Niloufar Abi

There has been so much exposure of the Bahai Temple over the past 2 days that I think if they had wanted the publicity, they could not have done that well !

Look here, here, here, here, and here -- not to mention the official Iranian media, which, when criticizing something gives it more credit...

Of course, the government thought that this was the best excuse to close down Hamshahri, and thus attack Qalibaf, Ebtekar and the like, but I am not sure they expected this flurry, which present the so-called "misguided zionist sect" (sic.), as having an open, recognized and even praised presence in India -- one of Iran's best friends.

Speak to the point

For once the International media reported the adoption of the resolution on the human rights situation in Iran, and they even reported a few sentences of the statement of the Iranian Ambassador. However, they omitted to say that rather than trying to respond to the criticism that was included in the text,
Mr. Khazaee, aside from attacking Canada for its widespread (!) human rights violation, went on and on about the Goldstone report and about Israel and Palestine.

Far from me to want here to dismiss the Goldstone report, I just want to point out that Mr. Khazaee, his superiors, and his inferiors (who probably drafted the statement) should listen to the Iranian people.

Fart and the temple

As can be seen, I have been reading Mr. Abtahi's blog fairly regularly and although his unfailing support of Mr. Khatami is a little unnerving to say the least, I recently had to admit that I enjoyed some of his posts.

Well, clearly now, they are after him, and I am not surprised because he has been quite critical of some of the political stances taken lately.

For those who cannot read Persian, Mr. Abtahi has been accused by an ultra-conservative site of having his blog designed and run by Baha'is. And in order to make their accusations look credible, the authors of the article included a number of links. Out of curiosity, I tried all of them... and (of course) none of them led to anything that might remotely suggest any link to the alleged designers.

Moreover, there is this box on the side of the article that without showing any name indicates "Age:24" and then what can be assumed to say "Children: no", "Ethnicity: Middle-Eastern", "speak: Persian" (which is not correct English, by the way...), and "Religion: Baha'i" . Now, the form being in English, I really wonder where in the Western world would any form ask for one's religion?...

But my final question is: so what? And even if Mr. Abtahi's website designers are Baha'is, what does it have to do with the way the site is designed or run? Are they running subliminal messages so that everyone reading the blog are going to become hypnotized and convert? Is Mr. Abtahi less of a Muslim cleric because of his webmasters' alleged religion?

Little stones

It had been too many years since I last tasted Sangak... my favourite -- while watching PBS' programme on Iran.

Another transition...

Regardless of what Hoder had to say, I thought that Gozaar (which they themselves have translated "Transition" -- but no connection with yours truly) produced an impressive line-up of contributors and interviewees for it's first edition. Moreover, they covered the human rights issues in Iran that are at the moment at the forefront, without any taboo. I understand that they needed to have a first edition that would attract interest, we now need to see how the subsequent editions will fare, and whether they will not be repetitive.

But I wish them well. Freedom House is what it is, and American human rights NGO, but let's face it, how many other publications do you know that seriously deal with human rights in Iran?

Iran Human Rights NGO Media