Reporters Without Borders disgusted by case in Iran

[democratic]

http://www.payvand.com/news/04/jul/1143.html

We are appalled at this denial of justice," the international press freedom organisation said. "The Iranian judiciary has displayed intolerable cynicism and hypocrisy in a case which the world sees as a test of intent by the Iranian regime, which has been unanimously condemned by international human rights organisations.

"By turning the trial into a mockery, the authorities have once more totally discredited themselves and deserve to have sanctions imposed on them," it said.

Reporters Without Borders welcomed the reaction of Canada which, for the third time in connection with the case, announced after the trial curtailment the recall of its ambassador (Philip MacKinnon) in protest. It urged Canada to keep up strong pressure on Iran.

The organisation also renewed its call to the European Union to impose tough economic and political sanctions on the regime, whose repeated human rights violations it said were incompatible with the official EU-Iranian dialogue begun in 2001.

Kazemi was arrested on 23 June 2003 as she was taking pictures of prisoners' families outside Evin prison, north of Teheran. She was ill-treated in detention and died of her injuries on 10 July. After trying to cover up the cause of death, the authorities admitted on 16 July that she had been "beaten."

Her body was hastily buried on 22 July in the southern town of Shiraz, against the wishes of her Canadian son Stephan. Her mother, who lives in Iran, admitted being pressured to allow burial in Iran. Requests for the body to be exhumed and returned to Canada have been refused.

[jeff30997]

1. Yes,it's a big scandal over here.

The poor woman was beaten to death.

[DulceDecorum]

4. OMG

why did she not flee to Iraq
where she would have been safe
photographing the families of people
in Abu Ghraib?

Those Iranians!!!
What will they do next?
Have their CIA-installed prime minister
personally execute six suspects in police custody?

Some country somewhere desperately needs to undergo regime change.

[geek tragedy]

2. Iran has oil, so look for EU outrage to be short-lived eom

[AP]

3. Should we drop bombs on Iran now?

I'm seeing all the signs in the media lately that suggest Bush is ready to go after Iran.

It's so funny that in one breath the media is chastizing themselves for not being more critical about Iraq and then in the next dropping the same kinds of hints about Iran being a bad country that they dropped about Iraq when they were just getting into cheerleading mode over Iraq.

[democratic]

5. .

AP,

As an Iranian i'd like to let you know, it doesn't get much *WORSE* than the Iranian government.

Now, I think we agree that interference will do damage, but no logical person can make excuses of any sort for Iran's dictatorship.

[KoKo]

9. Would you be in favor of the US invading your country to topple the regime

Would you want to see what's going on in Iraq move over the border?

Just curious.

[democratic]

24. ..

Change has to come from within Iran. I don't think many people in Iran support a military attack.

The Mullahs may have very minimal support and the Iranian population may be real pro-US, but the minute the US decides to attack the people will gather around the leaders, and the populace will become anti-US.

Best thing the world can do is give moral support to those seeking change.

[AP]

10. What I'm commenting on is not so much the political realities in Iran

(or in any of the countries which have gotten the sudden attention of the US media in the last four years, like Zimbabwe, Haiti or Venezuela).

What I'm commenting on is the the US media builds consensus about countries that Bush doesn't like (while ignoring bad governments that they might like, like Saudi Arabia, Nigeria or Nepal).

Last night, I heard on the news a story about how some of the 9/11 bombers might have passed through Iran. It wasn't so much giving the public a piece to a puzzle, as it was a way to start planting the seed that we should punish Iran now.

[geek tragedy]

14. The media consensus on Saudi Arabia is far from peachy

even before F9/11 that was the case.

A lot of right-wingers are pissed at Bush because he's so soft on their support of terrorism and Islamist extremism.

[AP]

18. However, my local news doesn't chose to talk about the fact that

most of the 9/11 hijackers were Saudis. They think it's more important that some of them might have passed through Iran at some point.

So, Iran is bad. Saudi Arabia? No comment.

[geek tragedy]

20. In all fairness, I've never seen the nationality of the hijackers as a big

issue.

Timothy McVeigh was a US citizen. Should the US have bombed itself in retaliation?

[AP]

26. What do you think the media here is doing when they talk more about

some of the hijackers passing through Iran more than they every talked about the fact that they were all FROM the same country.

If it doesn't matter that they were all citizens of Saudi Arabia, does it matter that some of them were in Iran once?

If citizenship doesn't imply government cooperation, does travelling through a country imply that the Iranian government was complicit? Does assmebling in Florida imply the complicity of the US and Florida government?

I get the distinct impression that in the last few days the media is trying to suggest that the Iranian government was involved in 9/11 so to reduce public resistance to an invasion of Iran, which is exactly what they did viz Iraq (which, as I said, they seem to acknowledge their complicity in doing in one sentence, and then repeat the same exact mistake in the next sentence).

[geek tragedy]

28. I think the media are a bunch of ignorant twits

who are still stuck on 1980 in terms of Iran.

Having passed through the territory means nothing. Well, not exactly nothing--it's more than we had on Iraq.

[Jackpine Radical]

25. Seems like quite a few of the 9/11 hijackers also travelled

through portions of the US, and actually lived there for months. So does that mean the US was harboring terraists?

[jobycom]

27. Only liberal states

Bush will begin bombing them on November 1st.

I agree with AP. The information being released and leaked to the media is the beginnings of the justification of pressuring Iran, maybe for invading Iran. Bush is behind in every poll now, and needs a "Wag the Dog" enemy to focus attention away from Kerry and Bush's failings. So Iran is the enemy du jour.

Bush is a follower of Reagan. Reagan said over and over again that enemies united people. He tried a couple of times to say that the world would unite if aliens invaded, thus Americans should unite behind him. That's why he propped the DOA Soviet Union up throughout his administration. That's why W has his war on terror. The basis of the threat is real, but the methods used by both men are negative fear mongering.

Iran is the next enemy. It can't be Iraq because we have now liberated them.

[rman]

12. how do the Iranian clergy fit in here?

I remember reports about Iranian university students fighting police and religious militants - neither under control of the government (European news, ~1 year ago).

As far as i know there are two major powers in Iran: religious fundamentalists and the government, and they don't exactly agree on everything.

[democratic]

29. .

The government are the religious fundamentalists, they wield about 10-15% support from the people.

You're thinking of Khatami who's a "reformer", who has virtually no power in the country.

The "government" in Iran are radical fundamentalists, the population is 70% under the age 30. The government is so out of touch with the people that you have a tough time believing they're in control, but they have that base that they regularly rely on to beat, kick and kill.

[DrWeird]

17. Doesn't get much worse? Well, there's always the US government

Look at how many people we've tortured to death.

[geek tragedy]

6. One way to look at it is

that there's no way the US can go after Iran now--that would mean a draft (there aren't even enough troops for Iraq, for goodness' sake).

So, the Iranians KNOW that they can do what they want, and the US won't do jack crap about it.

Ambiguity is a very powerful diplomatic tool for the US. For decades it worked with China and Taiwan.

Bush doesn't recognize that--he has the "Hulk Smash" approach to international diplomacy.

Would going after Iran be a good or a bad idea? I strongly believe it would be a bad idea no matter what the circumstances are. But I also believe it wouldn't have been a bad thing for the Mullahs to be a little nervous either.

[THUNDER HANDS]

7. we don't need a draft

We already have them surrounded. We just have to tell the troops to move East and West. We're already in Iraq and Afghanistan.

[geek tragedy]

13. Tha's a Neocon fantasy (I'm not implying that you're a Neocon)

Iran has more people than Afghanistan and Iraq combined. It is almost twice as big geographically as Iraq and Afghanistan combined.

If it took 100,000 troops to take care of the much weaker Iraq, one can imagine that it would take 250,000 troops at least.

And remember, the US is already severely undermanned in Iraq. If it pulled its troops out to go into Iran, the US forces would themselves be surrounded--caught between Iraqi militias and Iran's military.

[demgurl]

19. We will not need a draft.

We are staunch allies with Israel and they have a pretty nice sized army. If you read one of the other posts on here today, Israel is ready for a fight with Iran. In fact, Bu$h is probably talking about Iran due to Israel! I wouldn't doubt it.

Here is the link:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=694117&mesg_id=694117

Edited to provide link!

[geek tragedy]

21. Israel can't send troops into Iran. eom

[daleo]

8. I know I should be more outraged by this case

But, put in some different names and dates, and this could describe many incidents of human rights violations by the "coalition" in Iraq. I think this is one of the worst features of Bush's illegal invasion and occupation.

"_______ was arrested on __ ____ 2003 as she was taking pictures of prisoners' families outside _____ prison, north of ______. She was ill-treated in detention and died of her injuries on __ ____. After trying to cover up the cause of death, the authorities admitted on __ ____ that she had been "beaten."

[AP]

11. Seriously. A US tank shot at a hotel room in Baghdad killing a journalist.

IIRC, in Afghanistan, 15 or 20 of the casualties in the first two weeks were journalists. How did they die?

[Ms. Clio]

16. Doesn't sound so different from the journalist shot outside Abu Ghraib

Mazer Dana (sp?), killed because his camera supposedly looked like a grenade launcher.

[daleo]

22. The big difference is Iran is trying the person who killed the cameraman

The U.S. military has just investigated itself, then said everything was A-OK.

[Ms. Clio]

23. excellent point! n/t

[The_Casual_Observer]

15. They are tired of Iraq already

It's time to move on to our next "victory". Plans probably have already been made about how they are going to work this one. They won't use the same method of setting up a pile of bogus UN resolutions either.