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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Iran Minister Warns ex-Presidents over Elections

2013-05-03

[An Nahar] Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi on Thursday warned ex-presidents Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani ... the fourth President of Iran. He was a member of the Assembly of Experts until he was eased out in 2011 He continues, for the moment, as Chairman of the Expediency Discernment Council. In 2005 he ran for a third term as president, ultimately losing to rival Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was in Khamenei's graces back then. In 1980 Rafsanjani survived an assassination attempt, during which he was seriously injured. He has been described as a centrist and a pragmatic conservative without all that much reason. He is currently being eased out of any position of actual influence or power and may be dead by the end of 2012... and Mohammad Khatami, without naming them, over their alleged role in the protest movement that followed Iran's disputed 2009 elections. The two former presidents have not yet announced if they will contest the June 14 presidential election to replace Mahmoud Short Round Ahmadinejad, who cannot stand for a third consecutive term. "We say to he who claims to have predicted the 2009 plot that he did not predict anything because we have very specific information on his role in the plot," Moslehi said, quoted by the Mehr and Fars news agencies. Rafsanjani, a moderate who was president from 1989 to 1997, has said he had "predicted" the demonstrations and festivities which followed the contested re-election of Ahmadinejad to the presidency in 2009. The two reformist candidates in the 2009 elections, Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, had called for the protests after they rejected the results on charges of fraud. They have been kept under house arrest since. Moslehi also issued a thinly-veiled warning to Khatami, who was a reformist head of state from 1997 to 2005. "One of the leaders of the plot, who was not put under house arrest like the other two for various reasons, should not fool himself and think that the revolutionary power has forgotten the role he played in the plot," he said in a speech in the northern city of Qom. Reformist newspapers and officials have stepped up calls for the two former presidents to contest the election, although people close to them have dismissed the idea for the moment.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Iran issues writs of culpability for 18 persons regarding assassination of nuclear scientists

2013-03-18

Azerbaijan - Writs of culpability have been issued for 18 persons who are indicted to be involved in the assassination of three Iranian nuclear scientists, ISNA quoted Tehran Prosecutor General Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi as saying. Bills of indictment will be issued for the persons in the near future and they will be tried in the next year, he added. Elementary-particle physicist Massoud Ali-Mohammadi was assassinated in a bomb attack in Tehran on January 12, 2010. Physicist Majid Shahriari was killed in a bombing in Tehran on November 29, 2010 and professor Darioush Rezaiinejad was shot and killed by a gunman with an AK-47 in Tehran on July 23, 2011. Operation Lemony Snickett has been a smashing success so far... In January, Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi said Iranian intelligence agents have foiled several assassination plots against a number of nuclear scientists. He refused to give additional information, saying that the details of the operations would be announced soon. "I can say no more!" The methods of the terrorist groups to hatch assassination plots have been discovered and neutralized through intelligence operations, Moslehi added.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Iran Breaks Up Nuclear Assassination Cells

2012-07-23

Intelligence minister says authorities have shut down two networks involved in training nuclear scientists' killers Iran has placed in long-term storage Maw! They're comin' to get me, Maw! some of those responsible for liquidations of its nuclear scientists, state media reported on Sunday, in a continued hunt for those it says are working to sabotage its nuclear program.   Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi said Iran had shut down two networks inside and outside the country he said were involved in training the killers, Fars news agency reported. Moslehi did not say how many people had been placed in long-term storage Maw! They're comin' to get me, Maw! , for which killings they were allegedly responsible, where the networks were operating or how they trained the assassins.   "They (the two networks) took steps not to leave any clues behind but they were stricken by mistakes," he said. More: Iran says 30 cooled for a few years ... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not... in connection with liquidation of nuclear scientist About 30 suspects have been cooled for a few years ... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not... in connection with the liquidation last year of a nuclear electronics expert, Iran’s intelligence chief Heidar Moslehi said Sunday Moslehi’s comments, reported by the official IRNA news agency Sunday, gave no other details on the arrests, including whether they are new or among those previously announced. At least five Iranian nuclear experts have been killed since 2010. In May, Iran hanged a man convicted in the killing of a nuclear physicist in early 2010. Also Sunday, Iran’s nuclear chief said more domestically produced nuclear fuel has been supplied to a medical research reactor, and said the country could produce nuclear fuel for ships if it wanted.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Iranian Minister: Israel Behind Recent Blasts In Syria

2012-04-01

Iran's Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi said Saturday that according to intelligence obtained by Tehran, Israel was behind a recent series of kabooms in Syria. Operation Lemony Snickett isn't just for Iran, anymore. Check under your bed and in the closet to make sure you're alone before you go to sleep.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

'US spies were to disrupt Iran polls'

2012-01-09

[Iran Press TV] Iran's Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi says the spies recently placed in long-term storage in Iran were plotting to implement US plans during upcoming Iranian parliamentary polls. Moslehi said on Sunday that the espionage agents were planning to disrupt the elections, using guidelines communicated to them from outside the country and generating disturbance through online social networking websites. According to the deputy head of Iran's Election Headquarters, Hassan-Ali Nouri, more than 4,500 hopefuls have applied for candidacy in the ninth round of Iran's parliamentary elections, slated to be held on March 2. Moslehi said the fifth columnists were placed in long-term storage after their activities and liaisons were fully established by Iran's Intelligence Ministry. The Iranian intelligence minister added that the spies were not part of any major group. Over the past year, the Islamic Theocratic Republic has apprehended many suspicious individuals, who were later found to have been enlisted by the United States and Israel.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Iran claims to have captured 12 CIA spies

2011-11-24

Iranian officials claimed a blow against US spying efforts on its nuclear programme and strategic industries after 12 CIA assets were captured by the regime and its Lebanese ally, Hizbollah. US officials acknowledged that its network targeting Iran had suffered a setback and expressed fears that its contacts would be executed by the regime. Heydar Moslehi, Iran's intelligence minister, said yesterday that the alleged spies worked at the highest levels of "major firms involved in oil, gas and nuclear industries" as the country . Parviz Sorouri, a member of parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy committee said the arrested spies were on a mission to cripple Iran in vital sectors with military and security links. This current announcement follows the unravelling by Lebanon's Hizbollah of a CIA spy ring included a network based in a Pizza Hut. Hassan Nasrallah, Hizbollah's leader, has admitted that at least two CIA spies had infiltrated the ranks of the organisation. The US Embassy in Lebanon officially denied the accusation but officials conceded that Hizbollah had subsequently methodically picked off CIA informants in recent months.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Three Iranian Ministers Target of EU Sanctions

2011-10-11

[An Nahar] Three Iranian government ministers are on a list of 29 people targeted by new European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... sanctions, diplomatic sources told Agence La Belle France Presse on Monday. The present ministers for intelligence (secret services), justice and culture are joined by a former interior minister as well as regional governors, prosecutors and prison directors, the sources added. The sanctions will take effect on Tuesday when they are published in the EU's legal log, the Official Journal. EU foreign ministers signed off the Iranian travel bans and asset freezes, alongside other sanctions on Belarus in Luxembourg on Monday. They follow a previous wave of restrictive measures in March against 32 Iranians, as well as plans to hit the Commercial Bank of Syria, targeted by a US assets freeze in August, according to diplomats. Heydar Moslehi, intelligence minister, is responsible for the infamous Evin prison's torture ward, section 209. Moslehi stands accused of ordering arbitrary detentions and persecution of opposition figures. Culture Minister Mohammad Husseini is held responsible for press censorship as well as the arrests of journalists and artists, the same sources said. Justice Minister Seyyed Morteza Bakhtiair is said to have harassed prominent Iranians living abroad. Former interior minister Sadeq Mahsouli and the head of the Iranian police's computer crimes squad are also on the list, for investigations into opposition figures using the Internet. In Belarus, where President Alexander Lukashenko has thrown hundreds of opponents behind bars, four of 16 people blacklisted are believed to be involved in a court case against the head of a top human rights ...which often intentionally defined so widely as to be meaningless... group, Ales Beliatsky, that has sparked global outrage and calls for his release. The 27-nation bloc last month banned the delivery to Syria's central bank of bank-notes and coins produced in the EU in a seventh round of sanctions designed to step up economic pressure on President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad's One of the last of the old-fashioned hereditary iron-fisted fascist dictators. Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor... regime. The last round also included a ban on European firms making new investments in Syria's oil industry, biting further at Assad's regime after an earlier ban on imports of Syrian crude to Europe. Europe buys 95 percent of Syria's oil exports, providing the regime with one third of its hard currency earnings. The sanctions against Syria come on the heels of growing irritation against Russia and China in the EU and the United States, for their veto of a UN resolution against the Syrian regime's unrelenting crackdown on protests.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Iran accuses US, Israel of killing scientist

2011-07-25

[Dawn] Iran on Sunday accused arch-foes the United States and Israel of criminal masterminding the liquidation of a scientist in Tehran, Dariush Rezaei-Nejad, who was reportedly associated with the defence ministry. "The American-Zionist terrorist act yesterday against one of the country's scientists is yet another sign of the Americans' degree of animosity," speaker Ali Larijani told parliament. "America must think carefully about the consequences of such actions," he said, urging security forces in the Islamic republic to give a "stronger response to such evil moves." But Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi was quoted as saying by the official IRNA news agency that no signs had been found so far to suggest that foreign intelligence services were behind the murder. "What is certain is that Dariush Rezaie-Nejad was not involved in the nuclear issue. His liquidation is ambiguous and we are examining it," Moslehi said. "Operations by foreign intelligence services generally leave signs, but we have not found any signs in this terrorist act and we have not reached any conclusion on whether foreign intelligence services are behind it," he added. Assailants riding a cycle of violence rubbed out Rezaei-Nejad, 35, in Tehran on Saturday evening, according to Iranian media which originally reported he was a nuclear scientist working for the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran. But on Sunday, the media stopped referring to him as a nuclear expert, without giving an explanation, and presented him as an "electronics master's student" at Tehran's Khajeh Nassir University. The Fars news agency suggested that the media had made a mistake in reporting Rezaei-Nejad's speciality, and insisted that he had links with the defence ministry, without giving details. But higher education deputy minister Mohammad Mehdinejad Nouri told Mehr news agency that the victim "was not a member of the defence ministry" and suggested he may have collaborated on a project the ministry contracted out to Khajeh Nassir University. According to reports on Sunday, Rezaei-Nejad was shot five times by unknown assailants as he and his wife were waiting for their child in front of a kindergarten in Tehran. His wife was maimed in the attack. Tehran governor Morteza Tamaddon said at Rezaei-Nejad's funeral that the liquidation "was without a doubt part of a project to discourage the Medes and the Persians from the path (of progress) it was pursuing," Mehr reported. Tamaddon linked the murder to those who last year killed two top physicists working on Iran's controversial nuclear programme, Masoud Ali Mohammadi and Majid Shahriari. "Nuclear energy is our undeniable right," chanted the crowd attending the funeral, according to Fars. A statement signed by 200 deputies condemned what they called "the cowardly actions of America and the Zionist regime against the Islamic republic,"particularly the "murder of an Iranian scientist." Several Iranian nuclear scientists have disappeared in recent years or been targeted in attacks the Islamic republic has blamed on the United States and Israel, which suspect Tehran's atomic programme masks a nuclear weapons drive. In Israel, there was no formal reaction to the allegation but an official said such charges were "routine.""Iran routinely accuses Israel of all sorts of things," he told AFP on condition of anonymity.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Ahmadinejad oil ministry move 'illegal'

2011-05-21

Iran's constitutional watchdog has deemed illegal Mahmoud Short Round Ahmadinejad's decision to take over the role of oil minister, after Iran's president removed the previous minister along with two others earlier in the week. Iran's president was said to have assumed the role earlier this week as part of a government shakeup that reduced the number of ministries from 21 to 17. The move put him in direct control of the government unit responsible for the extraction and export of the world's fifth largest oil and gas reserves. It also meant Ahmadinejad would represent Iran at the next OPEC meeting, set for June 8 in Vienna. According to Iranian law, a president has three months after removing a minister to introduce a new candidate to parliament. During that period he can act as caretaker of the ministry or appoint someone else to do so. But Iran's Guardian Council, which supervises legislation and can block laws it deems unconstitutional or not Islamic, found Ahmadinejad's move illegal, according to the semi-official Fars news agency. Fars did not give details as to why the council came to that conclusion, or what effect it could actually have. A dispute over the government changes has grown in the past weeks, with members of the conservative ruling elite clashing with Ahmadinejad. Iranian media has reported that Iran's Ayatollah Khamenei, the country's supreme leader, resolved a growing dispute between Ahmadinejad and parliamentary speaker Ali Larijani, an outspoken critic of the president's economic policies. Last month, Khamenei overturned Ahmadinejad's decision to sack his intelligence minister, Heydar Moslehi.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Ahmadinejad under sorcerer's spell: top cleric

2011-05-16

Iran's diminutive President Mahmoud Short Round Ahmadinejad has been put "under a spell" by his chief of staff Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie, an ultra-conservative holy man was quoted by local media on Sunday as saying. Actually, that explains quite a bit... "I've told some of my close friends that I am more than 90 percent certain that (Ahmadinejad) has been put under a spell. This is not natural at all,"Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi, believed to have once been a mentor of the president, told the weekly Shoma. "No sane person does such things unless his free will has been taken away,"Mesbah Yazdi said in reference to a crisis that has erupted since mid-April between Ahmadinejad and the hardline conservative camp close to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. "His actions have no justification. When he has 10 friends... does it make sense to constantly defy nine of them and defend (the actions of the) tenth person?" Mesbah Yazdi asked in an allusion to Mashaie. Mashaie, the president's top adviser and close relative who has worked alongside Ahmadinejad for more than 25 years, has been the target of a barrage of criticism from the conservative camp in past weeks. Mashaie, who has been condemned for being too liberal, holding nationalistic views dating back to pre-Islamic Iran, and for having a great influence on the president, is now accused of leading a "current of deviation" aimed at destroying the Islamic regime. Mesbah Yazdi said he sensed a "great danger" lingering over Ahmadinejad because of Mashaie. "I do not know if it is (because of) hypnotism, a spell or relations with yogis. But there is something wrong," said Mesbah Yazdi. "It is almost as if this questionable person (Mashaie) has put this man (Ahmadinejad) under a spell, as if he has wrapped him around his finger," he said. The conservatives also accuse Mashaie of orchestrating the attempted sacking of Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi in mid-April, which was vetoed by the supreme leader. The aborted dismissal triggered an unprecedented political crisis in the higher echelons of Iran's regime, with Ahmadinejad expressing his displeasure by withdrawing from public life and official duties for 10 days. Several conservative websites have recently hinted that Mashaie may be connected to the practice of dark magic, while the judiciary has announced the arrest of two "sorcerers" but stopped short of linking them to the chief of staff. The rumours have gained enough momentum to prompt Ahmadinejad to deny them publicly. "Those who have spoken in recent days about the influence of fortune tellers and jinn (shape-shifting spirits) on government were telling jokes,"Ahmadinejad said on May 8. Iran's first Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi hit back hard at the accusation by the ultra-conservatives. "Some people speak of sorcery and jinns and attribute them to the government. Is it possible to govern the country with sorcery and jinn? Is it possible to send satellites into the sky (using them)? Science is behind all these issues," Rahimi was quoted as saying in some local papers. "How could they attribute such things to Dr. Ahmadinejad, the president and a (university) professor?" Rahimi added. Another vice president, Hamid Baghaie, defended Mashaie against accusations of deviancy, describing them as "slander." Ayatollah Ahmad Janati, who heads the powerful Guardians Council, a body that oversees elections, interprets the constitution and vets parliamentary legislation, warned Ahmadinejad on Friday that he could not protect Mashaie forever. "Some people seek to deviate from and act against the country and Velayat-e Faqih (the supreme leader)," Janati said. "But there will come a day that the regime and the people will deal with them."

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Ahmadinejad, Larijani in bitter row over ministries

2011-05-13

[Asia One] A blazing row has erupted between President Mahmoud Short Round Ahmadinejad and parliament speaker Ali Larijani over the restructuring of ministries, reports said Thursday, in a fresh sign of tension in Iran's ruling conservative camp. The row comes shortly after an unprecedented rift surfaced between Ahmadinejad and supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei which saw the president disappear from public life for nearly two weeks. Larijani, an ardent critic of Ahmadinejad and who was defeated by the hardliner in 2005 presidential elections, publicly accused the president on Wednesday of "violating the law" by not following parliamentary procedures on the merger of ministries. "If the government has ambiguities in understanding the law, the parliament can explain the law to the government," the reformist Arman newspaper Thursday quoted Larijani as saying in sharp remarks aimed at Ahmadinejad. At the centre of the row are government proposals to merge several ministries, including energy and oil, so as to reduce their numbers to 17 from 21 in accordance with a overarching five year plan. Ahmadinejad in turn lashed out at Larijani, saying parliament should mind its own business. "The respected speaker of the parliament apparently thinks that he is the manifestation of the law, but this is not a true assumption," Arman quoted Ahmadinejad as saying after Wednesday's cabinet meeting. "One should pay attention not to disturb and pollute the atmosphere of the country with such assumptions." Ahmadinejad said Larijani himself had written the law, "but he had better read the law once again today." "Certain people think that they are the employer and the government is their labourer, but it is better that the respected majlis (parliament) focuses on its duties and allow the executive branch to carry out its duties based on the law," the hardliner said. Traditional tension between the conservative-dominated parliament and the government have been exacerbated by the political rivalry between Ahmadinejad and Larijani that first arose when they competed in the 2005 presidential election. The two men have clashed often in the past but never so bitterly in public. The political tussle comes after Ahmadinejad found himself in a row with Khamenei, the all-powerful authority in Iran. Ahmadinejad last month disappeared from public life for a period after Khamenei overruled his decision to dismiss Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi. He returned to his office May 1 after the two reportedly settled their differences.

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Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Iran's Conservatives Turn Up Heat on Ahmadinejad

2011-05-10

[An Nahar] Iran's ruling conservatives have increased the pressure on President Mahmoud Short Round Ahmadinejad to "obey" the Islamic republic's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, saying his latest pledges did not go far enough. "The president said he would dishearten the enemies of the regime (in accepting Khamenei's authority) but that is not enough. We are waiting for him to act on his words," said influential religious authority Hojatoleslam Kazem Sediqi, widely quoted in Sunday papers. Ahmadinejad told a cabinet meeting on May 1 that he would obey Khamenei like "a son would his father" in an attempt to draw a line on the stand-off between the two leaders. The president had last month boycotted all public duties for eight days after Khamenei vetoed his sacking of Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi, an ally of the supreme leader. But later on Sunday, he reiterated his allegiance to the Velayat-e Faqih system of supreme leader in Iran. "The government with strength in word and action will continue to defend Velayat-e Faqih," Ahmadinejad said at a cabinet meeting on Sunday, quoted on state television's website. The clash over control of the intelligence ministry triggered a conservative backlash against the president that shows little sign of abating. One Ahmadinejad ally, presidential prayer leader Hojatoleslam Abbas Amirifar, was tossed in the calaboose May 1 for his murky role in the distribution of a DVD announcing the imminent return of the hidden imam, whom Shiite Mohammedans believe to be the ultimate savior of humankind who will bring justice to the world. A court also insinuated the arrest of a "sorcerer" who was allegedly linked to Ahmadinejad's chief of staff, Esfandiyar Rahim Mashaie. "Certain people within the regime have forgotten the values of the revolution and seek to misrepresent Islam ... but the people do not follow demons or jinns, and will not tolerate such deviance," warned General Mohammad Ali Jafari, head of the Revolutionary Guards, who reports directly to the supreme leader. But Ahmadinejad on Sunday played down the row. "The country can only be built with wisdom and sacrifice. For this, we believe those who these days speak of the influence of fortune-tellers and jinns in the performance of the government are only making jokes," he said. Mashaie has long been a thorn in the side of the religious ultra-conservatives, who say he is too nationalistic, too liberal and wields too much influence over the president. Regime hardliners also accuse him of "deviating" the revolution and have petitioned the president several times to get rid of him, so far to no avail. For the past week, religious conservatives have been issuing daily reminders of the president's duty of obedience to the supreme leader. "To obey and submit to the supreme leader is a religious duty that has nothing to do with politics," said Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi, Ahmadinejad's former mentor, who added that the president's "legitimacy is based upon the approval of the supreme leader and not the popular vote." Hojatoleslam Mojtaba Zolnour, Khamenei's deputy representative to the Revolutionary Guards, echoed the message: "Neither the president nor anyone has any legitimacy without the order of the supreme leader," he said, asking Ahmadinejad to "correct" his position. The conservative parliament, dominated by hardliners, has opposed the government frequently in recent months. It has also upped the pressure on Ahmadinejad, launching a petition demanding that he come before parliament to explain his behavior, Mehr news agency reported, adding it had already garnered 90 of the 175 signatures required.

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