One of the MANY posters calling for peaceful "Green" protests on Feb. 11th in Tehran and other major Iranian cities. Please see the posters throughout this post as well as the link at the end of this post for many more.
Dear All,
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Greetings from Washington University in St. Louis…after a long delay. As those of you in academia know well, spring semesters are notorious for being busy. To attend to my teaching and departmental duties, the windows (e-mails and the blog) had be put on the back burner for a while. I am happy to be back with a plan: to make the windows shorter so I can sustain them.
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While you not have had a chance to follow the details, the Green Movement has sustained itself in the face of much brutality from the government.
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* About two days away from celebrating the 31st anniversary of the Iranian 1979 Revolution, and as the government of Mr. Ahmadinejad (in deep financial and political trouble) has invited the western press to witness, and report, the celebrations, we hear from Reporters without Borders that 65 Iranian reporters are in jail. This figure is unprecedented. Over a dozen of these reporters, whose fault is that they wish to report the events in Iran freely, were arrested in the past two days in anticipation of the “celebrations.”
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One of the MANY posters calling for peaceful "Green" protests on Feb. 11th in Tehran and other major Iranian cities. Please see the posters throughout this post as well as the link at the end of this post for many more.
Mr. Mousavi’s Daring Interview
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* Last week, for the first time, in an interview with the online magazine “Kalameh-i Sabz,” Mr. Mousavi suggested that the goals of the 1979 revolution for democratization of Iran have not been achieved and therefore, the revolution is incomplete. Furthermore, he said that “Religious despotism” is the worst kind of dictatorship. A group of us have praised his courage and expressed support for his position in an open letter (available here: Open Letter In Support of the Greens), which will be publicized shortly. If you are an academic of Iranian heritage and would like to add your voice to ours please e-mail your willingness, name, and position to: drahni@optonline.net and please do so a.s.a.p.
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Two New Warnings for the Supreme Leader
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* As green Iranians prepare for a massive rally on Thursday, Feb. 11, two major religious figures, Ayatollah Mousavi Ardebili, and Hojat al-Islam Hashemi Rafsanjani warned the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei of the consequences of his actions. Both these political and religious authorities asked for immediate, and unconditional, release of political prisoners and suggested that Mr. Khamenei distances himself from extremists.
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Recommendation to the Green Marchers
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*A large number of posters and guide lines have been distributed in Iran over the past few days concerning the Thursday rally. The main points are:
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One of the MANY posters calling for peaceful "Green" protests on Feb. 11th in Tehran and other major Iranian cities. Please see the posters throughout this post as well as the link to the left for many more.
* Come out in large numbers! The foreign press is present and you will be safe.
* Do not wear clothes that make you conspicuous.
* Instead of shouting your slogans and possibly being arrested, write them down in public places.
* Don’t use any form of violence, verbal, or physical.
* Take as many pictures as you can.
* Do not take your green signs out until you are in the Azadi Square …or close.
* When Mr. Ahmadinejad begins to speak, take your green signs out, stand up and turn your backs to him.
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To see a nice selection of the posters, please click here February 11, 2010 Posters to see the power point slide show that I have prepared. It is not even a third of what is being distributed. I just did not want to make the file too large.
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Have a great day.
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Best,
Fatemeh
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Fatemeh Keshavarz, Professor and Chair
Dept. of Asian and Near Eastern Languages and Literatures
Washington University in St. Louis
Honorary Co-Chair, Iranians For Peace
Tel: (314) 935-5156
Fax: (314) 935-4399
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