Many Ambassadors Leave Iran, Agence France Presse, April 14

TEHRAN - All the ambassadors from the European Union have left Iran in the past several days or are about to depart, except for the Greek envoy, diplomatic sources said here Monday….

In addition to the European countries, Canada, Australia and New Zealand have also decided to recall their envoys here….

[in a related report from Tokyo, AFP said that also "Japan plans to suspend exchanges of high-level officials with Iran following the Berlin court ruling implicating Iranian leaders in the 1992 murder of four Kurds, it was reported here Monday."]

German Parliamentarian Calls for Kinkel's Resignation for His "Critical Dialog" with Tehran, Reuter, April 12

German Foreign Minister Klaus Kinkel said on Saturday that Iran must show respect for international law before Bonn could discuss a fresh start in relations, shaken this week when a German court accused Iran of state terrorism…

Nevertheless, there were calls on Saturday for Kinkel to take the rap for the failure of the policy he had stood for.

"Kinkel has been publicly embarrassed. His Iran policy has gone awry and he has consorted with criminals," Wilfried Penner, head of parliament's interior affairs committee, told Sunday's weekly Bild am Sonntag…

Rafsanjani OKs Campaign of Terror in Europe, The Washington Times, April 14

LONDON - Hashemi Rafsanjani of Iran has authorized his intelligence chiefs to mount a "campaign of intimidation" against European governments in response to diplomatic sanctions imposed last week against Tehran.

Western intelligence sources said the decision was made at an emergency meeting of Iran's Supreme Security Council, the country's main security apparatus, after a German court found that Iranian agents ordered the murder of four Kurdish opposition leaders….

Fearing EU's Firm Reaction, Mullahs Resort to Intimidation, Iran Zamin News Agency, April 14

Following the verdict by Germany's judiciary which named the cleric leaders of Tehran as principals in the Berlin murders, today, the mullahs' regime staged a demonstration by its agents and operatives in front of the German embassy in Tehran.

The action was intended to intimidate and threaten Germany and other European Union members in order to weaken their resolve in adopting firm action against the regime."

In addition, Hassan Rowhani, the deputy Majlis speaker, brazenly threatened Germany that the mullahs would reconsider their commercial ties with that country. In a statement, the National Council of Resistance of Iran said that the council "condemns the mullahs' desperate schemes…"

"Experience has shown that the mullahs understand the language of decisiveness and any leniency or concession will only embolden them to export terrorism and continue their blackmail," the statement added.

Armed Women of Iran, Time, April 21

A months ago, Batul Ebrahimi, 18, was a high school student in Tehran. The daughter of a shopkeeper, she was relatively well off but enormously frustrated with the dictates of the Islamic fundamentalists who rule Iran…

After two arrests by Iran's ubiquitous secret police for openly complaining about the mullahs, Ebrahimi fled, but not to Europe or the U.S. Today she resides in a dusty camp in Iraq, a soldier in one of the most unusual and little known military forces in the world. The National Liberation Army (N.L.A.) of Iran is 30,000 strong, fully armored and ready at any moment to do battle. Some 35% of its soldiers are women, as are 70% of its officers…

… N.L.A. remains the strongest opposition to a government that last week again proved to be an international renegade….

When the moment is right, say leaders of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (N.C.R.), the rebels' civilian arm, the N.L.A. will roll across the border in support of a general uprising against the fundamentalist Iranian government. "We intend to combine the army with the rising of social unrest to sweep away the mullahs," N.C.R. president Maryam Rajavi told Time…

…[N.L.A. is] not only one of the world's most formidable rebel armies but a sophisticated resistance movement as well, with offices around the world, plus five radio stations and a new satellite-television network that beam anti-mullah propaganda daily into Iranian homes….

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