While humans lack
the ability to see into the future, we do possess the power to analyze our
world to predict what the future has in store for us. The result of Iran’s
so-called presidential election back in May rendered a second term for the
incumbent Hassan Rouhani. During Iran’s short election season, lasting no less
than a month, the mullahs’ cunningly downgraded crackdown measures, decreasing
executions and increasing social freedoms to lure the general public into
polling stations.
Nevertheless, the all-male
slate of cabinet candidates presented by Rouhani to the parliament for approval
provides a dark insight of what awaits the Iranian people and the international
community. To make a long story short, these are names consisting of former
Revolutionary Guards (IRGC)
members, hostage takers, executioners, torturers and thieves.
This is a signal of Iran
fuelling a future of further wars, crackdown, massacres, exporting terrorism
and fundamentalism, and killing sprees targeting the region’s nations.
While Iran apologists and the
appeasement camp misled the international community to naively describe Rouhani
as a smiling “moderate,” his first term rendered over 3,000 executions and went
mostly neglected. Knowing the Obama administration desperately needed a
legacy-defining foreign policy achievement, Rouhani and the mullahs saw a green
light to press the gas pedal on executions.
After deactivating the gallows
shortly for the May elections, the mullahs returned to their true nature and
resorted to over 100
executions in July alone. This consists of an average of at least
one execution every eight hours.
This should be a wake-up call
for European states that have banned executions altogether, and yet are willing
to signature lucrative economic deals with Tehran, such as Airbus, Total and
Renault.
Rouhani’s list of cabinet
candidates has raised quite a stir. After providing a variety of promises
during his election campaign, he failed to present even a single female
minister candidate. Only under a wave of protests and pressures did Rouhani
give in to naming three female vice presidents, providing nothing more than
symbolic roles.
There are also reports
indicating Rouhani ran through his candidates in close coordination with
Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. This goes against Iranian political norms
— Khamenei is known to have a say in a number of specific candidates, including
the key ministers of defense, foreign affairs and intelligence.
Anger mounted during his first
term over Rouhani’s ironic decision to appoint Mostafa Pourmohammadi as his
justice minister. Pourmohammadi is known for his direct role in the notorious 1988
massacre of over 30,000 political prisoners, mostly members and
supporters members of the Iranian opposition People’s Mojahedin Organization of
Iran (PMOI/MEK).
And while Pourmohammadi is set
aside in Rouhani’s second term cabinet, his replacement, Alireza Avaie, is
adding insult to injury. Avaie also played a leading role in the 1988 massacre
in Khuzestan Province, southwest Iran. The Iranian opposition National Council
of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)
held a press conference in September unveiling Avaie’s involvement in
executions of Younesco Prison in the city of Dezful. The majority of Iran’s
Arab community are resident in the country’s southwest regions.
Other names in Rouhani’s
cabinet indicate a bleak second term riddled with crackdown measures and going
back on all election season promises.
Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi is
appointed to serve as the new minister of communications and information
technology. This is an individual who entered the mullahs’ hated Ministry of
Intelligence (MOIS) at the age of 21, becoming involved in interrogations,
torture and censorship in his early days.
During the 2009 uprising
Jahromi was appointed as the MOIS Director of Surveillance. He is known to have
expanded this department and his appointment is seen as Rouhani’s attempt to
confront the PMOI/MEK’s increasing popularity amongst Iran’s population through
social media networks. Iran is known to have a young and very active social
media population of over 40 million users.
Amir Hatami is set to become
Iran’s new defense minister. Joining the ultraconservative and repressive IRGC
Bassij paramilitaries at the age of 12, Hatami is known for his active and
enthusiastic participation in the regime’s crackdown and killing campaigns. He
is amongst the Bassij members tasked to join Iran’s classic army and quickly
rose the ranks to provide the mullahs the influence they sought in this force.
Hatami also played an important role in identifying, arresting and eliminating
any army member showing even the slightest sign of patriotic devotion and
acting against the mullahs’ interests.
Habibollah Beetaraf, Rouhani’s
candidate for the new labor minister, was amongst the so-called “college
students” who stormed the US Embassy back in 1979 and took 52 American
diplomats hostage. He was one of the first IRGC members and participated in
literally herding teenagers and even small children into minefields during the
Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s.
Iran’s industry, mines and
trade will be managed by Mohammad Shariatmadari, famous for actively playing a
part in the regime’s crackdown and plundering. He is heavily involved in
managing Khamenei’s conglomerate, known as the “Setad
Ejraiye Farmane Hazrate Emam” – Headquarters for Executing the Order of the
Imam, controlling a large percentage of the regime’s economic
empire. $95 billion is this massive entity’s estimated capital.
This lineup provides a dark
glimpse into what the future will bring for the Iranian people and neighboring
nations. For example, following July’s execution spree, the mullahs’ regime
reportedly sent 13 individuals to the gallows on August 10th alone.
This atrocity included 11
hangings in a mass killing in the city of Birjand, eastern Iran; one execution
in a small town in northern Iran; and the horrific execution of 20-year-old
Alireza Tajiki, arrested at the age of 15 at the time of his alleged crime.
Amnesty International demanding
Tehran halt this hanging fell on deaf ears and Iran’s mullahs once again proved
their sinister cruelty and lack of respect for any humane values and
international laws.
Rouhani’s second term will
bring nothing but additional economic and social devastation, parallel to
political crackdown, destructive meddling across the region and continuing
Iran’s ballistic missile/nuclear drives. Rouhani neither has the will nor
intention to bring about any meaningful change in this regime’s foundations,
infrastructure, nature or approach.
What else is expected from an
individual who for 40 years has actively participated in the regime’s
oppression and warmongering. Rouhani was the first Iranian regime official to
call for public executions to teach the Iranian people a lesson.
Despite claims otherwise,
Rouhani is part and parcel of the mullahs’ establishment, and he, too, seeks to
maintain this system intact and in power. Hence, the international community
needs to understand no change will emerge from this medieval,
reactionary-minded regime.
The Iranian people and their
organized opposition finally deserve the support
and recognition they have been deprived of for the past four
decades.
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