Free Iran:  The regime understands that its greatest vulnerability is the country’s economy.  Why can’t the West see this as well and focus on cutting off the regime’s access to Iran’s oil income as opposed to wasting time and resources concentrating all its efforts on the nuclear issue or engaging this regime?

A record boom in Tehran’s stock market will end in a spectacular crash that could trigger a prolonged depression producing multiple bankruptcies, mass unemployment, and acute economic hardship, analysts say.

The warning follows months of soaring share prices that have prompted officials in Iran’s Islamic regime to proclaim that the country’s economy is flourishing despite fresh international sanctions aimed at combating its nuclear program.

The Tehran bourse index passed 17,900 on August 30, compared to 12,537 points on the final day of the last Iranian year in March, following a sustained wave of stock sales and purchases. The upward trend has pushed the exchange’s total value to more than $80 billion, up from $70 billion in mid-July.

However, the bull market has been dismissed as a “state-created bubble” by seasoned analysts who attribute it to the deliberate buying and selling of assets by supposedly private companies that are in reality owned by organizations like the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), which has been playing an increasingly dominant role in Iran’s economy.

…”There is absolutely no rational explanation in a country where productivity has been falling in the last 28 months consistently, [where] every quarter profitability has been negative for 92 percent of state-owned banks, and the banking system is highly indebted, to see such a boom in stock prices,” Emadi warns. “They do not reflect the profitability, they do no reflect the confidence in the economy, so it tallies that it is the reflection of the injection of new demand and money. Obviously this is kind of a bubble. But it is a state-created bubble, instead of sort of a market-induced bubble.”

…The goal, Emadi believes, is two-fold: to encourage confidence in the economy and thereby prevent capital flight; and to prevent a banking collapse by persuading small depositors to keep faith in the banks.

“The government has acknowledged that the biggest front they are fighting in managing the country is economic, and in that aspect of crisis management banks are an early warning system,” he says. “When people feel really insecure about the ability of banks to meet their obligations, they pull out their money. We have seen this in Mexico, in Argentina, in South Africa. They pull out their deposits, convert it into hard currency and buy gold. If this happens, it’s conceivable that within a couple of months we could see very big state-owned banks going bankrupt and that would be an outcome that government really would not be able to manage and cope with.” Go to Radio Free Europe.

Tony Blair says:  “I can say that never did I guess the nightmare that unfolded [in Iraq], and that too is part of the responsibility. The truth is we did not anticipate the role of al-Qaida or Iran.”  How could he possibly not have anticipated the role Iran would play?  Even someone like me wrote about it in an oped piece right about the beginning of the war.  What a breathtaking lack of imagination and anticipation!

Now he wants to repeat the same mistake in Iran.  The west should use force against Iran if it “continues to develop nuclear weapons”, Tony Blair said today, aligning himself with US hawks who have called for strikes against Iranian nuclear sites.  Blair said it was “wholly unacceptable” for Tehran to seek a nuclear weapons capability and insisted there could be “no alternative” to military force “if they continue to develop nuclear weapons”…They need to get that message loud and clear.”

So let’s see after bombing Iran is he going to again say never did I guess the nightmare that unfolded?  Why would anyone listen to this guy ever again?  People who lack imagination and an ability to anticipate and prepare for worst case scenarios like Blair don’t deserve to lead a village let alone to have been prime minister of England and to have had so much power over people’s lives and fates.

Bombing Iran is not the solution.  Cutting off the regime’s access to Iran’s oil income is the answer.

Guardian:  Tony Blair: West should use force if Iran ‘continues to develop nuclear weapons’

The west should use force against Iran if it “continues to develop nuclear weapons“, Tony Blair said today, aligning himself with US hawks who have called for strikes against Iranian nuclear sites.

The former prime minister made his comments in a BBC interview to publicise his memoirs, A Journey, which are published today.

Blair said it was “wholly unacceptable” for Tehran to seek a nuclear weapons capability and insisted there could be “no alternative” to military force “if they continue to develop nuclear weapons”.

Speaking to Andrew Marr in a BBC interview to be broadcast tonight, Blair says: “I am saying that I think it is wholly unacceptable for Iran to have a nuclear weapons capability and I think we have got to be prepared to confront them, if necessary militarily. I think there is no alternative to that if they continue to develop nuclear weapons. They need to get that message loud and clear.”

Guardian:  Tony Blair: I didn’t see Iraq nightmare coming

In an emotional chapter in his memoirs on the Iraq war, in which he admits to shedding many tears at the loss of so many lives, the former prime minister insists that military action was justified and refuses to offer an apology for joining forces with George Bush.

“I can’t regret the decision to go to war,” he writes in A Journey. But he adds: “I can say that never did I guess the nightmare that unfolded, and that too is part of the responsibility. The truth is we did not anticipate the role of al-Qaida or Iran. Whether we should have is another matter; and if we had anticipated, what we would have done about it is another matter again.”

NYT:  Blair’s Memoirs Reveal ‘Tears’ but No Regrets on Iraq

As the United States ends it combat mission in Iraq, Tony Blair, the former British prime minister who deployed troops alongside American forces in the 2003 invasion, said Wednesday that, while there had been many tears over the loss of life, he could not regard the war as a mistake.

Mr. Blair’s latest iteration of his attitude to the conflict — echoing similar arguments during a public inquiry into the war earlier this year — came with the publication of his memoirs, “A Journey.” The book went on sale in Britain the morning after President Obama said in a televised speech Tuesday night from the Oval Office that, with United States forces assuming a support and training mission in Iraq, it was “time to turn the page” after seven years of combat.

Separately, Mr. Blair, in a BBC interview to mark the book’s publication, urged a tough Western approach to Iran’s nuclear program, including possible military intervention, saying it was “wholly unacceptable” for Tehran to seek a nuclear weapons capacity. Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes, but many outsiders believe its leaders want to build a nuclear bomb.

“I am saying I think it is wholly unacceptable for Iran to have a nuclear weapons capability and I think we have got to be prepared to confront them, if necessary, militarily,” he said. The interview is to be broadcast later on Wednesday, but the BBC released segments of it earlier.

“I think there is no alternative to that if they continue to develop nuclear weapons,” Mr. Blair said. “They need to get that message loud and clear.”

Free Iran:  Squabbling Iraqi politicians disappointing both the US and Iran.   Welcome to the Middle East!

In mid-August, the leaders of Iraq’s Shia political blocs were summoned to Tehran for what amounted to a reprimand. Invitations were sent to all the parties that contested the 7 March general election except one – Ayad Allawi’s.

It was the third such group visit in six months of fruitless negotiations to form a government. And, as had happened on the two previous trips, the Iranians thought they had reached understandings that would either return Nouri al-Maliki for a second term as prime minister or nominate someone from his inner court to replace him.

Again, Iran was left disappointed. And it found itself in strange company. The US too has found its hopes dashed after being almost certain that diplomacy would have by now ushered in a power-sharing government to end a debilitating power vacuum.

…Ever since, Allawi has toured the Sunni Arab world looking for support in Syria, Yemen, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf. Maliki’s people and the conservative Shia Islamists, led by the young cleric Aamar Hakim, have consulted only with Iran.

The trips to see the neighbours at the expense of dealing with any prospective domestic partners are a clear sign of how business will be done in Iraq in future, said one senior ambassador. “This is a sovereign state in America’s dreams only,” he added. Go to Guardian.

Free Iran:  The regime is afraid of the international media coverage of its human rights record and that’s why it’s lashing out like this.  This is their weak point.  The West needs to press it.  Also see this NY Times piece.

An influential Iranian state-run newspaper on Tuesday reiterated and expanded on its earlier derogatory remarks about French first lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, spurring Iran’s Foreign Ministry to warn news media to refrain from insulting foreign dignitaries.

The Kayhan daily first called Bruni-Sarkozy “a prostitute” on Saturday. The paper repeated that remark Tuesday and added that the first lady, a former model and pop star, “deserves to die” because of her “perverted lifestyle” and her public support for an Iranian woman who has been sentenced to death by stoning.

The comments angered the French Foreign Ministry, which called them “unacceptable.” Ramin Mehmanparast, spokesman for the Iranian Foreign Ministry, responded by urging the national news media to use restraint and avoid “indecent words.”

“The media can properly criticize the wrong and hostile policies of other countries by refraining from using insulting words. This is not correct,” Mehmanparast said.

But the repeated allegations by the paper, which is headed by a representative of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, indicate that hard-liners have launched an offensive against the mounting international criticism over the Islamic republic’s controversial capital punishments and family laws, Iranian activists say. Go to Washington Post.

Fatemeh Karroubi, wife of Iranian opposition leader Mehdi Karroubi, in a letter to Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, condemned the attacks made on her home and family by the pro-government crowds.

Saham news reports that Fatemeh Karroubi asks the Leader: “What do the disagreements between you and my husband over issues that are evident to all by now, have to do with our right to live?”

Over the past week for three nights, Basij, Revolutionary Guards and the so-called plain clothes forces have been gathering in front of Mehdi Karroubi’s home engaging in “insults, harassment, disturbing the neighbours and vandalizing property.”

Karroubi’s home after the attack last December

Fatemeh Karroubi also reports that the attackers have been using “derogatory words” against Mehdi Karroubi and “writing slogans on the walls of the residential complex and the neighbours’ houses.”

Fatemeh Karroubi writes: “These obvious crimes are taking place in your support and in front of the security forces who do not dare to approach these attackers.”

Fatemeh Karroubi condemns the policy of “attacking the family and neighbours of political opponents” and asks the supreme leader if he condones such “unethical acts?”

Fatemeh Karroubi warns that these attacks have been filmed and documented.

Mehdi Karroubi, who is one of the chief challengers of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s victory in the last presidential elections, has been a target of similar violent attacks on many occasions in the past year.

His home was attacked, robbed and vandalized in December by a similar crowd in the presence of security forces who did not attempt to stop the assailants.

Karroubi’s has been attacked while travelling in his car, while visiting an exhibition and attending a funeral and also whenever he has participated in the past year’s demonstrations. Go to original article.

Free Iran:  Mr.Seib is correct that Iraq, Afghanistan, and the Israeli-Palestinian problems are all connected to Iran but he and the Obama administration are confusing (in the opinion of this humble blogger) the dependent and independent variables.  Without helping Iran become democratic, it’s virtually impossible to solve all these other problems.  It’s much easier for Iran to play the role of the spoiler than for the US to play the role of the nation builder/peace maker/consensus maker or what have you. Job #1 is Iran.

But each of the other moves is directly tied to that overarching concern about Iran and its influence in the region. In Iraq, the effort to consolidate power in a credible central government also is an attempt to block neighboring Iran’s ability to exert influence there. Similarly, stabilizing Afghanistan would demonstrate the ability of the West to bolster moderate Muslims as a counter to the rise of Iran-like extremism.

And restarting Israeli-Palestinian talks is an effort not just to seek peace on the Palestinian front, but also to remove a political sore point in the Palestinian problem—one that Arab leaders say inflames their people and reduces their ability to cooperate with the U.S. and Israel in countering Iran’s nuclear ambitions. More directly, a successful Palestinian peace process also would reduce the influence of Iran’s allies in the Hamas movement, which seeks to undermine Mr. Abbas and other moderate Palestinian leaders.

Of course, it could all go terribly wrong. A disintegration of the fragile government that U.S. forces leave behind in Iraq would only widen the playing field there for Iranian trouble-making. Palestinian talks could collapse quickly over the question of new Israeli settlement activity, strengthening the hand of Iran’s radical friends in the Hamas and Hezbollah Palestinian movements. Go to WSJ.

TEHRAN — Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has backed the Iranian government’s plan to scrap subsidies in the coming weeks, despite concerns from some conservatives of its inflationary impact.

…The government intends from late September to phase out subsidies on energy products, which according to official estimates cost state coffers around 100 billion dollars annually.

But the government has not yet indicated what the new prices will be once the subsidies have been removed.

Part of Iran’s ruling conservative camp has on numerous occasions expressed concern over the plan, saying it would further stoke inflation at a time when the economy is already reeling under high inflation and unemployment.

The Iranian parliament had particularly attempted to delay and limit the implementation of the measure by challenging the government’s sole authority to decide on how to distribute among the poor the savings generated from the scrapping of subsidies.

The government to date has not given a clear indication as to how much money it intends to distribute among the nation’s population. Go to AFP.

Free Iran:  Those bomb Iran hawks that claim even Iran’s Green movement may not be more compromising with regards to the nuclear issue and especially Israel should better inform themselves.  It is not easy for the opposition leaders who are essentially under house arrest to voice opposition to such critical policies.

The rhetoric used by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has endangered the security of Iran, opposition websites Saturday quoted opposition leader Mir-Hossein Moussavi as saying.

Ahmadinejad’s remarks such as eradicating Israel from the Middle East map, questioning the Holocaust in the Second World War, or describing UN Security Council resolutions as wasted paper tissues have caused international anger, he said.

Also Ahmadinejad’s uncompromising stance in the nuclear dispute and warnings of harsh retaliations in case of military attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites have caused fear of a war in the region. Go to Haaretz.

Free Iran:  I found it somewhat ironic but it is the French that at long last are pointing to the ultimate solution on Iran: sanctions that are tied to the regime’s human rights record and not just its nuclear ambitions.  The more difficult the world makes it for the regime to repress the Iranian people, the more likely that Iran will have a government that is accountable to the Iranian people and subsequently the more likely that the regime’s nuclear ambitions could be resolved.

PARIS — France has urged the European Union to threaten new sanctions against the Iranian regime in the case of a woman sentenced to be stoned to death, in a foreign ministry letter seen by AFP on Friday.

Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner wrote to European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton to call for all 27 member states to warn Tehran not to execute 43-year-old Sakineh Mohammadi-Ashtiani.

“A joint letter from all EU member states to the Iranian authorities has become necessary, in my view, if we want to save this young woman,” Kouchner wrote, in a copy of Wednesday’s letter released to AFP.

“We must engage the Union in new initiatives to remind Iranian authorities that, just as in the nuclear matter, their isolationist and closed stance will have a cost for them,” he wrote.

Kouchner said that Iran should only escape these new measures if it “chooses a more responsible course that lives up to its international human rights commitments.”

“I would like the European council to re-start its work on these matters to take new measures against all those in Iran who have organised repression,” he said, referring to an EU foreign ministers’ meeting due on September 10.

Mohammadi-Ashtiani, a mother of two, was sentenced to death by stoning in 2006 by an Iranian Islamic court. Iranian officials claim she is guilty of adultery and was an accomplice in the murder of her husband.

Her execution has been put on hold, amid a mounting international outcry over the sentence, but Iranian officials have insisted that justice will run its course. Go to AFP.

Free Iran:  A fantastic piece as always by one of the most insightful Iran analysts, Mr. Karim Sadjadpour.  If only Mr. Netanyahu would listen…

Much has already been written in this forum and elsewhere about the profound inadvisability of a military strike on Iran. Rather than reiterate the arguments, here are five key points that, if I could, I would convey to Bibi Netanyahu:

The cracks in the cohesion of Iran’s theocratic regime that opened after the violent imposition of Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad in last summer’s presidential election have not closed. It is not mullah-watchers who are saying this but Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader, who has ordered the radical and conservative fundamentalists who divide up Iran’s complex institutions to stop their feuding.

Mr Khamenei is understandably agitated. The threat to his regime comes not from the protean and leaderless Green opposition it has ruthlessly put down but from within its own ranks.

…The regime is beginning to look brittle, belying its triumph over reformism – and Mr Ahmadi-Nejad is starting to look expendable.

Conservatives and reformists are angered by his disregard for institutions such as parliament, mismanagement of the economy, and Holocaust denial provocations.

A west worried about Iran’s nuclear ambitions would be well advised to tread with care. Any attempt to determine the outcome of this faction fight – not to mention any assault on Iran – would stampede everyone back into the tattered tent of the theocrats. Go to Financial Times.

When a mother of two can be sentenced to death by stoning on the basis of a disputed confession of adultery and without proper legal representation, there is little reason for faith in the fairness or mercy of Iran’s judicial system. But as in the appalling case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, the 20-year jail sentences just handed out to seven Bahá’í leaders must provoke an international outcry in the hope that the Iranian government can be shamed into thinking again.

…The Iranian authorities, despite what they pretend, are not deaf to international criticism. We must all add our voices on this latest abandonment of Iran’s human rights obligations so the regime hears us loud and clear.

Go to Guardian.

Free Iran:  I hope when the US government officials meet with the so-called representatives of the Iranian-American community and listen to their arguments against sanctions they keep this great essay in mind.

…The internal feud between the “pragmatist” right – led by the speaker of parliament, Ali Larijani, and the hardline president, Ahmadinejad, has not been a well-kept secret. Larijani has blocked several of Ahmadinejad’s policy proposals and Ahmadinejad has in turn refused to implement those that the parliament ratified. Larijani then had to intervene and order the executive branch to implement what parliament had ratified.

…Insecurity about the punitive sanctions has clearly aggravated the tension at the top. “Under the threat of sanctions,” Iran’s supreme leader warned, “no one must speak in a way that implies tension between the parliament, the judiciary and the government.”

Another effect of sanctions seems to have been an official rapprochement towards the United States. We know that Ahmadinejad and the foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, have recently repeatedly spoken of their willingness to talk. However, far more important was the clearest green light given by the supreme leader, Khamenei. In a somewhat unnoticed part of his speech last Thursday he said:

“Speaking to the US under conditions of threat and pressure cannot be regarded as talks. We are happy to hold talks but not with a US that wants talks under sanctions, threats and pressure. We are ready for talks if they [the US] could climb down from their superpower ladder and stop sanctions and threats.”

Under these changing circumstances two steps could be regarded as immature: first, if the US fell for the ploy and began talks before sanctions took full effect, and second, if there was a decision by Israel or the US to strike Iran’s nuclear sites. Both would play into the hands of the hardliners. The most prudent response could be to continue with the present policy while ensuring close scrutiny of the nuclear sites by the IAEA as well as focusing on the regime’s human rights record. Go to Guardian.

The infighting between Iran’s fundamentalists has deepened the gulf between supporters and opponents of President Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad.

These differences are not merely about economic policies, amid unemployment of 14.6 per cent. The president has faced criticism for his management of the economy since he won power in 2005 and, if that was the only cause of the present tension, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader, probably would not have seen fit to intervene.

Instead, perhaps the most important trigger for the recent infighting between radical and conservative fundamentalists is a highly controversial interpretation of the Shia faith advanced by close allies of Mr Ahmadi-Nejad, who advocate a radical mixture of Islam and nationalism.

Allies of Mr Ahmadi-Nejad allegedly hold that Muslims do not need the clergy – a pillar of the Shia faith – to connect with God and that direct links can be made with the last, or “Hidden Imam”. Go to Financial Times.

Free Iran:  Not that I favor high taxes – far from it- but a government that has an independent oil income like the regime in Tehran is far less likely to feel the need to be accountable to the people.

Low taxes, and the erratic collection of them, are common features of life in most of the Middle East. Among the Arab oil producers, for example, taxation accounted for only 5% of gross domestic product in 2002, rising to 17% in the non-oil countries – which is still very low compared with Germany (39%), Italy (41%) and Britain (37%).

Taxes are never popular, and the higher the taxes are the more likely it is that people will demand a say in how the money is spent. It was the cry of “no taxation without representation” that spurred the American revolution in the 18th century, and a quarrel between King Charles I and his parliament over tax that helped to trigger the English revolution in the 17th century.

As a rule of thumb, high taxes can act as a spur towards democracy and accountable government. Conversely, where taxes are low the pressure for democracy and accountability is usually less.

…”Taxation,” the report continued, “is at the centre of good governance and state-building. The perceived fairness of the tax system is crucial to building an effective state based on citizens’ consent. Willingness to pay taxes is a good indicator of the legitimacy of the state.” Go to Guardian.