Iran said on Monday it hopes mass anti-government protests in Egypt will lead to the emergence of a more Islamic Middle East that will stand up to its enemies, Israel and the United States.
The Islamic Republic, locked in a standoff with the West over its nuclear programme, sees gains for its own geopolitical influence in the region if Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, a key U.S. and Israeli ally, is swept aside.
But Iranian opposition politicians, encouraged by scenes of “people power” in Tunis and Cairo, are hoping they will prompt Tehran’s hardline rulers to allow greater freedom at home.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast, setting out Iran’s official stance, said the people of Egypt and Tunisia had left foreign powers “bewildered” by rising up against U.S.-backed governments.
“With (the region) assuming a new shape and the developments under way, (we hope) we would be able to see a Middle East that is Islamic and powerful and also that withstands the Zionist occupiers,” he told a weekly news conference, using Iran’s term for Israel, which it does not recognise.
Iran has praised the Egyptian protests, saying they echo the 1979 Islamic Revolution that toppled the U.S.-backed Shah.
However, Tehran fears that uprising in Egypt could revive anti-government unrest that jolted Iran after the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2009. Iran’s reformist opposition, which rejected the poll result as rigged, says the uprising in Egypt is inspired by the Iranian nation’s fight for democracy in 2009.
“The slogans of the Iranian nation who took to the streets in 2009 … have reached Egypt,” said reformist presidential candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi, opposition website Kaleme reported on Saturday.
“Now it is time for Iranian … rulers to show wisdom and respect the nation’s demand to avoid facing violence,” Kaleme quoted another senior opposition figure, Amir Arjomand, as saying.
Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said protests in Egypt and the overthrow of Tunisian President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali “proved that the global arrogance’s era of domination and control of the region has come to an end,” state television reported on Monday. “Global arrogance” is Iran’s term for the United States.
Mehmanparast taunted Washington for its mixed signals about support for Mubarak, seen as a vital U.S. ally in the region.
“This popular wave … because it is in line with … severance of dependence on arrogant powers, will most definitely jeopardise the interests of these powers,” he said. “That is why you see an agitation and bewilderment of their foreign policy.”
source: Reuters
Iran lashed out at Western nations on Tuesday, saying a spate of executions in the Islamic Republic was none of their business, as it defended the hanging of an Iranian-Dutch woman.
Iran has hanged 67 people so far this year, according to an AFP tally based on Iranian media reports, and foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said 80 percent of those hanged were drug smugglers.
“If Iran does not combat drugs, Europe and the West will be hurt,” Mehmanparast told reporters at his weekly press conference when asked to react to Western criticisms against Iran for the recent jump in executions. “Our people are amazed by the humanitarian gesture that some countries adopt,” he said. “Why do they make such noise over a person executed for smuggling or someone on trial over adultery, while they do not defend thousands of Palestinians who innocently die?”
US State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said on Monday that Washington was “deeply concerned that Iran continues to deny its citizens their human rights.”
“We are particularly troubled by the recent execution of Dutch-Iranian national Zahra Bahrami, who was denied access to Dutch consular officials.”
Given the current rate of around two executions a day since January 1, the number of hangings in Iran is set to exceed the 179 reportedly executed in 2010.
In 2009, the last year for which complete statistics are available, Iran executed 388 people, according to international human rights groups, making it second to China in the number of people it put to death.
Bahrami, 46, an Iranian-born naturalized Dutch citizen, was reportedly arrested in December 2009 after joining an anti-government protest while visiting relatives in the Islamic Republic. She was later charged with drug trafficking for which she was hanged on Saturday. Following her execution, the Netherlands froze diplomatic contacts with Iran.
Mehmanparast said Iran did not consider Bahrami as a Dutch national as the Islamic republic’s constitution does not recognise dual nationality.
“Iranian-Dutch national is a forged term. Our constitution does not recognise dual nationality. It is totally unacceptable that Dutch officials interfere in an Iranian national’s case,” he said. “We do not allow any country to do that. The case (of Bahrami) had strong evidence. The defendant had clearly confessed to buying, selling, importing and exporting drugs,” he said, adding the Netherlands had been hasty in reacting to Bahrami’s hanging as it was unaware of her drug smuggling activities.
EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton also condemned Bahrami’s execution, saying on Monday she was “dismayed” Iranian authorities denied Bahrami access to consular officials before her execution and failed to ensure a “fair and transparent judicial process.”
Concerned about a “steep increase” in executions, Ashton wants Iran to “halt all pending executions immediately and declare a moratorium on the death penalty,” her spokeswoman Maja Kocijanci told reporters in Brussels.
source: AFP
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