Iran election

Make your confession to the Iranian regime

Sophie Team Observers — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 09:23:58 +0200

Public confessions made by detained opposition activists in Iran are being made a mockery of by anti-government protesters. To illustrate how farcical they found the confessions, Web users from around the world, including a pet cat, a "crazy Jew from Israel", a brainwashed bald manikin and a CIA agent, have made their own confessions, all 'owning up' to instigating the attempted velvet revolution following the 12 June election.

When over 100 reformist activists were put to trial at the beginning of August, it came as little surprise that they pleaded guilty to plotting a velvet revolution against Ahmadinejad's government; their supporters immediately denounced the declarations as forced confessions and labelled the event a "laughable show trial". The case of former vice president and popular reformist blogger Mohammed Ali Abtahi was given particular attention after he appeared on TV looking distressed and underfed. Reformist bloggers, human rights groups, the Western press and his family say that his testimony is a sham.

In response, Iranian comedian Ebrahim Nabavi, who is now exiled in Belgium, decided to make his own "confession" as a sketch. He admitted that he succumbed to an irresistible CIA agent who said "Come on! Let's have a velvet revolution". What followed was a website devoted entirely to confessions. Watch Me Confess has so far attracted dozens of submissions, both hilarious and saddening.

The Iranian uprising seen from the future

Sophie Team Observers — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 12:52:56 +0200

Iranian blogger "Bolts" posted this commentary on her blog on Monday. It was translated into English by "Sanli". One of our Iranian Observers, Farnaz Seifi, alerted us to the post. The information has not been verified by FRANCE 24 journalists.

Originally posted in Farsi by Iranian blogger Bolts on August 3.

In the history books of the 21^st century, the first chapter will be about us.

In the introduction, they might write that important events have happened before us, events like 9/11 and war on Iraq and Afghanistan, but those were the remnants of the previous century, with an outdated dialogue and with twentieth century tools: Airplanes, bombs and bullets. And then they will write that the first chapter is dedicated to us because we have been the true children of our time and our dialogue was the dialogue of the beginning of the third millennium.

Early in the book, they will write that social movements are born out of communication technologies and at the same place they will write that we were the first movement that exploited entirely all the new communication tools that were established at the beginning of this century.

Perhaps they will write a footnote on how these tools changed the social structure and how they changed the world view on the social classes, work flow, production and distribution of wealth, social leadership and management and even changed the world's attitude about the sustainable human values.

Perhaps on the same page, there is a photograph of the inventor of the first mobile phone and the portraits of the founders of Wikipedia, Facebook, Blogger, YouTube, Podcasts, or maybe photos of their statues in the main squares of the world's leading cities, with captions like: "Figures who built the twenty first century."

Idem they will write that previously there were only one-way paths: Somebody wrote and published the newspapers and the rest of the people read them. Somebody spoke while the rest were listening. One person was on TV and the rest were watching. Somebody commanded and led and then shapeless masses followed. They will write that the community structure and distribution of wealth, power and information was pyramidal, and then they will highlight that the new communication technologies flattened the society. It empowered the bases of the pyramid such that they reached the top.

It made it possible to communicate with each other, send and receive news, exchange information, tell and listen, watch and be seen, and find new means of cooperation, thinking, criticizing and progress.

There, on top of that page they will put a picture of us with our green flags. They will write that we were the first social movement that all of us were its leader and all of us were its organizer. The name which was called the most was only the speaker of a part of our demands.

Perhaps they will open a box there to put Mirhossein's written statement as an example, where he said: because the people participate in the Friday prayer, he will accept their invitation and join them. They must also add the explanation that previously the leader of a movement used to announce his presence and invited people to join him.

They may make a subsection to describe how a movement without a command centre was acting so well-orchestrated. How its ideas, desires, and slogans were suggested, criticized, and completed so well, and then one day they were expressed in such a harmony as if all these millions, have practiced together for years. Perhaps there, at least in the electronic version of this history book, they will make a link to a clip of us, where the speaker shouts from the loud-speaker: "death to the U.S." and we all respond "death to Russia". Without anybody been preparing for this response, without being coordinated, we shout as if we are all one mouth and one voice.<

They will write that we were the first party that had no central council, no secretary general, and no political branches. They will write that our party was one of complete anarchy that behaved quite systematic. They may presumably point their sarcasm toward anarchist parties of decades before us that were built systematically to behave as anarchists. They will write that our party had no party organs, but all its strategies were clear and its programs were all set correctly. Our demands were also summarized, reviewed, completed, and expressed in the clearest form of expression.

In the same chapter they will write that we lived the last days of guns and bullets and we showed that wherever the awareness, information and enough communication channels for human connection exists, the bullet is pointless. There may put a picture of a single bullet somewhere in our Freedom Museum and will write for its caption "the last bullet that was pulled out of the magazine".

A delicate person will calculate the total weight of the electrons that construct our blogs and websites, and will show that it was not even a thousandth of a bullet weight. He may estimate the weight of all the air molecules in our chants, our "death to dictators", our "all political prisoners must be released" and show that they altogether weigh less than the weight of a single wall of the Evin prison.

Next they will write that we suggested a new definition for the human society, the human relations, for globalization and for living in the global village. Each of these historians will give us a name. Their simplest may write the "Green Revolution", another will call us the "Silent Revolution", somebody will call it the "Smile Revolution", and at last there will be someone to write the "Awareness Revolution".

Operation Tehran blackout, take two

Sophie Team Observers — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 12:33:21 +0200

Sara, one of our Observers in Iran, explained to us a few weeks ago how Mahmoud Ahmadinejad opponents tried to create an enormous power cut during one of his televised speeches. Last night they tried again, armed with hair dryers and irons.

Video by Sara and her brother.

Sara (not her real name) is a student in Tehran.

At exactly the same time we all plug in our most electricity guzzling household appliances: hair strengtheners, irons, hair dryers etc. By doing this we were aiming to overload Tehran's surrounding power stations one by one.

It didn't work in my district last night [Tuesday 21 July]. But I know that there was a power cut in the capital and in towns outside the city."

Scene from a war film? No, a protest in Tehran...

Sophie Team Observers — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 12:08:59 +0200

This footage was filmed by residents on a balcony in Tehran. In the street directly below, the police shoot down a protestor.

FRANCE 24 has not been able to confirm the date of the incident. The video appeared in the past few days on the Facebook page and blog of "Iranian Leftists". Omid Habibinia, a member of the group, says that the video was most probably filmed on June 20, the day of the death of Neda Agha Soltan and the day after Ayatollah Khameni's speech, which marked the beginning of the repression. We see police officers (in green), armed with shotguns, and a plain clothes policeman who shoots with a handgun.

We advise watching the entire video.

Translation: Omid Habibinia. Subtitles by FRANCE 24.

If you have more information about this video, contact our journalists by registering on The Observers.

Why they're chanting “Death to Russia!” in Tehran

Sophie Team Observers — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 13:57:28 +0200

Image © Ryan Welborn

Thousands of opposition supporters gathered for Friday Prayers in Tehran last week. Most of the slogans on show were anti-Ahmadinejad, but there were also, strangely, many people demonstrating against Putin and Medvedev's Russia.

First video of Tehran gathering

Sophie Team Observers — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 12:58:51 +0200

Thousands of opposition supporters gathered after Friday Prayers at Tehran University today. These are the first images to emerge from the event.

We’re updating this post throughout the day.

The size of the protest was impressive.

Footage shot after the police used tear gas to disperse the crowds. Protestors start fires in the hope of dispersing the gas. Posted on Facebook.

From here we can see the gates of Tehran University, where Fridays Prayers are taking place.

The protestors chant "Mousavi, Mousavi", "Allah Akbar", "down with the government", "release the political prisoners", "we might die but we'll never give up" and "down with Russia".

Video posted on Facebook. Our Observers say that the video appears to have been filmed today.

Operation blackout with the help of hair straighteners

Sophie Team Observers — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 10:43:00 +0200

So brutal was the post-election crackdown that anti-Ahmadinejad protesters no longer dare to organise outdoor demonstrations. They have not given up the fight, however. One of our Observers in the country, Sara, took part in "operation blackout" on Tuesday. Armed with an iron and hair strengtheners, she tried, along with many others, to cut the president's televised speech with an electricity blackout.

French woman arrested in Tehran: “A pathetic diplomatic game”

Team Observers — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 17:15:04 +0200

Clotilde Reiss, a young French woman who taught French at the University of Isfahan, was stopped by the police in Tehran on July 1. A close friend of hers responds to accusations calling Reiss a spy.

Marina El Khoury graduated from the Institut d’Etudes Politique in Lille the same year as Clotilde Reiss. The 23-year-old Lebanese woman has set up a Facebook group asking for her friend’s release.

Coltilde was supposed to take a flight to Beirut last Thursday to see friends and visit my family. When she didn’t call on Thursday, we got worried. I called the French embassy in Tehran to ask what was going on, but they didn’t know.

I spoke to Clotilde’s father, who said that she had been able to speak to some French diplomats and seemed to be in good health. She speaks Farsi, which helps enormously with interrogators.

The accusations that she is a spy are ridiculous. Iranians authorities have said that she took photos and sent them abroad. Which isn’t true — we have never received photos from her. It seems that she simply forgot to delete the photos of some demonstrations that she had on her camera, and so they seized them at the airport.

The only thing she did was send emails to her family and friends during the demos. She wasn’t saying anything more than was already being talked about in the media. She was just reassuring us that she was all right.

All this is just nasty political scheming. They have already arrested Americans and Britons, they needed a French person as well. They are looking for ways to put pressure on. The foreign affairs ministry thought at first that they had sorted out the affair quietly themselves. But it didn’t work and that’s why they told the media about it.

Clotilde went to Iran to perfect her Farsi and because she loves the country, its culture and its people. After setting up the Facebook page, I’m now looking for other things I can organise to support her.

Mobile phones against censors

Sophie Team Observers — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 10:31:48 +0200

Here's one of the pictures we received directly from Thursday's demonstrations in Tehran. While the media is banned from reporting events in Iran, the protestors continue to defy the information clampdown by flooding the web with amateur photos and videos.

Direct from Tehran, despite the crackdown

Sophie Team Observers — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 15:40:21 +0200

The Iranian authorities are trying very hard to control information about the post-election protests. Hani, one of our reformist Observers in Tehran, however, has managed to send us this webcam video, explaining how they are going about it.

We didn't want to rebel, but we want freedom, democracy and equality. We can't use the internet to get the news, all websites have been filtered and mobiles are jammed. FriendFeed, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and all social networks are also filtered. All the news agencies are also filtered and some newspapers have closed.

[The authorities] have lowered internet speed to such a low rate that we cannot follow the news with it. Our state media is also cooperating with the government — they don't show any news at all. All these things signify what we're going through right now.”