramatic change.
 
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