Author Archives: khalijefars

A Window to the Fatherland – Tuesday 27 August 2019

We begin tonight’s edition of A Window to the Fatherland with Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh reading one of his poems from the book of his collected works.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

Tonight we speak with our special guest Dr. Hossein Lajevardi by asking him about his views about the latest news of our country in view of French president Macron’s behind the scene efforts to mediate between Tehran and Washington, while each party has put forward some pre-conditions before they could start talking to one another.

Dr. Hossein Lajevardi:

I have already discussed this matter on a number of occasions. My view is that the entire Iranian regime has only one aim and that is to stay in power at any cost. The talk of so-celled reformists versus conservatives is baseless.

However, that we do have two factions within the systems is true but each one of them wants to be in power but neither of them wants this in the interest of the Iranian people.

One faction is Khamenei’s that has the backing of the Revolutionary Guards and their policy to remain in power is through war, repression and violence andbloody purges of all voices of dissent.

I think once this regime has disappeared we will find out about those of its many victims that we have not even heard of them.

The other faction is formed of Rouhani, Khatami and Moussavi. I believe Moussavi is the most decent of them as at one point he separated his life and politics from the rest of the followers of this faction.

Rouhani on the other hand is the most deceitful of them.

As for the international support behind this regime, both the Western governments and the Russians are behind it simply because the regime looks after the interests of both to stay in power.

This includes Trump’s government, which keeps saying that he is not after the ousting of the regime in Iran.

All he has said about Iran since becoming the US president has meant that before the revolution Iran belonged to America and he wants it back!

Further more, it is in the interest of Trump to keep the Iranian regime in power because if a popular and democratic government comes to power in Iran he, and Mr Putin too, will not be able to sell billions of dollars of arms to the region.

We also have this problem of Iranian people suffering from the disease of not trusting any opposition groups.

Like Prince Reza Pahlavi, they keep changing their slogans and positions and this has caused confusion among our people. One day these opposition groups must sit down and decide who they want to lead them and then inform our people accordingly.

A Window to the Fatherland – Monday 26 August 2019

We begin tonight’s edition of A Window to the Fatherland with Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh reading one of his poems from the book of his collected works.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

Today we have a special program to cover the G7summit in France.

There had been talk of Emanuel Macron trying since last month to bring Rouhani to the gathering of the G7 leaders but at the end it proved that it was all a rumor.

However, Javad Zarif came to Paris on Saturday and met with Macron and then again he suddenly turned up in the venue of the G7meetings to put forward the regime’s offers to the summit through Macron.

Who better than our senior foreign correspondent Mohammad Reza Shaheed could update us on the developments in this program or other programs of our TV Station?

But before than we will listen to Khamenei’s comments about Iran’s oil industries and the sanction on them. If we listen to him carefully he claims that we can sell our oil as much as we want to anyone we wish. The same claims that he has been repeating without any substance and then parroted by Rouhani.

Rouhani has gone one step further and claims that since the imposition of oil sanctions Iran has exported 28 billion barrels of oil and Iran has been earning one billion dollars every month from this revenue.

But the question is where has this money gone to and the answer is in the pockets of Khamenei and the regime’s proxies.

The Hezbollah has said that they have downed two Israeli drones but it is reported that the drones had been suicidal ones and had destroyed themselves after accomplishing their mission.

Mohammad Reza Shaheed:

As your program went on air the press conference of Macron and Trump began and the first six minutes of it was about Iran. Theyhave also issued a short communiqué, which says Macron has been actively talking to Trump about Iran in the last few weeks.

The unexpected arrival of Zarif has however complicated the matter but it appears that all Khamenei’s claims that the regime will not under any circumstances negotiate with the US has proved to be false.

A Window to the Fatherland – Friday 23 August 2019

We begin tonight’s edition of A Window to the Fatherland with Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh reading one of his poems from the book of his collected works.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

We continue the program with talking to our special guest Dr Mohammad Sadigh Yazdchi.

My first question to him is why some Iranians who do not have the means of even providing bread for their families walk to Karbala to perform a religious ritual that gives them no security or benefit?

How can we correct this devastated society when some of its members behave in this manner?

Dr Mohammad Sadigh Yazdchi:

We had already discussed about this issue in the previous programs and concluded that the psyche of the Iranians is polluted with many backward religious thoughts and superstition.

The mentality of the modern Iranian is still blended with deep religious beliefs that have continued to be part of our culture for the last fourteen centuries.

It is not an issue that can be tackled over night and requires a new education system that is based on secular and democratic values that separates state from religion.

In democratic countries of the world whatever their responsible leaders do is in line with the interest of their people but in our country the rulers claim to be doing it for the interest of their religious duties.

In a country where half of its population is not even free to choose what they wish to wear in public any talk of having democracy is nonsense.

The first priority that our forefathers wanted in the 1905 Constitutional Revolution was to have a society that works on the principle of the rule of law.

I think more than a century later we are still in search of this noble idea for Iran.

Behind the Headlines – Friday 23 August 2019

Jamshid Chalangi:

Tonight we will look at the latest news of Iran and the world, plus what is going on between the two factions of the regime who operate under the rule of the supreme leader.

Some observers believe the Iranian regime has reached the end of its life and to extend it is now sacrificing some of its own founders by accusing and jailing them on corruption cases.

The tension between Iran and US still continues as Javad Zarif visits Europe to rally support for the regime in its confrontation with Washington.

Will Iran dominate the talks in the G7 summit at this weekend?

Our guests tonight to discuss these issues are Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh and Hassan Shariatmadri.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

This regime’s foundations are on deceit, divisions and political maneuvering. If it were not for these tactics it would not have survived.

For almost ten years Khomeini was the absolute leader and would slap at the mouth of anyone who disagreed with his orders.That is why organizations like the Mujaheddin of Islamic Revolution and theMuslim People’s Republican Party were banned and many of their members were arrested, jailed, tortured and executed.

Khomeini did not even allow the loyal Islamic Republic Party to continue with its activities when they were about to divide into two factions.

He did not even tolerate the Combatant Clerics Group because he did not agree with their policies.

When Khamenei came to power at first he did nothave any power. However, he then brought the intelligence and repressive organs under his command and once he felt secured enough he launched his campaign of terrors and purges. There is a long list of people who fell victims of his tyrannical rule and some of them like Abdullah Momeni and Nasrin Sotoudeh are still alive to testify to this.

I believe we should expect more confrontations between the regime’s factions in the coming weeks.

Hassan Shariatmadri:

All Dr. Nourizadeh’s points are quite right. Further more, we must also look at the issue of the so-called fight againstcorruption in Iran from a different angel.

Behind this current lies the hand of Khamenei who is following a number of objectives. It is the case of the most corrupt eliminating the lesser corrupt.

The reason for these purges is that this regime is an ideological one and its absolute ruler can only be surrounded by his most loyal stooges and the moment a rival begins to compete with its power or wants to take away some of his wealth then he will react and annihilate them.

A Window to the Fatherland – Thursday 22 August 2019

We begin tonight’s edition of A Window to the Fatherland with Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh reading one of his poems from the book of his collected works.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

We continue the program with talking to our special guest of every Thursday, Dr. Mohsen Sazegara, for his views about news of Iran and the Middle East.

Rouhani yesterday threatened that if Iran is not allowed to export its oil through the Persian Gulf then no other country in the region would be allowed to do it either.

His claim comes at a time when the super oil tanker Grace 1 is still wandering in international waters and while the Revolutionary Guards has said it owns the tanker, Iran’s maritime and shipping authority has said they are the owners of it.

What exactly is going on here?

Mohsen Sazegara:

Rouhani had already said the same thing a few weeks ago and in fact it was his threatening language that led to US despatching its extra naval forces and warships to the region and it is now putting together an international naval force to provide safe passage for tankers that carry more than 32 percent of oil exported to the world through this strategic waterway.

At the same time if the regime is fully cornered by the sanctions it may try to cause turmoil in the region and that would lead to this military alliance to respond and further escalate the crisis.

The regime resorted to causing explosions on the Japanese oil tanker in June but I do not think either Rouhani or the Revolutionary Guards were directly behind the decision for this action and it would have been a tactic by Khamenei and his son Mujtaba.

And now we hear that the Israelis have been behind bombing the bases of the regime’s proxies in the countries of the region in recent weeks but the regime has remained silent so not to lose its face.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

Rouhani has blasted Ahmadinejad for accusing his government of failing to sort out the problems of the country by saying Ahmadinejad’s administration had wasted 10 years of reaching a nuclear agreement with the world.

Mohsen Sazegara:

It was actually Khamenei who wasted these ten years by ordering Ahmadinejad not to negotiate, but as the sanctions began to etch away the revenues of his own financial empire and cause instability within the regime, it was Khamenei again who this time told Rouhani to start negotiating with the world powers, hence the nuclear deal.

A Window to the Fatherland – Wednesday 21 August 2019

We begin tonight’s edition of A Window to the Fatherland with Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh reading one of his poems from the book of his collected works.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

In tonight’s program we have Mr Abdullah Mohtadi as our special guest and we would like to hear from him as a leader of an Iranian Kurdish opposition group that is regarded as a major force of opposition to the regime in Iran what changes he himself and his organisation have gone through during the last four decades while subjected to the regime’s repression.

Abdullah Mohtadi:

Naturally when one is in socio-political action one would always make errors and learn from them and we are not an exception.

During the late 1990s it was time for us to review our strategy as well as our ideology.

One of the main issues in the course of our struggle that we had to revise was the way we used to look at the events of 28th of Mordad of the year of 1358 when Khomeini issued a statement and declared a war against the Iranian Kurdish independent organisations that were challenging the religious despotism that the clerical regime was trying to spread across the country.

While the new regime had managed to stifle many secular and democratic groups in many parts of Iran, it had failed to do it in the Kurdish areas of the country.

We had made these areas a truly democratic region within which many political organisations had established a base and were operating free from any restrictions or crackdowns.

We had even helped members of our Bahai communities to find a safe heaven away from the bloody persecutions that they were facing.

Obviously these conditions were not to be tolerated for the despotic regime in Tehran and it waged a bloody war against the Kurdistan of Iran and the opposition groups based in the region.

The consequent atrocities by the regime against our people have been well documented and will be remembered by generations to come.

Nowadays you can see that our struggle for freedom and democracy is in the form of general strikes and through political and cultural resistance.

We now pursue the same objectives via civil rights movements and our fellow Iranians must not listen to the regime’s lies about our struggle.

A Window to the Fatherland – Tuesday 20 August 2019

We begin tonight’s edition of A Window to the Fatherland with Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh reading one of his poems from the book of his collected works.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

In tonight’s program our senior foreign correspondent Mohammad Reza Shaheed will give us some news about the meeting between Presidents Putin and Macron in the south of France.

Mohammad Reza Shaheed:

They are meeting in Macron’s personal villa on the southern coast of France and enjoying the sun while discussing their relationship and politics.

I think Macron is also trying the mend the US-Russia somehow broken relations. While their meeting lasted only a few hours it is believed they also discussed the possibility of inviting Rouhani to the summit of the seven world leaders.

However, the US has already rejected this idea as they think it would boost both Khamenei’s and Rouhani’s position and will bring about no substantial change as far as Iran’s policies are concerned.

Russia has also been under pressure by France to come clean of its role in the Ukraine crisis and when Boris Johnson comes to France on Thursday the pressure on the Russian president will grow even more.

Putin had never liked Macron’s election but he has gradually adopted to his style of politics.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

Merkel’s role in the politics of Europe towards Russians is also important and now France seems to have Germany’s support behind him to pursue his European ambitions.

A Window to the Fatherland – Monday 19 August 2019

We begin tonight’s edition of A Window to the Fatherland with Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh reading one of his poems from the book of his collected works.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

Today is the anniversary of the arson fire at Rex Cinema in Iran 40 years ago in which hundreds of innocent people perished.

We will talk about who was behind this crime and what were their sinister aims.

Later we will talk about the comments made by Maziar Ebrahimi who had been forced by the regime to “confess” to the murder of Iran’s nuclear scientists, where it was all a plot to divert the public attention from the truth.

Also, clerics Mohammad Yazdi and Sadeq Larijanihave been openly accusing each other of corruption and Khamenei has been watching with joy his puppets tearing each other apart.

Sadeq Larijani had written a letter to Khamenei and threatened that he will have to migrate to the city of Najaf in Iraq if anyfurther revelations about the corruption by himself and his staff are revealed.

In response Yazdi has told him that he is “nobody” among the ranks of the clerical establishment and he might as well leave the country as his presence benefits nobody.

However, behind the scene of this spat among the regime’s top officials lies the question of the rivalry to succeed Khamenei after his demise.

Sadeq Larijani’s brother Ali had planned that at the end of Rouhani’s tenure with the help of his brother at the helm of the judiciary he would become Iran’s next president and Sadeq could get the job of the chairman of the Expediency Council.

Further more, then the two brothers could easily install Javad Larijani and Iran’s foreign minister.

Iran’s long history shows that clans like the Larijanis have never served our nation and have only acted against the interests of Iran and the Iranians.

Behind the Headlines – Monday 19 August 2019

Jamshid Chalangi:

In tonight’s program we will look at the economic cost of the Iranian regime’s regional policy for the nation;

The spat between the top clerics of the regime has been brought into open with each one accusing their rivals of corruption and cronyism;

The cleric Alam Ulhoda has said the regime’s supreme leader must have claim to being the leader of the entire human populatiotgn of the earth;

In the first part of the program we will also look at the life and tragic death of the veteran journalist Siamak Pourzand who was a role model for many of Iran’s younger generation of journalists and writers in the 1970s for his pieces about the world of cinema and Hollywood.

Siamak was arrested and tortured on fabricated charged including espionage and finally under severe duress committed suicide.

Now his widow the women’s rights activist and journalist Mehrangiz Karr has lodged a formal complaint at a US court against the regime in Iran and is asking for justice and compensation.

She is here as our special guest tonight and would tell us more about this case.

Mehrangiz Karr:

I have long been seeking justice for the death of Siamak. In Iran I had taken his case to courts of justice but none would want to listen to me as they all referred to an article which barred them to enter cases that had a political angle to it and dealt with issues of national security.

I had provided the courts with concrete evidence that Siamak had been abducted and taken into custody during which time he had been subjected to torture, against all the rulings of their own laws.

Cleric Mehdi Karoubi was the Majles speaker at the time and had agreed to take up the case within the justice system but had been silenced by the security and intelligence organs of the regime with the excuse that hearing the case publicly was “against the national security”.

All Siamak “confessions” were false and he was even forced to write and sign a letter before his death that he disagreed with my complaint against his arrest and imprisonment as he had “admitted” his charges.

Cleric Karoubi had once said that he knew about how the Revolutionary Guard had tortured Siamak and threatened to reveal their crime, which he never did.

A Window to the Fatherland – Friday 16 August 2019

We begin tonight’s edition of A Window to the Fatherland with Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh reading one of his poems from the book of his collected works.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

We continue the program with talking to our special guest, oil expert Mr Khosrow Semnani, who has also written the book “Where is My Oil?”.

Mr Semnani has also done a unique job by following the issue of the strike at Iran’s Haf Tapeh Sugar Refinery and reports its news to international labour organizations in defence of the Iranian workers.

Khosrow Semnani:

The story of Haft Tapeh is a symbol of the problems that Iranian workers and teachers are facing in the country. They are among the hardworking classes of Iran but as the country is engulfed in corruption of its rulers and top officials these lower class sections of the society are economically suffering most and are struggling for justice.

We sincerely hope to be able to help them and as such we employed a committee of lawyers and sent them to Geneva to meet with the representatives of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) to raise the case of Iranianworkers with them.

We also spoke with a delegation of American Workers Unions and asked them to declare their support for the Haft Tapeh striking workers.

Dr. Alireza Nourizadeh:

You use the interesting term of “engineered corruption” in Iran. What do you mean by this description?

Khosrow Semnani:

This engineered corruption is the outcome of what Khomeini said back in 1979 when he declared that oil revenue is not important for the future of Iran and that he wanted his officials to disregard its role in Iran’s economy.

As such, 40 years later we now hear from Iran’s Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh that the country’s oil industries are operating in “dark rooms”, which means it has lost its revenues and is bankrupted.

In my book “Where is My Oil” I have reflected on this issue by showing how Iran’s natural gas is sold at one fourteenth of its actual market price instead ofcreating real revenue for the nation.

And yet even whatever revenues that the government receives from this extremely low price ends up in the hands of the corrupt officials, their relatives and cronies.

The regime itself has announced that more than $24 billons from the Central Bank’s reserves have disappeared and another $22 billion have gone stray in Chinese banks, but at the same time when 3000 workers in Iran only need $4 million salaries they cannot pay it to them.

More than 51% of Iranians officially live under the poverty line and we hear oiltankers with $100 million worth of Iranian oil disappear on black markets.