Iran’s sham democracy
Published: Saturday, June 18, 2005
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/17/opinion/17iht-ediran.html
Friday’s presidential election in Iran was an affront to true democracy, just as the past record of Ali Akhbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, all along the leading candidate, is an affront to true moderation. As President George W. Bush rightly noted, the voting was effectively rigged in advance by the council of unelected clerics that decided who would and who wouldn’t be allowed to run. And this is for a presidency, remember, that has no power to do anything the unelected clerical establishment does not want done, as amply shown by the frustrating eight-year tenure of the departing incumbent, Mohammad Khatami.
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The Islamic Republic of Iran Is Holding Hostages in Iraq. Does Anybody Care?
November 13, 2011
On September 6, 2010, the Iranian Refugees Action Network, a charity, received a request from a refugee in India to help another asylum seeker who was imprisoned in Iraq. As director of the charity, I started the process of contacting the refugee’s family and the appropriate officials to get the victim, formerly a university professor, and over 34 others released.
Over the course of the our efforts, we were informed that an Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) consul named Kuhi (Koohi or Kouhi) was attempting to force the professor, who was registered with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), back to Iran. This effort was made despite the fact that the professor had requested asylum in Iraq — this after two of his family members were murdered by the regime in Iran.
One member of his family was murdered by the regime, the other gunned down near the Iraqi border as he was attempting to flee Iran. The regime perpetrators then drove the latter’s body back to Iran and dumped it in the street, in front of his business, to intimidate others from speaking out against the crimes and brutality of the Islamic regime.
It is important to note that the professor went, on his own, to an Iraqi police station seeking directions to the UNHCR field office. Instead of helping him, however, they arrested him for entering the country illegally, for which he was sentenced to five years and one month detention and, upon the completion of his sentence, immediate deportation to Iran.
After the Iranian consul and two of his fellow thugs beat the professor for resisting their attempt to force him back to Iran to be murdered, they threw him back into his cell in an unresponsive state. Our translator was again notified through third parties of his situation, and we immediately forwarded the information to the ICRC and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). A complaint to the prison was raised, and the professor was taken to hospital. Before he had chance to recover, and while he still had intravenous lines attached, the Iranian thugs took him from the hospital and returned him to the Iraqi prison, where he was then placed back into a cell, unattended.
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United against NIAC
Investigate NIAC and deport Trita Parsi to Iran!
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