Plea to UN for Help in Freeing Green Chiefs; Geneva Sit-In Planned

8:00 p.m./March 8 A Tehran Bureau correspondent relays the following:

Today's event was unsuccessful. A friend just came home after 2 and a half hours, said there was military everywhere, making a demonstration impossible. Also, though the place (Valiasr Sq.) was known, there was no official news about the actual time -- everyone just assumed it was around 5 p.m.

9:30 p.m./March 7 Our columnist Muhammad Sahimi compiled the following news items and commentary:

The Coordination Council for the Green Path of Hope, the temporary leadership council for the Green Movement, has sent a letter to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon asking him to help secure the immediate release of Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi from detention. The statement says,

"After the presidential election of 2009 in Iran there was a national wave of protest against the announced results. The protesters demanded recognition of their fundamental right to decide their own fate through democratic and fair elections. But the government, blocking all means for the free flow of information, banned and censored the press, outlawed the political groups that were critical of the government, and cracked down on the protesting citizens.... 50,000 citizens -- women, young people, political activists, heads of political groups, members of nongovernmental organizations, journalists, university students, teachers, and workers -- have been arrested, directly violating the Constitution, the laws of the country, and the internationally accepted standards for human rights that the government of Iran is obliged to respect. Four people died after being tortured in prison [Kahrizak detention center] and at least 80 people have been killed during peaceful street demonstrations. Those who committed these crimes have not been identified and put on trial. The security and intelligence organizations and government-controlled communication channels have spread lies and baseless accusations against the leaders of the Green Movement and have denied their right to respond. Those who criticize the violations of the laws cannot get employment with the government and the condition for receiving a university education in universities is to refrain from criticizing the government.

"After the peaceful marches of February 14 in support of the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt that took place as a result of a call by Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, every means of communicating with them was blocked. Violating all of their rights as citizens, the government has blocked their communications and that of their spouses, Zahra Rahnavard and Fatemeh Karroubi, with the outside world, has prevented their families from seeing them and has practically imprisoned them. The families of these distinguished national leaders and the people have no information about their whereabouts, the state of their health, and even the food that they are given, and this is while they have not been put on trial in any court and have not been convicted [of any crime]. The Coordination Council for the Green Path of Hope requests the United Nations and its human rights organizations to do what they can in the framework of the U.N. Charter and the international agreements on human rights to stop the violation of the rights of the leaders of the Green Movement and obtain their immediate release."

A group of 36 former university student activists who live outside Iran has called for a sit-in in front of the European headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva from March 12 to 14 to protest "the repeated violations of human rights in Iran, including murder of innocent people and students, widespread arrests, torture, and long jail sentences for supporters of the Green Movement, and the illegal arrest of the leaders of the Green Movement and their spouses."

Yukia Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, submitted a report to the agency's Board of Governors, in which he said that he cannot give Iran's nuclear program a clean bill of health because Tehran is refusing to cooperate with an IAEA probe.

Tehran's Mayor Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf appointed Mohsen Hashemi as his adviser and representative to the metropolitan subway system. Hashemi, who headed the subway system and its development program for 17 years, resigned from that post on Saturday after facing pressure from hardliners for most of his tenure -- much of it due to the fact that he is the son of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Ghalibaf said that it is inappropriate for supporters of the government to declare that, now that Hashemi has resigned, the government will provide the necessary funds to the subway system that it has long withheld.

In a speech in Shiraz, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said that the works of Hafez and Saadi, two of the greatest poets in Iranian history, are as valuable as the art of all other nations combined. While Ahmadinejad was speaking, a group of workers gathered outside to protest the nonpayment of their wages and retirement pensions.

Since last year, Ahmadinejad has turned himself into a nationalist, speaking regularly about Iran's culture and history and the "Iranian school of thought" as opposed to Islamic thinking, which has angered religious conservatives. In related news, Mohammad Nabi Habibi, secretary-general of the Islamic Coalition Party, said that putting the Iranian school of thought against Islamic thinking is what the prerevolutionary regime of the Shah used to do.

Four groups, the United Women for the Future of the Middle East, Green Movement of Azerbaijan, Democratic Movement of Azerbaijan, and Student Movement of Tabriz have issued statements in support of gatherings on Tuesday, March 8. In its statement, the Student Movement of Tabriz says, "This movement does not belong just to the Persian-speaking people [people in Tabriz and Azerbaijan speak Azeri or Turkish], but to the entire nation that has been wounded by the ruling group."

A group of hardliners have called for the arrest and prosecution of former president Mohammad Khatami. They include Mehdi Esmaili, member of the central committee of the Islamic Society of Engineers; Mohammad Taghi Rahbar, leader of the clerical faction of the Majles; and Hamid Reza Tarraghi, prominent member of the Islamic Coalition Party. Esmaili said today that Khatami was at the forefront of the "sedition" -- the hardliners' standard epithet for the Green Movement -- and that he had incited people against the government. Rahbar attacked the Association Combatant Clerics (ACC), the leftist clerical organization headed by Khatami and Ayatollah Sayyed Mohammad Mousavi Khoeiniha, and said that the ACC is similar to the Islamic Iran Participation Front and the Organization of Islamic Revolution Mojahedin, the two leading reformist groups that have been outlawed by the government. Taraghi said that so long as Khatami has not separated himself from Mousavi and Karroubi, he should not be allowed to return to the political arena. In related news, hardline cleric Jafar Shajouni said that people should try to wrest control of the Organization for Publication of the Work of the Imam [Ayatollah Ruhollah Khoemeini] from Mousavi Khoeiniha and called the ACC a group of "mercenaries."

Four young people, Najmeddin Sheikhehpour, Ghasem Izadpanah, Himan Tavaso, and Khaled Sourehei, who distributed leaflets calling for protests against the murders of Saneh Jaleh and Mohammad Mokhtari during the February 14 demonstrations, have been arrested. Human rights groups report that there is no information concerning their whereabouts. They are presumably members of a group called the Youth of Sardasht that has been active in informing people about demonstrations in support of the Green Movement.

Abolfazl Ghadyani, senior member of the outlawed reformist Organization of Islamic Revolution Mojahedin, who is currently serving a one-year prison sentence handed down after a show trial, was brought to court again. He was charged with insulting the Supreme Leader and spreading propaganda against the government. In previous interviews, Ghadyani had said that the Supreme Leader cannot run the country through dictatorship.

Fakhr ol-Sadat Mohtashamipour, wife of imprisoned reformist leader Mostafa Tajzadeh, was allowed for the first time since her arrest in the wake of the February 20 demonstrations to briefly contact her family. She said that she believes she will be imprisoned for a considerable length of time.

Mohammad Saleh Noghreh Kar, legal adviser to the Mousavi campaign and nephew of Dr. Zahra Rahnavard, was released from prison. He was arrested 25 days ago. He was also arrested last year and sentenced to one year in prison, but the sentence had been suspended.

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