20.Juni 2009 – Der Tag der alles änderte – Der Mord an NEDA

Es war der 20. Juni 2009 als sich das Leben von Farin Fakhari und vielen anderen änderte. An diesem Tag wurde NEDA durch die Schüsse eines Handlangers, des damaligen Pseudo-Präsidenten Ahmadinejad, ohne Grund, erschossen. Seit diesem Tag helfen wir iranischen Menschenrechtsaktivisten in aller Welt.  Täglich, 365 Tage im Jahr.

Es folgte die Gründung der Flüchtlingshilfe Iran e.V., gegründet durch Farin Fakhari, Dr. Mehran Barati, Roschanak Tabari, Hans-Peter Buschheuer, Prof. Dr. Hajo Funke, Lutz Bucklitsch und einigen anderen.

Hunderte dieser Menschenrechtsaktivisten aus dem Iran, die flüchten mussten aus ihrem Land, konnten wir in die Bundesrepublik Deutschland holen. Unterstützt durch die Bundesrepublik Deutschland, voran das Auswärtige Amt und das Bundesministerium des Innern, samt aller Länderinnenministerien. Diesen Einrichtungen gilt unser DANK. Aber auch allen Mitstreitern im gesamten Bundesgebiet, ohne deren Hilfe, wir dieses Projekt Flüchtlingshilfe Iran e.V. nie hätten machen können. Sie alle haben dazu beigetragen, diesen Flüchtlingen ein sicheres Zuhause und eine sichere Zukunft zu ermöglichen.  Erfolgreiche Integration in das hiesige Leben zeigen dies täglich.

A Baluchi woman killed by police forces

HRANA News Agency – Seyed Bibi Rasoulizadeh (Moradkhatoon), in Sarbaz town, was taken over by police when she was resisting against seizure of her nephew’s car and died in the way to hospital.

According to the report of Human Rights Activists News Agency (HRANA), police seized a Toyota car, in a checkpoint on Sarbaz town, the suburb of Ashar in Afshan village, which was carrying diesel fuel and belonged to the nephew of Seyed Bibi Rasoulizadeh, on Friday, July 18th at 12am.

When this 40 years old woman tried to prevent seizure of the car she was taken over by the police officer who was driving and died on the way to hospital due to the injuries.

An informed source told HRANA’s reporter, “when police officers were trying to transfer the car to station, they confronted with her. Moradkhatoon insisted that they should not seize her nephew’s car. But, the officer who was driving had taken over her”.

This source also said that officer was a conscript and he even did not stop for transferring her to hospital.

This incident caused anger of the community and some had attacked the station and broken the door.

Poverty and unemployment have caused the young people tending to smuggling the fuel to neighbor countries.

Source: HRA-NEWS.org

25 Jahre nach den Wiener Kurdenmorden – Eine Schande für Österreich

Vor 25 Jahren haben die Wiener Kurdenmorde Österreich erschüttert. Am 13. Juli 1989 wurden der Chef der Kurdischen Demokratischen Partei/Iran, Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou und zwei weitere Kurden bei einem Geheimtreffen mit der Teheraner Führung ermordet. Bis heute sind die Morde ungeklärt.

Die Tatverdächtigen tauchten nach der Tat in einer Privatwohnung in Wien-Landstraße in der iranischen Botschaft unter und konnten nach Interventionen der iranischen Regierung unbehelligt ausreisen; einer von ihnen wurde sogar unter Polizeischutz zum Schwechater Flughafen geleitet.

(APA/Jäger) Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou

Ahmadinejad an Tat beteiligt

Nach Darstellung des grünen Parlamentariers Peter Pilz, der sich jahrelang mit dem Fall beschäftigte, saß zumindest ein Akteur von damals in höchster Position: Der frühere iranische Präsident Mahmoud Ahmadinejad höchstpersönlich sei „dringend verdächtig“, an der Ermordung der drei Kurdenführer in Wien beteiligt gewesen zu sein. Möglicherweise habe er selbst geschossen, dies lasse sich allerdings nicht mehr eindeutig eruieren.

Laut Aussage eines deutschen Waffenhändlers aus dem Jahr 2006, so Pilz, habe es in der ersten Juliwoche 1989 ein Treffen in der iranischen Botschaft gegeben. Bei diesem Treffen sei auch ein „gewisser Mohammad“, welcher „später Präsident der iranischen Republik wurde“, anwesend gewesen. Zweck dieses Treffens seien laut Protokoll illegale Waffenlieferungen gewesen.

Große Empörung in Österreich

In Österreich war die Empörung über die Morde groß. Der damalige Außenminister Alois Mock (ÖVP) sprach im Zusammenhang mit den Tötungen von einer „Schweinerei“, am Ballhausplatz war von „erpresserischen Methoden der Iraner“ die Rede.

Der damalige Chef der Politischen Sektion des Außenamts, Botschafter Erich Maximilian Schmid, sagte im April 1997 nach seiner Pensionierung in einem TV-Interview, der iranische Botschafter habe „mit ziemlicher Klarheit“ zu verstehen gegeben, dass „es gefährlich werden könnte für die Österreicher im Iran“, sollten die Tatverdächtigen in Österreich vor Gericht gestellt werden. Über die iranischen Drohungen war nach Angaben Mocks auch der damalige Außenamts-Generalsekretär und spätere Bundespräsident Thomas Klestil informiert.

Iran setzte Österreich unter Druck

Am 30. November 1989 sagte Innenminister Franz Löschnak (SPÖ) nach einem Treffen mit dem Chef der Terrorbekämpfungsabteilung im US-Außenamt, Morris Busby, dass Haftbefehle gegen die Tatverdächtigen erlassen worden seien. Allerdings hatte der Generaldirektor für die Öffentliche Sicherheit, Robert Danzinger, am Vortag per Weisung die Überwachung der iranischen Botschaft „reduzieren“ lassen.

(APA/Jäger)  – Eine Leiche wird abtransportiert

Im August 1991 erklärte der in Frankreich im Exil lebende Ex-Präsident Abolhassan Bani-Sadr, Teheran besitze ein Druckmittel gegen Österreich, nämlich die Unterlagen über die illegalen österreichischen Waffenlieferungen im irakisch-iranischen Golfkrieg. In der Noricum-Affäre war eine Woche vor dem Attentat eine Voruntersuchung gegen die SPÖ-Politiker Altbundeskanzler Fred Sinowatz, Ex-Außenminister Leopold Gratz und Ex-Innenminister Karl Blecha eingeleitet worden.

Bis heute nicht aufgeklärt

Am 17. August 1992 wurde Ghassemlous Nachfolger Sadegh Charafkandi nach einer Tagung der Sozialistischen Internationale (SI) mit drei Mitarbeitern im Restaurant „Mykonos“ in Berlin ermordet, der Lokalbesitzer lebensgefährlich verletzt. Charafkandi hätte am darauffolgenden Tag nach Wien kommen sollen.

Österreichische Beamte sagten im deutschen „Mykonos“-Prozess aus, dass sich der Iran für die mutmaßlichen Attentäter von Wien eingesetzt hatte. Die deutsche Justiz warf dem Iran Staatsterrorismus vor. Nach ihren Erkenntnissen wurden auch die Wiener Morde von der obersten iranischen Führung angeordnet. Das „Mykonos“-Urteil veranlasste die EU-Staaten, ihre Botschafter 1997 vorübergehend aus Teheran abzuziehen.

Täter nie bestraft

Im November 1992 wurde die Amtshaftungsklage der Ghassemlou-Witwe in Wien in dritter Instanz abgewiesen; die Republik Österreich bescheinigte ihren Organen, dass es „keinerlei schuldhaftes und rechtswidriges Verhalten“ gegeben habe. Grüne und Liberale scheiterten 1997 mit ihrer Forderung nach einem parlamentarischen Untersuchungsausschuss zur Aufklärung möglicher Vertuschungsversuche am Widerstand der Koalitionsparteien SPÖ und ÖVP.

Von einem „bösen, brutalen und vorbereiteten Verbrechen“ sprach der damalige Nationalratspräsident und heutige Bundespräsident Heinz Fischer bei einer Gedenkfeier zu Ehren von Ghassemlou. Es sei „bitter und traurig“, dass die Aufklärung im Einzelnen und die Bestrafung der Täter nicht zustande gekommen seien.

Quelle: ORF.at – Studio Wien

Photo Essay: A New Mood in Iran

bySemira Nikou 

 

            The voice of Ali Larijani, Iran’s parliament speaker, disrupted our dinner party.

            We left our plates filled with fruits and nuts to huddle around the television, as the speaker read the names of President Hassan Rouhani’s cabinet picks one by one, announcing whether or not each had been approved by the parliament. One of the guests, a journalist, let out a sigh of relief with Bijan Namdar Zangeneh’s approval as petroleum minister. Zanganeh, who had served in the same position under former President Mohammad Khatami’s reformist administration from 1997 to 2005, was a key candidate whose nomination had been hotly challenged by Iran’s conservative parliament.

            With parliament ultimately approving 15 out of the 18 proposed ministers, the administration of hope—as Rouhani’s presidency is referred to—had delivered a competent cabinet. Now we could eat.

            There is a new mood in Iran. I recently visited Tehran in August 2013, four years after my last trip in June 2009. Much has changed since.  The Iran of 2009 and the Iran of 2013 are two different places.

Rouhani: Challenges Ahead

Haleh Esfandiari

            The decisive election of Hassan Rouhani as Iran’s new president has been greeted around the world as a sign that Iranians are tired of hardline policies at home and abroad and are ready to embrace change. But the outcome also raises the question of how the new president might go about it, given Iran’s powerful clerical leadership and long history of quashing reform efforts.
      Rouhani will inherit from his predecessor a host of difficult, even insurmountable problems. In the past eight years, such limited freedoms as existed have been severely eroded. The economy is in shambles due to Western-imposed sanctions and outgoing president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s reckless spending and misguided policies. With few real friends, Iran is internationally isolated, and its relations with the US and the Europeans are under strain over Iran’s nuclear program, its support for Assad in Syria, and its inflammatory rhetoric on Israel. Negotiations between Iran and the so-called 5+1 (five members of the UN Security Council and Germany) about Tehran’s nuclear program have been deadlocked.
While he is considered a moderate, Rouhani comes to office as an insider. For sixteen years he was head of Iran’s National Security Council (NSC) and for two years Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator. Even today, he sits on the NSC as the personal representative of the supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei. He served five terms in the Majlis, or parliament. He sits on two major state councils, one of which, the Assembly of Experts, will elect Khamenei’s successor whenever he passes away. In holding high office, Rouhani was more a team player than a maverick and continues to support many existing Iranian policies. On Syria, since his election he has offered only the formulaic non-answer that the Syrian people should decide their own future through elections.

            Critics have noted that Rouhani spoke in support of the harsh crackdown on student protesters at Tehran University in 1999—he later explained he was in the government at the time and could have not done otherwise. He also was silent when security forces brutally crushed protests following the contested 2009 presidential elections, and his explanation for that silence remains unconvincing: he was not then in the government, he said, the nature of the protests had changed, and the protesters were obligated to act within the laws.

Rouhani in his own words: On Nukes, Talks

 

      In mid-2005, President-elect Hassan Rouhani gave a detailed speech outlining Iran’s nuclear needs and its negotiating strategy with the outside world. The 39-page speech is the best indication – in his own words—of his views on Iran’s controversial program. Most notably, he told senior Iranian officials that the government could have avoided problems with the international community if it had been more open about its nuclear activities from the start. Rouhani also claimed Iran “never wanted” to build a bomb. These are excerpts from his briefing to Iran’s Supreme Cultural Revolution Council shortly before he resigned as chief nuclear negotiator after differences with then newly elected President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad—who is now his predecessor.

On Iran’s Nuclear Needs

            “The Islamic Republic of Iran 15 or 16 years ago ― that is in [the Islamic years] 1366 or 1367 [1987‐1989 on the Western calendar] ― started to pursue fuel cycle technology. We pursued this technology because we always wanted to make use of nuclear energy, wanted to have nuclear power plants, and wanted to be able to produce the needed fuel for those plants ourselves…

            “The argument that because Iran has oil and gas, it should not have this technology is not a correct argument. The United States maintains that Iran does not need nuclear power plants, but the Europeans say it is Iran’s right to have nuclear power plants and it should have them .Iran has the right to worry about its long‐term future. Iran’s oil and gas resources will be exhausted one day, and it should have this technology…

            “If we can reach a political agreement to work with the world and activate our fuel cycle, that would be very desirable. We think there is a chance we would be successful in this undertaking.”

On Secrecy

            “Some of you say that if wehad said from the start that we wanted to have the fuel cycle, the situation would havebeen easier. Yes, if we had decided to declare our intention at the beginning, if we hadtold the IAEA that we intended to build a UCF (uranium conversion facility) plant at the same time that we started construction at Esfahan, if we had announced our facilities at Natanz from the start, we would not have any problems now, or our problems would have been far less than they are today.

            In fact, this is the very reason that our case has become so complicated. Theyask: If you truly were after fuel cycle, why did you do it secretly?! This is the root of all problems.

Rouhani: Tweets picture at US field hospital

President-elect Hassan Rouhani has tweeted a picture of himself at a U.S. field hospital set up to treat survivors of the 2003 earthquake near the southeastern city of Bam. Rouhani’s English-language account posted it one day after he reached out to the United States during his first press conference. Both countries need to heal the “very old wound” and “find solutions to past issues,” said Rouhani.

 

Election:What Rouhani Victory Means for Iran

by Shaul Bakhash

            Hassan Rouhani’s surprising first round victory in the presidential elections represents a significant shift in the Iranian political landscape. In a field of candidates dominated by conservatives, Rouhani ran as a moderate. He questioned the necessity of the expanding security state and the constant oversight of student and civil society associations by the security agencies. He spoke of the need for greater freedom of press and speech. He devoted attention to women’s rights issues and promised to establish a ministry for women’s affairs.

      On the economy, while all the candidates promised to address problems of inflation and unemployment, Rouhani also focused on the institutions that make rational economic policy possible. He said one of his first acts would be to revive what were once key institutions such as the Plan Organization and the Supreme Economic Council, which outgoing President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad did away with.

      On foreign policy, during the election campaign the Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, continued to stress the need for resistance and steadfastness in the face of the ‘hegemonic’ West, warned against those who naively believe compromise with the West will gain Iran positive results, and ridiculed the idea that Iran was internationally isolated. But Rouhani, while appearing as steadfast as the other candidates on Iran’s nuclear rights, stressed the need to find a way out of the impasse with the West on the nuclear issue and to end Iran’s diplomatic isolation. He did not shy away, but rather defended, the softer line on the nuclear issue adopted by the government of President Mohammad Khatami, when Rouhani served as head of the National Security Council and as Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator.

Election: Diverse Iranian Press Reaction

      The Iranian press issued both praise and warnings after the election of Hassan Rouhani. In their editorials, reformist publications said the victory by a moderate cleric reflected a rejection of the status quo in politics, the economy and foreign policy. Newspapers heralded the beginning of a new era. The conservative press said the high turnout proved the popularity and legitimacy of Iran’s unique form of theocratic rule and the “ineffectiveness” of sanctions. But hardline commentators also warned that the stunning outcome did not mean Iran would accept “foreign hegemony.” The following is a collection of editorials translated by the BBC Monitoring Service.

Editorial in reformist daily Mardom Salari

            „The vote for Hassan Rouhani is a sign that people reject the current state of affairs and want to remove power from the fundamentalists… It was a vote for his two great supporters, [disqualified candidates] Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and Mohammad Khatami… The other main message is the public’s interest in changing the way nuclear negotiations are carried out.“

Commentary in reformist daily E’temad

            „People have shown that they disagree with the country’s foreign policy over the last eight years, which has led to four [UN] resolutions against Iran… Dissatisfaction over the disqualification of Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani also gave a boost to Rouhani.“

Commentary in reformist daily E’temad

            „A new political landscape has been created… This opportunity could result in political prisoners being freed and the lifting of the siege on [reformist] presidential election candidates from 2009 and basic steps toward reforming the economy.“

Commentary in reformist daily Bahar

            „Even reformism is going toward moderation and the centre… Both sides must move toward the centre and protect the country’s political atmosphere from radicalisation.“

Commentary in reformist daily Sharq

            „The new president must take control of the economic plan… and start the engine of production, employment, and growth.“

Commentary in reformist daily Sharq

            Conservatives „should not be dissatisfied with this outcome, because the dominant discourse in the election was that of moderation, which is also among their main objectives.“

Editorial in moderate daily Aman

            „The economic burden on the have-nots, unprecedented unemployment and price increases are among the reasons for the high turnout. The impact of economic sanctions is key. It seems that people voted for Rouhani to express their wish for moderate, peaceful policies.“

Editorial in hardline conservative daily Jomhuri-ye Eslami

            The vote represents „the acceptance of moderation and the rejection of extremist thought… Moderation does not mean accepting international hegemony and ignoring the rights of the Iranian nation.“

Commentary in hardline conservative daily Javan

            „The Islamic Republic has passed this election test in a proper way… The winner should learn from the Ahmadinejad years and the reformist era and not follow the same path. Rather, he should address the concerns of the people.“

Commentary in hardline conservative daily Keyhan

            „Enemy think tanks are in a spin… Their mistake was in ignoring the depth of the people’s belief in the Islamic System… The election proved the ineffectiveness of sanctions… [It] also showed the world that there was no vote rigging and fraud in the free elections.“

Editorial in conservative daily Khorasan

            „The participation of 72.7% of eligible voters indicates that the people followed the Supreme Leader’s [Ayatollah Ali Khamenei] call for an epic political act to protect the country and the Islamic system.“

 

Spiegel| Irans Exilanten: Das neue Leben der Grünen Bewegung

Von Raniah Salloum

SPIEGEL ONLINE

Iraner im Exil: Maryam Mirza und Kaveh Kermanshahi leben in Berlin

Es waren Hunderttausende, die 2009 in Iran aus Protest gegen Wahlfälschungen auf die Straße gingen. Von dieser „Grünen Bewegung“ ist wenig geblieben. Viele engagierte Iraner wurden verhaftet, manche hingerichtet, Hunderte flüchteten ins Ausland. Besuch bei zwei Exilanten in Berlin.

Berlin – Wenn an diesem Freitag in Iran gewählt wird, sind Maryam Mirza und Kaveh Kermanshahi nicht dabei. Es werden für beide die ersten Präsidentschaftswahlen im Exil. Die 32-jährige Journalistin und der 28-jährige Menschenrechtler können nicht mehr zurück in ihre Heimat, seit sich dort im Zuge der umstrittenen Wahlen 2009 die Repressionen verschärft haben.

Beide sind keine Staatsfeinde oder Verschwörer, wie Teheran gesellschaftlich engagierte Iraner gern bezeichnet. Mirza und Kermanshahi haben bescheidene Hoffnungen. Sie setzen darauf, dass sich die Islamische Republik langsam von innen heraus zum Besseren wandelt. Bei den letzten Wahlen stimmten sie für den Reformer Mir Hossein Mussawi. „Wir waren viele, die für Mussawi gestimmt haben“, sagt Maryam Mirza. „Jetzt sind wir viele, die im Exil leben.“

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