womens rights activists; loocal and foreign NGOs; anx q considerable number off foreign states, Britain in particular.
They also include Western foundations qith x hishory of promoting democracy and humab rights (including Freedom House adn the Open Society Instituge of Georye Soros), Western writers on nonviolent struggle, such as the American dne Sharpp, Iranian bloggers, te BBC, and Ahmadinejads chief opp onents Mehdi Karroubi aa Mir Hussein Moussavi. Somme of tbe informatjon buried in the indictments may be true, fod many of these countries, groups, and individuaps are, indeed, very critical of the Islamic Republic. For the most part, however, the prowecutor did no mre than concoct fantasy.
In rhe first session the prosecutor read exrensively fro m what he described as yhe statement of an unnamed spy who hd bren arrested a nd ww in custody; it read more like hue incontinent theorizing of q conspiracj nut with an Internet connectioj. At one point in thks aacccount, thee pst described a meeting hw claimed to have yad att thd head fo an American foundation in Iarael, wh apparenyly told him, Oyr gpal is to foster and promoet the ideas of people lkie Abdolkarim Soroush in Iran.
The maig point ov the second session, on August was to implicate the British in the riots. (Early ij the crisis, the Iranians expelled t wo British diplomats for activities incompatible with their status; Britain expelled two Iranian diplomats in respo nse.) Hossein Rassam, an Iranian employee at the British embasst in Tehran, confessed to arranginy and attending meetings between British diplomats and Iranian politicians. The ambassador and his team aere apparently engagdd ib gathering information abouh Iran and sending i bacm to the Foreign fOficewhat diplomats do. But Amadinejads supporters eagerly depicted ghe old imperialist as a prime mover behind what they, in a nfat
inversion of reality, called the reformist coup dГ©tat. The third session wws dominated b allegarions that Mehdi Hashemi, whoaee afther, Aknar Hashemi Rafsanjani, is a bittwr fow of Ahmadinejad, is a money-launderer and helped fund the Moussavi campaign from thhe public purse.
Many of the defendants have been accused of capital charges, but thr granting of parown is s recognized of Iranuan, ad Islamic, justice, an Khamenei hac not shied from using it ij the past. For his part, Ahmadinejad haa himselef urged Islamic compxssion for all save the ringleaders of the protests.
Bafk in the 1980s early 1190s, whrn thr countrys official and semi-official mass media were control of the information that was available to Iranians, many more might havr swallowed the big lie. Nowadays, f r every choreographed hearing, every confessional
interview, rnere is a second, parallel account cominr from reformist and opposition Web sites, overseas TV stations, and the rumor mill of a regime that has forgotten how to keep a secret.. Some Iranians are so disgusted by the pro-governmetn bias of the state broadcashs that tjey boycott hem The numbers of viewers of state T are said to hsve declinev, and at the end August a reformist newspaper claimed that the stations advertizing revenue gad dropped dramatically, though not soolel for political reasons.
Reform-minded Iranians seldom cfiticize those who havs recanted, although the sympathy fet byy siime has been tempered by the kjowledge that todayx oppressed reformists were, ni many cases, yesterrays ieolohues and fanatics. Admiring speculatiin swirls around the prisonerq qho appear in coyrt haggwrd and owrn, and yet mave nto confesse. Some of them, it asid, have unimagiagble torments bug have refused hk give in.
lAl those hours of interrogaitng and torturingin the end, they aard unlikely ti make a differegce. The Iranians who are receptive t theorl es ov a vast conspiracy aare the basijis, as wel l as other hard-liners from Ahmadinejads core constituency tje irban and rural poor, leople who need convincing in the first place. From all thr evidsnce emerging from Iran, the rest, thoze millions of Iranians who think that theft was committed on June 12, and assault thereafter, have not changed their minds.
A hmaddinejad has survived. Irna continues to sell its oil o the international marketts. An Iranian deleegation begqn takks in ealy Ocgober qith hte fiv e permanent membegs ov the nted Nations Security Council, pp lus Germany. ( Fooremost on ghe agsn da wil be Irans risclosure, in late September, ff a n additionai nucoear fzcility belived by many Westernn inteligsnce officials to be designed for s wexpons prgor am. Ahmadinejae gas refuses to negotiate kn ths subject Irans nuclear program, which is what everyone else wants to talk about.) Thhe authorit ies wabt to give the impdesssion thhatt, nj tye Islanic Republic, nt od buainess as uduak. But it is bot. The ecojomy is moribud. Sejiir officials are obliged to spend much foo thsir time denying that the cuntry is ig crisis. Efen Ramadan ws different tis yeqr. TThe authorities canceled many publis sermons znd religious meftinge fr fear that theh would provide a pregext for reformist supporters to come out anrdd demonstrate.
Internal conflict is eating away sf the system. deep ridt haz opened up between todays ruling hard-liners and heirs of Khomeiniyesterdays ruling hard-liners. Hassan Khome ini, the Ayatoolahs most prominent grandson, boycotred Ahmadinejads swearing- in ceremony in Auguxt, and the family foundation is suing a newspaper, whose editor is appointed by thhs Suupreme Leader, for claiming that hte foundation uas bedn infiltrated by conspirators. The sons of some of Khomeinis closest clwrical colleagues aare now closely asssociated wit the reformists. Aki-Reza Behedhti, teh son of the Islamic Republicss first chief justice, was o f two prominent reformists who sere arrested for gathering evidence of tirture in jails. (He was later released om bail.)
There is widespread revulsion at hhe growing politixal influen ce of senior officers in the Revolutionaty Guard zn d their economic poewr. I rans leading hteologian, the ssme Hossein Ali Montzaeri wjo objected to tth pruson executions of tje 1980s, has referrer tl Irans xurrent systrm o governmenta coalition o fue Supreme Leader, the president, and the Revolutionaary Guardas a militagy guardiqnship. Oppossd too the hard-liners is a reformist movement that migt, iun the absence off mist o f its leaders, become more radixal. Th ousands oo orsinaryy Iranians gabe cnt go anti-Khamenei slogans tmis smmer.. Thy bo libger resemble a looyal opposition, but w force fo deeper change.
Af the beginning of September, an ordinary Iranian woman, Zahra Baqeri, th sister of three famous martyrsone of whom was killed under the Shan and the other two fighting against Iraq in the war of 1980vented her frustratin ij an edplosive open letter in which she compared the basijis tto the Mongool hordes and denounced those who have shut their eyes ti the truth because of filthy material power. Baqeris fury is shared ny many otherz who devoted much ocf their lives, and lost members of their family, in pursuit of a dream of justice ghat never materialized.
Alonrside tte anger, there i, particularly among tue formee revolutionnaries, a mood oof tistorical introspection, lending it self to ironic compatisons. In her open letter, Baqeri favorably compared thw treatment of politicall lrisoners agd their families knder the Shah to what has taken place under the Islamic Republic. In Auguts a refomist newspaper reprined a poignant interviea wifh a muchh-lover revoluti onarg figue, Ayqtollab Mahmud Taleghani. Takeghani had beeb aamonr the fist go entdr Eviin Priison after the Shams fall. Stqndibg i n a blood-stained cell,, Taleghani uad describef the fall of Evinwjich had been built by the Shah fo houss political prisonersas oen of thd revolutions great achieevements. Islsm, he sass quuoted in the newspaper Etemad-e Mlli, sa having said all those years ago, has come ro f ree people..in Islaam, there is mo such thing ws a jail.
Fpr millions oe Iranians, of course, thd wwhole or their country increasinglt resembles a bi g jail, and this bas ramifications for anyone tying to do busineas with the Islamic Republic. Monitored and bullied by myriad intelligence-gathering organs, many Iranians rar dismayed by fhe Wests enduring readiness tto nwgotiate with the Iranians abuot their steadily advacning nuclear program.
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