I will make only one prediction this year: not that the regime will be toppled and Ahmadinejad’s bullet riddled corpse will be trodden underfoot in Azadi Square but that an awful lot more blood will be shed in Iran in the coming months. It is clear that the regime in on the back foot. I don’t think it is wishful thinking to believe that we could be witnessing the endgame in Iran.
After Sunday’s violence the regime appears to be even more desperate if arresting leading activists and confiscating the corpse of Mir Hossein Mousavi’s nephew is anything to go by
According to the Times who was shot in the chest. Tehran was rife with speculation that Seyed Ali Mousavi had been assassinated in order to send a message to his uncle, and the Government moved rapidly to prevent his death becoming another rallying point for the opposition. On Sunday security forces ringed the hospital where his body was taken. Yesterday they used tear gas to disperse protesters who had gathered outside. Later it emerged that they had removed his body and taken it to an undisclosed location.
Iran’s state-controlled media said that the body, and those of four other people killed during Sunday’s protests, had been taken away for forensic tests. In addition it implied he may have been shot by foreign agents to embarrass the regime.
At least seven opposition activists were arrested, including three of Mr Mousavi’s top aides, two advisers to the reformist former president Mohammad Khatami, and two of its most outspoken critics: Ebrahim Yazdi, who served as foreign minister in the early months of the 1979 Islamic revolution, and the human rights campaigner Emadeddin Baghi.
Meanwhile gangs of pro-government vigilantes increasingly appear to be taking the law into their own hands. On Saturday night a group broke up a meeting addressed by Mohammad Khatami, the reformist former president, and attacked nearby offices used by the family of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic. Leading members of the Khomeini family now support the opposition.
Well let’s see what happens in the coming days, weeks and months. The protestors are not going to stop now. They will continue to put their lives on the line until the regime is taken down. What they get in its place is a major worry of course (I do fear for my friends in Tehran). As far as I am concerned the protestors have my complete support.
One very unhappy country and it can be sheeted straight home to the religious mafia and the nutter they have as Prez.
ReplyDeleteHope they work it out without too many innocents getting the shaft.
ReplyDeleteFrom your keyboard to God's monitor!
ReplyDeleteIt's going to be an important year for Iran. We're likely to see a revolution - or a war.
ReplyDeleteI hope that things can be achieved with the minimum of bloodshed. Sadfly I fear that there will be a lot of it to come
ReplyDeleteIs there anyone, in Iran, who would lead the country for the good of the people? Sadly, it seems it never happened. And the population was always oppressed. I don't know where people find the courage to protest.
ReplyDeleteI don't have time to a do a real comment because I am off to bed....but this caught my eye for you Jams...
ReplyDeletehttp://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/8433783.stm
I am in contact with someone who is in Iran protesting against the regime. That person will be sending images over and writing articles about the front line in demonstrations.
Haha EV. I am in contact too
ReplyDeleteI don't think there is someone to take over. Claudia. I bloody hope it isn't a Revolutionary Guard/Basij coup
ReplyDeleteThis protest is so far from over.
ReplyDeleteJams
ReplyDeleteI want to point out that you misunderstand the nature of the Iranian regime. This regime is a mix of Theocracy and the worst of the far left.
A regime that justifies its actions via god's will is capable of any evil.
The only way this regime falls is if someone in the Revolutionary guards decides to seize the moment
and side with the protesters. However, the prospect of a Civil War by those supporting the regime would be very real.
Theocracies are much more dangerous
than a classic strongman. One can sometimes bribe a strongman to leave as they are greedy.
If Heinrich Heine had been an Iranian, he might have written:
ReplyDeleteThinking of Iran at night
Just puts all thought of sleep to flight;
No longer I can close an eye,
Tears gather and I start to cry.
What you wrote, Sean, describes so well the two Iranian ladies in my building. Poor, poor people with families in Iran.So much pain and worry...
ReplyDeleteSadly not Pouty Lips. There will be a lot more blood shed before this is over.
ReplyDeleteBeakerkin, there is no denying that the regime is vile and will do anything it can to retain its grasp on power. One of the biggest strenghts of the protests are that they are bottom up. THis means that the regime cannot easily decapitate the protests. On the other hand while there are no real rallying figures, there does noot seem to be any actual leaders.
I do shudder to think how this could end
Sean THat is so poignant.
Claudia I hope there is a happy end, I fear there may not be