GCC Secretary To Visit Iran

GCC secretary Abd Al-Rahman Al-Atiya is to visit Iran on October 28, by invitation from Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki.

Gulf sources noted that this is an important visit, and that during it Al-Atiya will discuss tightening ties between the GCC countries and Iran with senior Iranian officials, headed by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Mottaki.

Source: Al-Hayat, London, October 6, 2008

Montazeri: Iranian Regime Oppresses

In a speech marking 'Eid Al-Fitr, Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, a leader of Iranian clerics critical of the regime, attacked Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's "slogans" stating that "Iran is a country with the greatest freedom."

Montazeri stated that the Iranian regime was implementing a policy of repression, in contrast to its duty in the Islamic revolution, and gave as an example regime's restrictions on him and on his speeches in the media.

Source: Montazeri's blog, Iran, October 2, 2008

Iranian Daily Warns Of Israeli Attack

The Iranian daily Jomhouri-e Eslami has warned of a combined Israeli attack on Iran, Syria, Lebanon, and Gaza.

The paper also called on Muslims to strike Israel to hasten its collapse.

Source: Jomhouri-e Eslami, Iran, October 4, 2008

Iran Set To Screen Sequel To Anti-Sadat Film 'Assassination Of A Pharaoh'

According to an announcement by a senior official of the student Basij at Tehran University, the Iranian film "34 Bullets For a Pharaoh" – the sequel to the anti-Sadat film "Assassination of a Pharaoh" – was to have been screened yesterday at a university ceremony marking the anniversary of the assassination of the "traitor" late Egyptian president Anwar Al-Sadat.

The official added that following the film, speeches would be delivered by World Islamic Organization Headquarters for Remembering the Shahids secretary-general Firooz Rajai-Far, one of the film's producers, and Hizbullah's representative in Iran Abdallah Safialdeen.

The Iranian daily Etemad-e Mali noted that the decision to produce the sequel was made despite the anticipated impact on Iran-Egypt relations (see http://www.thememriblog.org/blog_personal/en/8440.htm).

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman said that these relations were at the beginning of the normalization process.

Sources: IRNA, Iran, October 6, 2008; Etemad-e Mali, Iran, October 5, 2008; Fars, Iran, October 4, 2008

Iranian Daily: No To American-Iranian Council Office In Tehran

The Iranian daily Jomhouri-e Eslami, which is close to Hashemi Rafsanjani, the main political rival of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has warned against supporting the initiative by Amir Ahmadi, an Iranian-born American businessman, to open an office of the American-Iranian Council, a nongovernmental organization, in Tehran.

The paper stated that establishing the office was a plan to reactivate the "espionage nest" in Iran, and added that senior Ahmadinejad government officials' consent to examine the possibility of opening such an office contradicts the policy of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and constitutes interference in his authority.

Source: Jomhouri-e Eslami, Iran, October 6, 2008

Senior Iranian Cleric: Regime Won't Advance Without Ayatollahs

Iranian Ayatollah Mokarem Shirazi, a senior cleric who supports the regime, has said that the Islamic regime in Iran cannot advance without the active participation of the ayatollahs and the seminaries.

He added that one of the roles of the ayatollahs and seminaries is to provide society with leadership and guidance, and to influence in varied questions.

Source: IRNA, Iran, October 5, 2008

Majlis Chairman Criticizes Iran's Economic Situation

Iranian Majlis chairman Ali Larijani has announced that the Majlis will not ratify laws increasing inflation, and that it has therefore so far opposed approving economic reforms by the government of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Larijani added that the Iran's banks should not be turned into interest-free funds, and that they should function as business units standing on their own feet.

Source: Tehran Times, Iran, October 5, 2008

Iranian FM Spokesman: Iran Has No Reason To Stop Uranium Enrichment

There is no reason for Iran to stop uranium enrichment, as there is no guarantee that West would meet the country's demand on nuclear fuel, senior Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hassan Qashqavi said today.

He said, "It is a fact known in the world that talks which had started 20 years ago for setting up a committee to guarantee nuclear fuel supply have reached no conclusion yet." argued the spokesman.

As for Iran's nuclear activities even in the pre-revolution era, Qashqavi said that even the former head of Iran's Atomic Energy Agency had said at the time that the U.S., Germany, and France had not honored their previously agreed commitments to Iran.

He reiterated, "Uranium enrichment is an absolute right for Iran, based on the Non-Proliferation Treaty, and Tehran will pursue this right to the end."

Source: IRNA, Iran, October 6, 2008

Iranian FM: Bahrain Initiative To Establish Organization With Israel Is Impractical

Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said in New York on October 3 that his Bahraini counterpart's proposal to form an organization comprising Iran, the Middle East's Arab states, Turkey, and Israel is impractical and cannot be implemented.

The proposal by Bahraini Foreign Minister Sheikh Khalid has been welcomed strongly by Israel and its allies.

Mottaki told IRNA, "I believe that the proposal lacks any ground for materialization. Our Bahraini friends do know where our main problem is and why such an issue cannot be met."
He added, "The problem facing the region is that an illegal regime, which has many claims, is still thinking of expansionism and continued occupation. Besides being illegitimate, such a regime is not basically reliable... All plans set forth have been rejected by the Zionist regime; even in the Arab region, all Arab states came and offered an Arab initiative."

He added, "The initiative calls on the Zionist regime to accept three conditions but it did not meet any of them. This shows that the Regime, besides being illegitimate, is not reliable."

Source: IRNA, Iran, October 3, 2008

Zubkov: Moscow Keen To Expand Relations With Iran

Chairman of the Government of the Russian Federation, Viktor Zubkov, said in Astrakhan, Russia today that Moscow wants to expand ties with Iran.

Zubkov told Iran's Vice President for Executive Affairs Ali Saeedlu that exchange of visits by Iranian and Russian officials is a sign of expansion of mutual ties.

The two sides met on the sidelines of the first Intergovernmental Economic Conference of Caspian Sea countries, which opened in Astrakhan today.

Zubkov said that the two sides share common stances on various regional and international issues and that there is much common ground for bilateral cooperation in the Caspian sea.

Source: IRNA, Iran, October 3, 2008

Human Rights Violations, Censorship Across Iran

Iranian human rights activist Abdolfateh Soltani says that executions in Iran under President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have increased significantly, despite regime efforts to conceal the statistics.

Iranian authorities are not allowing imprisoned Kurdistan human rights organization director Mohammad Sadeq Qabodawand to receive visits from relatives.Qabodawand, who has been imprisoned for 15 months, has been permitted one 20-minute visit. Relatives who came to visit him on September 24 at Evin prison were turned back by prison authorities.

Pressure by the Ahmadinejad government has led to the closure of the weekly political supplement of the reformist daily Etemad, The Rooz website reported that following government pressure and restrictions placed on the supplement, its members resigned.

Iranian authorities carried out a wave of arrests of Arab Sunni residents of the Ahwaz-Khozestan region in southwestern Iran, because they celebrated the 'Eid Al-Fitr holiday according to the Sunni tradition, not the Shi'ite tradition.

Sources: Rooz, Iran, October 2, 2008, September 29, 2008; Al-Siyassa, Kuwait, October 2, 2008

Iranian IAEA Rep Soltaniya: Iran Has No Alternative But To Enrich Uranium

Iranian representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency Ali Asghar Soltanieh said yesterday that talks between Iran and IAEA on guaranteeing fuel recycle [sic] have failed, and thus that Iran had no alternative but to continue its independent uranium enrichment and to generate a fuel cycle.

Soltaniya made the remarks in a meeting hosted by the European Security Institute (ESI) in Vienna yesterday.

He said that Iran would continue to enrich uranium while there is no legally-binding international assurance of a nuclear fuel supply, and added that the West has not remained committed to its pledges in the past, that Iran should continue with uranium enrichment, and that there is no technical or legal justification to halt it.

In a different report, dated today, the London daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat stated that Soltaniya had said that Iran would be willing to study a proposal under which Iran would stop enriching uranium if it received guarantees for a supply of nuclear fuel.

Sources: Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, London, October 3, 2008; IRNA, Iran, October 2, 2008

Iranian IAEA Rep: Iran Will Consider Proposal To Stop Enriching Uranium

Iranian representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency Ali Aghar Soltaniya has said that Iran would be willing to study a proposal under which Iran would stop enriching uranium if it received guarantees for a supply of nuclear fuel.

Source: Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, London, October 3, 2008

Iran News Agency To Activist Ebadi On German Tolerance Prize Win: Don’t Exploit Regime's Tolerance

In response to Iranian human rights activist and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi's receiving the Tolerance Prize from the Protestant Academy in Tutzing, Germany, the official Iranian news agency IRNA has warned her that she must not exploit the Iranian regime's tolerance of her activities in anti-Iranian circles and of the anti-Iranian propaganda that she is spreading.

Source: IRNA, Iran, October 1, 2008

Khamenei: Defeat Of Israel Certain, We Will Never Stop Supporting Hamas Gov't

Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei declared, on the occasion of 'Eid Al-Fitr, that "the defeat of Israel is certain" and that "the current Palestinian generation will see this great day."

He added that Iran would never stop supporting the Hamas government headed by Isma'il Haniya.

Source: IRNA, Iran, October 1, 2008

Iranian Official: Increase Armed Forces Budget By 50%

Iranian Parliamentary Committee for National Security and Foreign Policy chairman Ala Al-Din Boroujerdi has stated that in light of the U.S. threat, it is essential that the Iranian armed forces budget be increased by 50%.

Source: Islamemo.cc, September 22, 2008

'Iran Diplomacy,' Iranian Presidential Advisor Place Blame For Recent Assassinations, Bombings In Syria

In an article, the Iranian research institute for international relations and foreign policy, Iran Diplomacy, said that responsibility for the recent assassinations and bombings in Syria lay with several Arab countries concerned that the Israel-Syria negotiations would succeed, and that these countries were also attempting to topple the Syrian regime.

Iranian presidential advisor and Ambassador to Syria Ahmad Moussavi stated that elements trying to prevent Syria's continued support for Hamas and Hizbullah and Islamic Jihad were behind the September 27 Damascus bombings.

He added that "Iran and Syria are inseparable."

Sources: Press TV, Iran Diplomacy, Iran, September 29, 2008

Iranian Daily: Observe 'Eid Al-Fitr On Date Set By Khamenei

Following the setting of a different date for the 'Eid Al-Fitr holiday by Shi'ite jurists in Iran and Iraq, the Iranian daily Resalat called on Shi'ite jurists to follow the ruling of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei setting the beginning of the holiday, thus preventing political and social chaos.

(See also http://www.thememriblog.org/blog_personal/en/10214.htm.)

Source: Fars, Iran, October 1, 2008; Resalat, Iran, September 30, 2008

Iranian Official: Iran Will Respond To Any Attack With Operations Against Countries Supporting Attack

Ali Akbar Nateq-Nouri, senior official in the office of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, has said that if Iran is attacked, it will respond with operations against its attackers and against the countries supporting the attack, not only against Israel.

Source: IRNA, Iran, September 29, 2008

Iranian Interior Minister: My Honorary Degree From Oxford's Fake

Iranian Interior Minister Ali Kordan has acknowledged that the diploma of the honorary Ph.D in law that he had claimed to have been awarded by Oxford University is a forgery (see http://www.thememriblog.org/blog_personal/en/9142.htm).

Source: Fars, Iran, September 30, 2008

IRGC Al-Qods Forces Cmdr: Egyptians Are Letting Palestinians Die

Qassem Suleimani, commander of the Al-Qods Forces in Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), has criticized Egypt and warned that while European human rights activists come to the aid of the Palestinians, "the Egyptian government closes the Rafah Crossing in order to let the Palestinians slowly die."

Source: Fars, Iran, September 26, 2008

Iranian Daily Warns Against Sufism

The Iranian daily Jomhouri-e Eslami, which is identified with the religious seminaries in Qom, has attacked Sufism, stating that it leads to secularization of youth.

The paper said that Sufism was a "deviant stream" of Islam and "false mysticism," and called on the Iranian media not to give it a platform.

Source: Jomhouri-e Eslami, Iran, September 30, 2008

Criticism Of Ahmadinejad's Policy, Statements

The Iranian reformist daily Aftab-e Yazd has expressed criticism of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for preferring, during his recent New York visit, to meet with Jews who have no influence in the international community instead of with leaders of influential countries.

The paper stated that in contrast to Ahmadinejad's assertion that only a few countries oppose Iran's nuclear program, countries such as Argentina, Indonesia, India, Qatar, and Egypt oppose it.

Source: Aftab-e Yazd, Iran, September 29, 2008

Iran Threatens To Close Strait Of Hormuz

Iranian Army navy commander Habibollah Sayari has declared that Iran has absolute control of the Strait of Hormuz, and that if it is attacked it can close it for a short time or for a long period.

Source: ISNA, Iran, September 28, 2008

Complaints In Iran On Russia's Position On U.N. Security Council Resolution 1835

The Iranian daily Kayhan, which is close to Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, stated that the September 27 adoption of the fourth version of U.N. Security Council sanctions resolution against Iran (No. 1835) proved that the price Russia will demand from the West in order to trade on the back of Iran has increased following the crisis in the Caucasus, and that it approved the resolution to ward off accusations that it was acting irresponsibly and in violation of agreements.

The Iranian daily Jomhouri-e Eslami stated that Russia approved the resolution despite its "slogans," and that this approval proved wrong those who thought that the Caucasus crisis would prevent understandings between Russia and the U.S. in the nuclear crisis, and that "the Russian politicians were willing, very early on, to trample their own declarations in order to assure their interests."

Iranian MPs complained that the adoption of the resolution by the U.N. Security Council attests that Russia and the U.S. have reached an agreement and are acting jointly against Iran on the nuclear issue.

Sources: Kayhan, Jomhouri-e Eslami, Rooz, Iran, September 29, 2008

Iranian Human Rights Activist Shirin Ebadi Forced To Cancel Malaysia Universities Lecture Tour

Under pressure from Iran's Foreign Ministry, the Malaysia universities lecture tour of Shirin Ebadi, human rights activist and Nobel Prize laureate, has been cancelled

Source: Rooz, Iran, September 28, 2008

Advisor To Khamenei: In Future, There'll Be Middle East Without Israel

Yahya Rahim Safavi, security advisor to Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, said during International Qods (Jerusalem) day on September 26 that the countdown to the fall of Israel had begun, and that in the future, the map of the region will be drawn without it.

The major Iranian dailies wrote that the "cancerous growth" called Israel would soon come to an end, and that the armed struggle will be "the last nail in the coffin of the Zionist regime."

(For more on Qods Day, see http://www.thememriblog.org/iran/blog_personal/en/10148.htm, http://www.thememriblog.org/iran/blog_personal/en/10151.htm, http://www.thememriblog.org/iran/blog_personal/en/10150.htm.)

Source: Jomhouri-e Eslami, Mehr, Iran, September 27, 2008

Iranian Media Criticize Ahmadinejad Gov't Over On Fox News Correspondent's Visit

The Iranian media have criticized the government of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for recently permitting a correspondent from the "most anti-Iranian of the U.S. television networks," Fox News, into Iran, and for asking several sensitive facilities to cooperate with him.

Sources: Jomhouri-e Eslami, Asre-e Iran, September 28, 2008

International Qods (Jerusalem) Day Marked In Iran And Internationally

Click here to view Part 1

Click here to view Part 2

International Qods (Jerusalem) Day Marked In Iran And Internationally Part 2

Yesterday, Iranian First Vice President Parviz Davoudi said that since the barbarous Zionist regime is on the throes of death, public turnout on Qods Day demonstrations this year will prove completely different. Visiting the ongoing 16th International Quran Exhibition at the Grand Prayer Grounds yesterday, he said that it was a duty to participate in the demonstrations.

In Damascus, the secretary-general of the Palestinian Popular Struggle Front, Khalid Abdulmajid, said today that International Qods Day this year is historic because Qods is under Judaization. He added, "So, solidarity with Quds and this year's activities in connection with International Quds Day have a special position for Quds residents and for the Palestinian nation."

In New Delhi, Indian Muslims expressed solidarity with the Palestinians with an anti-Israel rally at Jantar Mantar today. Thousands of demonstrators under the banner of Muslim Political Council, the major Indian Muslim Organization, Jamaat Islami Hind, Jamiat Ulema Hind, Milli Council and All India Muslim Majlis-e-Mushawwarat and other organizations took to the street to mark the International Quds Day. The demonstrators chanted "Down with Israel," "Down with the U.S.," and "Long Live Islam." Addressing the gathering, Maulana Syed Mohsin Taqvi, Friday Prayer Leader of the Shi'a mosque Kashmiri Gate in Old Delhi called for unified resistance against the Zionists and the U.S.'s designs.

Sources: IRNA, Fars, Iran, September 26, 2008.

International Qods (Jerusalem) Day Marked In Iran And Internationally Part 1

International Qods (Jerusalem) Day, which was instituted by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran to support the Palestinians and to voice the protest of the Islamic ummah against the "Zionist usurpers," was marked today in Iran and across the world.

In Iran, millions of people gathered in Tehran for the march, chanting 'Death to Israel' and holding anti-Israeli and anti-American signs. One marcher, quoting the words of Imam Khomeini, said, "We must remove the cancer of the Zionist establishment." Another marcher called on Israel to "stop its crimes immediately."

Mohammad Ali Ramin, advisor to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said, "Qods Day is a day to report on the work of the Muslim world, to see what they've done to save the Palestinians in the previous year."

Sources: IRNA, Fars, Iran, September 26, 2008.

Iran Friday Sermon For International Qods Day: Qods Remains Most Pivotal International, Islamic Issue

In his Friday sermon marking International Qods (Jerusalem) Day, Tehran's interim Friday prayer leader, Hashemi Rafsanjani said that the issue of Qods was "still most acute, most vital, and most pivotal issue of the Islamic world, and probably [of the] international community."

Rafsanjani, who is also Expediency Council chairman, stressed, "Among the other lingering and great world events, you can trace no other nation that has suffered as much pain and injustice as the Palestinian nation, for almost an entire century."

Sources: IRNA, Press TV, Iran, September 26, 2008

In Iran, Harassment Of Women, Minorities, Human Rights Activists

Alam Al-Hoda, Friday prayer leader in the city of Mashhad, in northeast Iran, stated that women who violate the Islamic dress code are indirectly helping the U.S. and Israel generate a "velvet revolution" in Iran, and called on the public to act against these women.

Tehran's prosecutor-general Sadeed Mortazevi announced a new round of the Islamic dress code enforcement campaign against women.

The online daily Rooz reported that prison and security authorities in Kurdistan and Tehran were pressuring and threatening the families of hunger-striking Kurdish political prisoners. However, the committee for supporting the strike announced that prisoners in other prisons had joined in the strike.

Iranian human rights activists issued a list of 517 political prisoners held in prisons in the country.

Iranian sources reported to the Saudi daily Al-Watan that the Iranian regime had decided to exile Mohammad Hossein Kazemini Boroujerdi, a cleric critical of the regime, to a prison in the city of Yazd for 10 years. Boroujerdi preaches that elections should be held for the position of supreme leader in the country. Rooz reported that security forces told Boroujerdi that his exile, along with that of four of his close associates, would be carried out in the near future.

Sources: Rooz, Iran, September 25, 2008; Al-Watan, Saudi Arabia, September 24, 2008; Rooz, Iran, September 21, 2008; Jomhouri-e Eslami, Iran, September 20, 2008.

Iranian Supreme Leader Honors Martyrs

Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei today honored the memory of martyrs, on the day designated to commemorate martyrs in Sacred Defense Week.

In a message, he said, "The auspicious names of the martyrs and designation of a day of Sacred Defense Week for them convey a great theme."

He said that the symbolic move implies that a nation will never be able to defend its national identity, values, and beliefs without devotion and sacrifice, and added, "The Iranian nation taught the lesson to all the world and made history."

"Martyrs are shining on the forehead of the country like a precious gem, and that's for the same reason that any enlightened heart and clean conscience consider their reverence as imperative," he said.

Source: IRNA, Iran, September 25, 2008

Iran Prepares For International Qods Day

In advance of International Qods (Jerusalem) Day tomorrow, marking Iran's solidarity with the Palestinians, Iranian Committee for Supporting the Intifada in Palestine director-general MP Ali Akhbar Mohtashemi-Pour said that Israel had intentions of expanding even towards Iran, and that it must be stopped on its own soil.

He also called on supporters of the Palestinians on this day to simultaneously throw seven stones in seven different countries at the U.S. Embassies in each country.

The main Iranian daily papers wrote that "the cancerous growth called Israel" was nearing its end.

Sources: Jomhouri-e Eslami, Kayhan, Iran, September 25, 2008; Etemad-e Mali, Iran, September 24, 2008

Mojahedeen-e Khalq: Iran Accelerating Development Of Nuclear Warheads, With Help From N. Korea

The Iranian opposition organization Mojahedeen-e Khalq has told a press conference that in the past two years Iran has accelerated its development of nuclear warheads and of attaching them to ballistic missiles, with help from North Korean experts.

Mojahedeen-e Khalq released details of straw companies through which the Iranian regime is importing components for the warheads, far from the eyes of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The organization also reported that at the Mojdeh facility, northeast of Tehran, nuclear warheads were being developed for Shahab-3 and Qadr missiles, and in the Khojair region, southwest of Tehran, tunnels have been dug and a facility is producing nuclear warheads and ballistic missiles.

Iran has denied that there was any military cooperation between it and North Korea.

Source: IRNA, Iran, September 24, 2008; mojahedin.org, September 23, 2008

Iranian Satirical Book On Holocaust, Featuring Cartoons, To Be Unveiled To Mark International Qods (Jerusalem) Day

A “Holocaust" book featuring cartoons and satirical texts is to be unveiled in Tehran's Qods Square, during a ceremony attended by Iranian Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance Mohammad Hossein Saffar-Harandi, to mark International Qods (Jerusalem) Day, September 26.

Afshin Parvinkar, a founding member of the Martyr Shahbazi Cultural Institute, said that the book deals with the paradoxes as well as the distortions before, after, and concurrent with the Holocaust, in a satirical manner.

He said, "According to us, holocaust is a great historical distortion, and it is the Zionists who present the statistics."

Seven thousand copies of the 100-page book will be published by the Martyr Shahbazi Cultural Institute, which is affiliated with the Elm-o-San'at (science and technology) University's Students Basij.

Source: IRNA, Iran, September 24, 2008

Iranian Daily: Ahmadinejad Uniting America Against Us

The Iranian opposition daily Etemad-e Mali wrote, in two editorials, that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s speech at the U.N. General Assembly had created a consensus in the U.S. against Iran and against its right to pursue nuclear development, and had set these as the first problem on the agenda of whoever is elected president of the U.S.

The paper attacked Ahmadinejad's insistence on holding talks with the U.S., Iran's main enemy, and added that his style did not serve Iran's interests.

Source: Etemad-e Mali, Iran, September 24-25, 2008

Iranian Organization Threatens To Assassinate Iranian Reformist

The Iranian organization Ansar Hizbullah, which supports the Iranian regime, has threatened to assassinate reformist Abdollah Nouri if he runs in the upcoming presidential elections in the country.

Nouri said in response that he was not afraid of threats.

Source: Adwar News, Rooz, Iran, September 23, 2008

Senior Iranian Officials Step Up Threats

Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) deputy naval commander Ali Fadavi has said that Iran is preparing for confrontation with U.S. submarines and warships.

He said that Iran has missiles covering every area of the Persian Gulf, the Gulf of Oman, and much of the Indian Ocean,

At a military conference in the country, Mohieldin Hairee Shirazi, representative of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei in the Fars district, praised the Iranian forces' readiness for martyrdom, and senior IRGC official Nourali Shoustari warned that "Iran's power is global, and Iran will cut off the hands of its enemies even before it is attacked."

IRGC air force commander Hossein Salami said that Iran's air space had become "very dangerous" for the enemy's planes.

Sources: IRNA, Iran, September 24, 2008; Aftab-e Yazd, Iran, September 23, 2008; Fars, Iran, September 22, 2008

Kuwaiti Daily Reveals: Iran Building Secret Nuclear Reactor, Special Dispatch Series - No. 2006 - Iran - July 29, 2008

Investigation by Egyptian Daily Al-Ahram Finds Iranian Involvement, Shi'ization in Comoros Islands, Special Dispatch Series - No. 2004 - Iran - July 28, 2008

Iranian Threats in Anticipation of Western Attack , Inquiry and Analysis Series - No. 455 - Iran - July 15, 2008

Ayatollah Emami-Kashani in Tehran Friday Sermon: "Oh Liar Israel! Oh Liar White House! If You Wish To Attack Iran, We Will Give You a Response That Will Make You Regretful", Special Dispatch Series - No. 1982 - Iran - July 11, 2008

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