The Scotsman: A SCOTS Conservative MEP is to address a gathering of 40,000 exiled Iranians in Germany at a demonstration against the fundamentalist regime in Tehran.
Struan Stevenson will tell the crowd at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin today that “the days of the brutal fascist regime are numbered”.
The demonstration has been organised by the National Council for Resistance in Iran.
Scots Tory to speak against Iran at Berlin demonstration
Germany bans Iranian opposition protest in Berlin
DPA: Police in the German capital on Thursday banned a demonstration called by an Iranian opposition group, the National Council of Resistance of Iran. Officials said the group – which seeks the ouster of the Teheran government – planned to use the rally to build support for the Iranian People’s Mujahedin-e Khalq which has been declared a terrorist organisation by the European Union.
Austrian arms manufacturer sold 800 rifles to Iran
AFP: The Austrian government authorised the sale of 800 rifles classified as war weapons to Iran for use by that country’s police, the Austrian interior ministry said Wednesday after a local newspaper reported that Washington had tried to stop the deal.
Bush: World must speak with one voice on Iran nukes
Reuters: President George W. Bush said on Wednesday Iran with a nuclear weapon would be a “very destabilizing” force
and that it was important for the world to speak with one voice against Tehran’s program. “The Iranians just need to know
that the free world is working together to send a very clear message: Don’t develop a nuclear weapon,” Bush said.
Iran Will Never Give Up Nuclear Technology – Khatami
Reuters: No Iranian government, present or future, will give up the country’s drive to master peaceful nuclear technology, including uranium enrichment, President Mohammad Khatami said on Wednesday.
In a toughly worded speech to foreign ambassadors in Tehran, Khatami also warned Iran could adopt “a new policy” which would have “massive consequences” if Iran’s nuclear talks with the European Union did not prosper.
Rice attacks EU countries over Iran nuclear drive
AFP: US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Wednesday took a swipe at European countries negotiating to halt Iran’s nuclear drive, saying they had failed to make sufficiently clear the threat of UN sanctions. Rice made her remarks concerning the negotiations led by Britain, France and Germany in an interview with Fox News to be broadcast a day after she made a major appeal for transatlantic unity following the divisions over the Iraq war.
Iran: Political Prisoners Held with Violent Criminals
Human Rights Watch: The confinement of political prisoners in Iran together with violent criminals endangers their lives, Human Rights Watch said today. Human Rights Watch called for the immediate release of all prisoners held for the peaceful expression of political opinions. Six prisoners in Rajaii Shahr prison near Karaj, a suburb of Tehran, launched a hunger strike on January 25 to protest their confinement with dangerous and belligerent criminals who have assaulted and intimidated them.
Rice: Iran Cannot Set Its Own Nuclear Terms
Reuters: Iran cannot be permitted to set its own conditions for carrying out a pledge not to develop nuclear weapons, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Tuesday.
“We should not let the Iranians continue to create new conditions that have to be fulfilled somehow before they are prepared to live up to their international obligations,” she said after talks with French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier.
Europeans warn Iranians over nuclear fuel cycle work
AFP: Officials from European heavyweights Britain, France and Germany were warning Iran about activities that verge on breaches of a deal to freeze nuclear fuel cycle work in talks that opened Tuesday in Geneva, diplomats said. Britain, France and Germany were “to read the riot act to the Iranians,” a diplomat close to the talks, which is aimed at getting Iran to guarantee that it is not developing nuclear weapons, told AFP.
Bush seeks regime change in Iran, but his route is unclear, experts say
AFP: US President George W. Bush has been actively behind “regime change” for Iran, but the route to that end has yet to be defined and the perils are great, US experts said. Bush and his top aides have turned up the volume in their verbal attacks on the Islamic republic, calling it an “outpost of tyranny” and one of the principal backers of international terror, on its way to developing a nuclear weapon.
