It’s A Trap
McClatchy has reported that Iran expels many foreign reporters as more violence looms
TEHRAN, Iran — With at least seven people dead in street violence, Iran’s government Tuesday ordered foreign journalists to halt their coverage of demonstrations, and reporters with temporary visas to leave the country. More violence loomed as opponents and backers of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad scheduled rival demonstrations.
Backers of candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, who says he won Friday’s election, had intended to converge on Tehran’s Vali Asr square at 5 p.m. (8:30 a.m. EDT). However, state-controlled media exhorted Ahmadinejad’s supporters to gather in the same spot an hour earlier. Iranian television showed tens of thousands of them filling the square and nearby streets, and it wasn’t immediately clear whether Mousavi’s crowds would show up.
…The orders affecting foreign journalists were an ominous sign, and could mean that a full-scale crackdown on the students and other protesters is coming. Foreign journalists who had visas to cover the elections were informed that their press credentials had been revoked and they should prepare to leave the country.
The regime has stepped up its allegations that forces outside the country are fomenting the unrest.
It is always “outside agitators” when conservatives “reap what they sow”.
Ahmadinejad is safely away in Ekatrinaburg, Russia as part of an observer delegation to the meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization so he will have plausible deniability for what the security forces are trying to arrange. They want the demonstrations to end, and they will brutalize as many people as necessary to make that happen.
I noticed that John McCain wants the US to take a forceful stand backing the demonstrators. John, these are the same Iranians that you keep saying should be bombed. Which is it? Do you want them all to gather in the city squares so they are easy to kill, or what? Make up your mind – are Iranians good or bad?
8 comments
…ol’ Maverick couldn’t have been the slightest bit pleased when Senator Richard Lugar, who is noted – unlike McCain – for his experience in foreign affairs, stepped all over his saber-rattling by saying that the Obama administration was doing the right thing maintaining a low-key approach to deny the mullahs the ability to whip up anti-American sentiment against the protesters. Mighty entertaining moment, that was…
With any luck Ahmadinejad can get asylum in Russia! Seriously MacCain and the other hawks are simply idiotic. Or perhaps they don’t want the people trying to take down a favourite bogeyman
.-= ´s last blog ..More on Iran – The power of Twitter and Youtube =-.
After I posted, Jack, I saw the Lugar response. The current government is looking for any excuse to claim foreign involvement as a cover for what they want to do. The US has to stay on the sidelines or we will be responsible for civilian deaths and Ahmadinejad will be confirmed as President.
I don’t think they understand anything about foreign policy, Jams. They are a bunch of hammers looking for nails to hit. Military force is their response to every issue.
If the world and Iran are lucky, some real reforms will come out of this, but it is too close to the twentieth anniversary of Tiananmen Square for me to be very hopeful.
On the other hand on 18 December 1989 Ceaucsecu left Romania for Iran. Seven days later he was shot.
On 15 June Ahmadinejad leaves Iran for Russia, seven days later???
I hope the result is less like Tiananmen Square and more like the fall of the Iron Curtain.
.-= ´s last blog ..Keeping Twitter open – The best suport the US Government can give to Iranians at present =-.
I would be thrilled if any of the senior clerics decided to give up politics to return to terrorizing grad students and arguing over faculty offices like normal professors. Operating a country by the rules of a university is not a pleasant thing to watch, but that is the closest analogy there is to the “government” of Iran.
Good analogy Bryan. Iwonder if it would be better if run as Unseen University!
.-= ´s last blog ..Keeping Twitter open – The best suport the US Government can give to Iranians at present =-.
One thing that should be understood is that the Iranian demonstrators aren’t demonstrating for the overthrow of the Islamic Republic. For the region, Iran’s constitution despite the parts giving the clerics much of the power is downright liberal and they certainly aren’t interested in a rigid tyranny like Kuwait or Saudi Arabia, or an anarchic hellhole like Iraq. So they don’t want to overthrow the government as such. They’re demonstrating for their constitution to be followed and their votes to be counted. So I think McCain is not only insane, but he’s for people who would gladly drag his raggedy carcass through the streets of Tehran if he dared show his face there. Not that he’s ever going to realize that, because all he thinks of nowdays is D.C. politics, not anything that occurs beyond the Reality Distortion Bubble of Washington D.C….
.-= ´s last blog ..Thought for the day =-.
And governance at UU is different from other universities in what significant way, Jams?
You’re right, Badtux. Mousavi is not what the DC clowns think. He is less obnoxious than Ahmadinejad, but he was the prime minister during the Iran-Iraq War when Iraq was financed by the US, so he isn’t our BFF. He would probably improve life for the Iranians and cut down on the harassment over the dress code and having pets, but he definitely wouldn’t align Iran with the West, or cave in on Iranian interests. An improvement yes, but a true-believer in the revolution.
The people in the streets want their rights under their constitution recognized.