DOMESTIC

Mullahs' confess in despair

NCR secretariat, Jan. 31 - After a month-long hysteric campaign against Mojahedin and the Iranian Resistance, Khamenei, the mullahs' leader, finally came to the stage in Tehran's Friday Prayers today and accused the Mojahedin of "killing Muslims and the supporters of Islam, revolution and the Imam." Obviously disappointed at the outcome of the regime's full-fledged propaganda campaign in the past month to prevent outpour of support for the Mojahedin all across the country, he described the Mojahedin as dependent on "complicity with America, the Zionists and Iraq."

Khamenei made a desperate bid today to take advantage of the occasion of the holy month of Ramadhan and the mourning processions for Imam Ali, the Shiites' first leader, to boost the morale of the regime's forces in encountering the Mojahedin. His anti-Mojahedin remarks best indicate the regime's frustration in confronting the Mojahedin's increasing activities in Iran as well as the popular uprisings which continue to occur in their support in many parts of the country.

Today, the regime has been forced to break its silence and acknowledge these nationwide activities. The mullahs' military troops and Intelligence Ministry forces are on alert. Nevertheless, their brutal clampdown and campaign of mass arrests and executions these days have not been able to quell or impede the nationwide acts of resistance.

According to reports from Iran, parallel to the escalated activities of the Resistance, the regime's forces are badly terrified and this fear has extended even to the higher levels of government officials, as many of them express disappointment and are gravely concerned about their own future.

Free all political prisoners

Associated Press, Jan. 31 -- The United States criticized Iran Friday for a Supreme Court decision upholding the death sentences of two members of the minority Bahai religious group who were convicted last year of apostasy. State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns also called on the Tehran government to free all political prisoners and ensure human rights in Iran. Burns said: "We urge the government of Iran to free all prisoners of conscience and to ensure freedom of religion and other basic human rights of the Iranian population."

No improvement in human rights in Iran

Voice of America, January 30 - The U.S. State Department's annual report on human rights practices world-wide gives a mixed -- and generally bleak -- picture of human rights conditions in the Middle East...

The State Department says there is no evidence of improvement in rights conditions in Iran, where it accuses the Islamic government of "systematic abuses," including extrajudicial killings and the widespread use of torture....

Death in front of the mosque

AFP, Feb. 2 - The official Iranian news agency, IRNA reported Sunday that in a commotion on Saturday night in a mosque in Iran, two young girls were killed and 43 wounded. According to this agency, the incident happened in front of the entrance to the grand mosque of Kermanshah (western Iran) as the crowd pushed to enter the building...

Two 27 and 55 year-old men and a 70-year-old woman and two 7 and 13 year-old girls lost their lives in this incident. Kermanshah was the scene of intense battles in early December after the suspicious death of a Sunni leader in this city. The Iranian state-run radio confirmed these riots but denied the circumstances of mullah Mohammad Rabii's death.

70% live under poverty line

Weekly Iran Zamin, Jan. 27 - According to assessments made by the Administration and Employment Commission of the mullahs' parliament, the average salary of government staff employees during the current year is about $72.5 annually (the dollar exchange is approximately 4,645.00 rials). Considering that the minimum cost of living (poverty line) for an Iranian family is about $138.00 per year, the above income accounts for merely half of their expenses. According to the assessments made by this commission, 1,119,000 government staff employees receive less than $60.00 annually and more than 70% of them live under the poverty line.

Kayhan daily, on January 17, quoted Mousavi, a member of the commission as saying that to stop the decline of the buying power of these employees, their salaries must be raised by three folds.

Election farce

Pejvak radio, Sweden, Jan. 30 - Hojat-ol Eslam Seyed Mohammad Khatami made official announcement that he will run for the seventh term of presidential elections. Mohammad Khatami is a renowned personality from the Community of Combatant Clergy who was the Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance who was forced to resign his post due to the opposition of the majority in Majlis.

With Khatami's nomination, the main rivalry will be among Nateq Nouri, the nominee from the Combatant Clergy, Mohammadi Rayshahri, the candidate from the Society of Defense of Islamic Values, and Mohammad Khatami, candidate of the Community of Combatant Clergy. All three candidates are turbaned clergies.

Resignation in protest

Jomhouri Islami, Jan. 30 - Members of the executive committee of the interim Majlis elections in Malayer resigned in protest to the confirmation of one of the candidates and the announcement of his name in the list of candidates.

Impact of American boycott

Reuters, Jan. 28 - After months of calling on the Clinton administration to enforce a law passed last August for tighter sanctions against Iran, U.S. Senator Alfonse D'Amato Tuesday hailed the administration for making the sanctions work.

"I applaud the administration for working to make the sanctions stick, and I urge them to remain vigilant," D'Amato said in a statement.

The statement followed comments Tuesday by a senior member of the Iranian parliament's oil commission, Mohsen Yahyavi, who said the sanctions had slowed foreign investments.

"Despite widespread arrangements by the (oil) ministry, foreign contractors are not much interested in engaging in petroleum projects in Iran," Yahyavi was quoted as saying by the daily Iran News.

"The Iranians are admitting what we knew would happen. The sanctions are making it harder for them to get access to western currency," D'Amato said.

FOREIGN

Trying again to influence Mykonos

Frankfurter Rundshau, Jan. 31 - Iran is once again trying to influence the Mykonos trial in Berlin. This was announced on Thursday by Hans Ehrig (defense attorney of private plaintiffs). According to this information, Iran has sent a message to the party whose members were killed. In this message the mullahs has demand that the relatives of the victims withdraw their complaint in exchange for several political prisoners to be released subsequently. Otherwise, Iran will attack this party with all available resources. According to Ehrig, Talebani's Patriotic Union of Kurdistan has been the carrier of this message. Official translation of this message is due to be read in the court next week.

FEATURE

A horror story

Dagens Nyheter, Jan. 30 - The Iranian writer, Faraj Sarkouhi, has been once again detained by the Iranian secret services since Monday. In the brief period of his freedom, he wrote a letter to be published if he got arrested again. This is what has happened now. [Excerpts of the letter:]

Today, it is January 3, 1997. I, Faraj Sarkouhi, am writing this letter, very hastily in the hope that one day people may be able to read it....

I do not know how much more time I have. Every second I am awaiting being arrested or get killed in a manner which would be portrayed as suicide....

From the very first days, they, the secret services of the regime, told me that I have been reported as disappeared and that every one was convinced that I had left the country, that my name had been registered at the airport in Hamburg. They told me, "You are going to stay here until all interrogations, interviews and further investigations are completed. Then we will kill you in secret. We will either bury you or some one will find your corpse in Germany..."

I was not officially a prisoner. The general public thought that I had disappeared. My situation was different from the situation of other prisoners, even those on the death row... The decision to kill me had been already made and was irreversible. I went through the pain and suffering of a human being who is buried alive. It was under this mental and physical pressure that I broke....

Then they began interrogating me. The main thing was not the questions, but the interviews...

The main part of the interviews was about espionage. They forced me into expressing what was completely untrue, that I had contacts with the cultural attaché of the French embassy and with another person, the cultural attaché of the German embassy, and I received money from them...

I was imprisoned, like being buried alive with death hanging before my eyes. I had spent eight years in prison under the shah, I had been arrested and imprisoned several times, but those eight years were never as horrifying and painful as five minutes of these 47 days...

I do not know what to write. The end is drawing close. If any one finds access to this letter, he or she should give it to my wife three days after my arrest or one day after my death, so that my wife would bring it to the attention of the public. Even if no one finds this letter, I will die any way. In fact I died on November 3 [the day he was abducted for the first time at Tehran's Mehrabad airport.] I love my wife and two children from the bottom of my heart and before November 3, I lived an honorable life.

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