Adloyada

Twittering the Iranian uprising resistance

At the height of the pouring out of mass demonstrations on the streets of Tehran and other Iranian cities, I started writing the post which is appended to this one.

But I hadn't finished it when tonight, one of the key Twitterers from inside Iran came back after a silence of several days. Over the last hour or two, he's been running a series of tweets telling the story of what happened to some of his fellow Tehran university protesters as they got rounded up by the security apparatus of the Iranian regime.

So I'm editing together the series of tweets to form this continuous post. I don't know if it's safe to give his Twitter name. I want to pay tribute again as I did repeatedly on Twitter, and as I did in the original draft below, to his honesty, his courage and his unfailing commitment to bear witness to what's going on in this uprising.

The tweets from him presented here run backwards--latest first (it came up four minutes ago), down to the first of the series, which he put up about an hour ago. I'll keep updating them as long as he's able to go on telling this story of what's been happening to the arrested protesters.

It's classic police state stuff.

May the Almighty protect him and his fellow protesters, strengthen them and keep them safe.

the biggest help: spread the news & don't desert us! it may take some time but we will take what is rightfully ours!8 minutes ago from web

1. why BBC & CNN reporting things like it's all over now? how can it be over after what gov done to us?3 minutes ago from web
2. the numbers of protectors were far more than 5000! the entire district was full of people

1. this is going to happen on every national occasion & gov has no excuse to stop us!13 minutes ago from web
2. Karoubi was there in person & Mousavi said he was stuck in traffic but we heard him through his cellphone & loudspeakers15 minutes ago from web
3. it may work on a short period of time, but they can't stop what is already started, today's rally was a clear proof18 minutes ago from web
4. Gov is working hard on State TV trying to depress people & stop them from fighting back20 minutes ago from web

1. we passed a letter to Karoubi today describing everything we know about various students conditionsless than a minute ago from web 
2.   
3.   
4.  the student community will stand to the very end! we won't forget what they have done to us!
5. 3 minutes ago from web in reply to TheVitmo
6. and I don't want to put him in more pressure of any kind right now6 minutes ago from web
7. I skipped some of the incidents as Reza requested. he's very weak both mentally & physically7 minutes ago from web

1. Reza had no idea why they suddenly released him & some of his inmates1 minute ago from web
2. at night around 10PM they Released Reza & his family instantly moved him to a hospital for internal bleeding4 minutes ago from web
3. he promised if one of them confess in front of camera he will free them all & they will blur his face & nothing to worry!9 minutes ago from web

in morning a man introduced him self as Intelligent (intelligence?) came saying he will record their confections (confessions?) with camera1 minute ago from web

1. they prevented them from sleeping by kept them standing all the nightless than 20 seconds ago from web
2. according to Reza some students from Polytechnic university were also there5 minutes ago from web
3. and after they knew Reza is a student they moved him to a more harsh environment with some other people6 minutes ago from web

1. the man promised Reza's family they will release him if he's really innocent1 minute ago from web
2. unfortunately Reza's mother told everything she knows over the phone to a man calling from Evin3 minutes ago from web

in last days Reza said it looked they get a little more organized and start searching for any special case in arrested people

less than 20 seconds ago from web

they ran another confession show at Evin,this time with promise of instant freedom & new accusations

3 minutes ago from web

1. a man came and say they will be released today and an hour later another came & say they will be in prison for 10year!2 minutes ago from web
2. Reza said it looked like they have no idea what should they do with so much people4 minutes ago from web
3. all types of gov agents came & go in the next couple of days, moving people, forcing them to walk or just stand for a long time6 minutes ago from web
4. according to Reza some of the injured people already passed out and a taxi driver looked like dead by that time10 minutes ago from web

1. In first day at Evin prison staff started searching for severely injured people & gave them some first aid4 minutes ago from web
2. and another hour passed just standing in the row at the entrance of prison & filling out forms8 minutes ago from web
3. it took near 3 hours to get to the prison, Reza said the driver seemed enjoys wandering in the streets11 minutes ago from web
4. Reza had no idea why they select some of the people and where they moved the others16 minutes ago from web
5. apparently they released some people on that night & move Reza & some of the selected people to Evin17 minutes ago from web
6. around 3am day 2 they started moving people in vans, Reza said a driver was talking to a Basiji about Evin prison is full and what shoul ...20 minutes ago from web
7. Reza said some people sign them & some other just faked their signs & names, there were not enough confession papers for all people24 minutes ago from web
8. and they paid to go to streets and say things & they know they have violated national security & Islam26 minutes ago from web
9. the papers were prewritten confessions all in different hand writings saying the signer is a member of organization by mousavi27 minutes ago from web
10. He said in the second day some pain cloth people came with papers forcing people to sign them32 minutes ago from web
11. there was also a awful problem of only one toilet for all people in there and a impossible time limit of around 1min for each person34 minutes ago from web
12. Reza said the only exception was they didn't hit arrested people directly in the face39 minutes ago from web
13. they didn't open the plastic handcuffs for a day & half, & randomly beat up people in there44 minutes ago from web
14. Reza estimated around 200 people were in each room and there were not enough space to even sit on the groundabout 1 hour ago from web
15. he said all sort of people were there & some of them were just unlucky people just walking in streets and captured for no reasonabout 1 hour ago from web
16. he spent his first 48h of arrest at level -4 of ministry of interior building without food or waterabout 1 hour ago from web
17. my connection is very poor & I don't know how long I will be able to sustain itabout 1 hour ago from web
18. Reza released from Hospital yesterday he is banned from university and now is a stared [marked by gov] studentabout 1 hour ago from web
19. 1:17AM finally managed to load twitter! HTTPS protocol is still blocked by some ISP & no chance getting to twitter with apps

Drafted on 16th June:

I'm keeping up with what's going on in Iran via this Tweetgrid link, which shows the tweets of protesters in Iran alongside a flood of messages from commenters across the world.

It was Twitter that alerted me to what was beginning to roll on Sunday. I picked up a couple of Tweeter names from my usual followees which were putting out angry protest messages in some contrast to what was running on the MSM-- who were running Ahmadinejad's contemptuous dismissal of the protesters as a variant on disappointed football team losers. 

The BBC was running headlines about Mousavi as "the loser", as if to imply that there was certainly no question of doubt about Ahmadinejad's victory.

Then I began reading the tweets of two Iranian students, one obviously under siege in the University of Tehran, the other seeming to have a broader set of contacts across Iran. Then there were the tweets coming from non-Iranians picking up messages and videos coming out of Iran.

I sat up till 3:00am on Sunday night following the tweets from the students besieged in Tehran University. By Monday morning, I emailed my daughter and son-in-law the Tweetgrid link and urged them to follow it.

One of the things that most impressed me and convinced me of the potential power of this movement was the way in which one of the besieged student tweeters sent message after message where he acknowledged his own fear-- he described himself as shaking and sweating with fear-- as he saw the security forces attacking the adjoining building and sought help for a severely wounded friend. He also felt fear at the thought of what might happen at the demo called for the next day. I saw the tweets reporting government threats that the proposed demo must not go ahead because it had been declared illegal, and that protesters would be met by live bullets. He wasn't sure whether to go or not--it was clear that disinformation was being spread fast.

He went offline for almost a day but by that time it was clear 

Stupid UKIP, stop picking on Churchill

I've never been in the least tempted to vote for UKIP-- the one-issue political party whose sole raison d'etre is to campaign against membership of the European Union. But I've been gobsmacked by the sight of this UKIP election poster plastered here and there in odd corners I've passed in my car driving across London. 

So there's Churchill, proudly invoking victory in his Homburg (hello--a European hat style) as their poster boy. 

They could hardly have chosen a more inappropriate front man. 

Does UKIP not know one of Churchill's most famous post-war speeches was the one where he advocated not just a European common market (as was being discussed at that time)-- but a federal United States of Europe, way beyond anything the current EU has proposed? 

Here's some extracts from what he was saying back in 1946:

If Europe were once united in the sharing of its common inheritance, there would be no limit to the happiness, to the prosperity and the glory which its three or four million people would enjoy..... 

Yet all the while there is a remedy which, if it were generally and spontaneously adopted by the great majority of people in many lands, would as if by a miracle transform the whole scene, and would in a few years make all Europe, or the greater part of it, as free and as happy as Switzerland is to-day. What is this sovereign remedy? It is to re-create the European Family, or as much of it as we can, and to provide it with a structure under which it can dwell in peace, in safety and in freedom. We must build a kind of United States of Europe. In this way only will hundreds of millions of toilers be able to regain the simple joys and hopes which make life worth living. The process is simple. All that is needed is the resolve of hundreds of millions of men and women to do right instead of wrong and to gain as their reward blessing instead of cursing.....

Our constant aim must be to build and fortify the strength of the United Nations Organization. Under and within that world concept we must re-create the European Family in a regional structure called, it may be, the United States of Europe. And the first practical step would be to form a Council of Europe. If at first all the States of Europe are not willing or able to join the Union, we must nevertheless proceed to assemble and combine those who will and those who can.

Of course, at that time, Churchill spoke of Britain as if it was somehow not really part of Europe. But his vision was of Britain as head of the Commonwealth. That's pointed out by some of the defenders of this campaign in the comments here.  However, a key feature of the Commonwealth he advocated was one in which all of its citizens had unlimited right of immigration to Britain. It was the Conservative governments of his time and subsequently which turned to mass immigration from Caribbean and the Indian subcontinent as the answer to Britain's postwar labour shortages. Churchill did express reservations about the policy in racist terms--but it can hardly be UKIP's case that they stand behind Churchill's suggestion, towards the end of the time when he was barely able to function as a politician, that a Conservative Party slogan should be "Keep Britain White"?

So, if UKIP is going to invoke Churchill, are they going to support substituting membership of the EU with that of a Commonwealth of unlimited rights of immigration? Or are they hinting at support for Churchill's sometimes-expressed white supremacist attitudes?

The UKIP grandees like Campbell Bannerman, who picked Churchill as their poster boy, seem to have arrested their awareness of his historical role at Dunkirk, the biggest military defeat in British history, in which his role was primarily to inspire and commit Britain to fighting Nazism and totalitarianism.

David Campbell Bannerman commenting on the launch said:  "Sir Winston is an ideal icon for our campaign because it is high time that Britain found that old Dunkirk spirit again and learned to fight its corner in adversity.  We've accepted far too much nonsense from Brussels over the years and it is time to say NO MORE!  The only way to do that at this election is to vote UKIP, as none of the old parties have anything to offer other than more Europe.
 

UKIP's barely concealed agenda is a decidedly Little England one. No, they're not fascists in smart suits, like the BNP. But their view of politics is simplistic, ignorant and ultimately a prescription for economic dead-endery.

They would hardly stand a chance in next Thursday's election were it not for the disastrous failure of the UK's three main political parties to confront and put a rapid and decisive end to the cosy, all-in-it-together morass of self-serving corruption through our own Parliament's expenses rackets.

There's of course no shortage of corruption in the EU's own Parliamentary arrangements. But the answer isn't to walk away, any more than it is to walk away from the House of Commons and the House of Lords.

I'm probably going to vote for Libertas in the EU elections, because I think trans-EU parties with a focus on accountability and a combination of commitment and scepticism are the least worst choice.

The local UK elections are more problematic. Any temptation I was beginning to have to vote Tory in protest at Gordon Brown's handling of just about any policy or crisis you care to mention has been laid to rest by David Cameron's shying away from dealing with (and sometimes open support of)  those expenses miscreants of his own party he happens to be most sympathetic to.

In the past, I've resorted to voting for the Green and Liberal parties when protesting against the worst excesses of the former ultra-left Hackney Labour Council in its heyday. Looking at the policies of the Green and Liberals today, their policies seem to me a lot more disastrous than those of Labour and their politicians no more trustworthy.

I'll be looking at the other minority parties over the next few days to see if there's one I can square my conscience on registering my vote with.

Into my mailbox pops a breathless little communication from Teachers' TV telling me it's Behaviour Management week. Well, so it is. I hope the voters get their sanctions and rewards right and our politicians decide to change their ways.