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Iran on Sunday defended the broadcast of interviews from two US-Iranians detained for harming national security amid criticism from reformists the programme was unnecessary. Tehran has said the televised statements from Haleh Esfandiari and Kian Tajbakhsh, who were arrested in May, have exposed a US plot to overthrow Iran’s Islamic authorities through a peaceful “soft revolution.” “It was necessary that the nature of the cultural onslaught was exposed,” government spokesman Gholam Hossein Elham told reporters. “This was required for informing the public. It is nothing people are unaware of.

But their beliefs have now been documented by real evidence,” said Elham. He also denied US allegations the statements were made under pressure, pointing to the comfortable surroundings in which Esfandiari and Tajbakhsh were filmed. “For those who say that the statements were made under pressure, their appearance shows that these were natural comments,” he said. No mention was made in the programme that the two academics are currently jailed or face grave charges of harming national security. Instead, both were shown in rooms equipped with potted plants, carpets and, in Esfandiari’s interview, a fridge. The surroundings bore absolutely no resemblance to prison cells. This was to show that “we are not the kind who use violence with our enemies and opponents. Giving the accused a hard time and pressuring them is not our policy,” Elham said. Elham also recalled Iran’s treatment of the 15 British sailors detained in March, who were shown on television relaxing in tracksuits, browsing through brochures and playing table tennis. “A humane, non-violent, behaviour with the accused is part of neutralising psychological warfare,” said Elham. The US State Department and New York-based Human Rights Watch had expressed concern that coercion was used to force the detainees to make the statements.

Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman Mohammad Ali Hosseini also defended the broadcast, saying the programme had shown up US efforts to destabilise Iran. “The United States has always had overthrowing goals and the detainees’ recent confessions aired on television are an indication of a long-term plan and extensive efforts,” the semi-official Mehr news agency quoted him as saying. However Iran’s main reformist party, the Islamic Iranian Participation Front, attacked the conservative government for airing the programme, which it said was of “no use.” “Such programmes are no use in clarifying anti-Iranian moves by US officials … by airing such programmes one cannot divert public opinion from the numerous mistakes and failures resulting from the government’s work.” “A ‘Velvet Revolution’ normally happens in a dictatorship where it is not possible to implement the people’s free and fair opinion through free elections,” the Fars news agency quoted it as saying. “This is why the best way to assure the durability of the Islamic system is democracy,” it added. Iran has repeatedly protested that the United States has been seeking to spark a “Velvet Revolution” in Iran under the guise of initiatives to promote democracy.

A reformist Iranian newspaper also broke ranks on Saturday to criticise the interviews. “We must accept that the era of televised confessions is over,” said the Hambastegi (Unity) daily. “If these people are spies then why are the ones who gave them classified information not introduced and detained? “Would it not be better if the national media introduced these people as opponents of the Islamic republic after their intentions to oppose and overthrow have been proven in court?” it asked. Source: AFP

U.S. and Iranian envoys will hold talks in Baghdad on Tuesday to discuss Iraq’s worsening chaos, following up on a landmark meeting in May, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said on Sunday. “Iraq will host the second round of U.S.-Iranian talks on the 24th of this month. We support this dialogue and hope it achieves tangible results,” Zebari told Reuters by telephone. Washington accuses Shiite Muslim Iran of fomenting violence in Iraq by backing militants. Iran denies the charges and blames the U.S.-led invasion of 2003 for bloodshed between Iraq’s majority Shiite and minority Sunni Muslim Arabs.

But the growing conflict has pushed the two countries, which have not had diplomatic ties since shortly after Iran’s 1979 revolution, to seek common ground. Zebari said the ambassadors to Iraq from both countries would lead the talks, with Iraqi government officials present. Iranian ambassador Hassan Kazemi-Qomi and U.S. ambassador Ryan Crocker met in Baghdad on May 28 to discuss Iraq, in the most high-profile contact between the two enemy states for almost three decades. Both envoys described those talks as positive and Iraq has been urging the two sides to meet again. The United States has been leading diplomatic efforts to isolate Iran over its nuclear ambitions, but both sides have said any additional talks, like the May discussions, will focus solely on Iraq. The precise agenda of Tuesday’s talks was not immediately clear. Keeping up the pressure on Iran, the U.S. military on Sunday said two suspected insurgents linked to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ Qods Force had been detained during a raid on a farm near the Iranian border east of Baghdad.

Iran does not officially acknowledge the Qods Force. “The suspects may be associated with a network of terrorists that have been smuggling explosively formed projectiles, other weapons, personnel and money from Iran into Iraq,” the military said in a statement. Explosively formed projectiles, or EFPs, are sophisticated roadside bombs capable of sending molten slugs of metal through amour. Roadside bombs account for the majority of U.S. military deaths in Iraq. The U.S. military has previously displayed what it says are Iranian-made rockets, mortars and roadside bombs seized in Iraq. Spokesman Rear Admiral Mark Fox reiterated the U.S. military’s belief that “networks” of EFPs are being brought into Iraq from Iran. He likened U.S. efforts at combating the networks to “draining a swamp.” “The ultimate solution in our view is to ensure that the source of these weapons could be controlled and dried up and that there would be a good neighbor policy here,” Fox told a news conference in Baghdad. At the May 28 talks, Kazemi-Qomi had called the meeting “a first step in negotiations between these two sides.” Crocker said then he was less interested in arranging further meetings than laying out Washington’s case that Iran is arming, funding and training Shiite militias in Iraq. The second round of talks comes after the Iranian envoy earlier this month made the first consular visit to five Iranians detained by U.S. forces in northern Iraq in January. Zebari had previously said he hoped that visit would improve relations between Washington and Tehran. The U.S. military says the five men are linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and were backing militants in Iraq. Iran has insisted they are diplomats and demanded they be freed.

Source: Reuters