End Of Jail Not Beginning Of Freedom: Dissident Iranian Filmmaker

Xi had invited Raisi to Beijing, and their meeting comes as both Iran and China face rising tensions with the United States over a range of global issues.

Ahead of his visit, Raisi wrote an editorial in China's state-controlled People's Daily in which he said both countries believe that unilateralism and "violent" measures such as the imposition of "unjust" sanctions are the main causes of crises and insecurity in the world.

In the editorial, Raisi described China as an "old friend", and said Iran's efforts to strengthen bilateral relations would be unaffected by regional and international situations.

The two governments are expected to sign cooperation documents during the visit, according to Iran's state news agency IRNA. A 25-year strategic partnership deal signed in 2021 has remained largely on paper.

Xi visited Saudi Arabia in December and also met members of the Gulf Cooperation Council, followed by a joint statement in which the issue of three Iranian islands in the Persian Gulf was mentioned as a claim pursued by the United Arab Emirates.

The Iranian public showed a strong reaction once the joint statement was reported by Persian media, accusing their own government of being so weak that its ally China was subtly endorsing the UAE claim.

Xi and Raisi pledged to forge a stronger alliance when they last met in person on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit in the Uzbek city of Samarkand in September.

The individual targeted was an opponent of the Iranian regime who took part in recent protests in Australia. Iranian communities worldwide have held frequent rallies to support their countrymen in their uprising against the government.

The individuals involved in the plot allegedly monitored the home of the anti-regime activist and extensively researched the person and the family, the Guardian reported.

Home affairs minister Claire O’Neil revealed the incident in a speech to the Australian National University, while condemning foreign interference as “one of the core threats our democracy faces.”

The incident took place last year as protests were raging in Iran and security forces were using lethal force against protesters, killing more than 500 and inflicting gunshot wounds on hundreds of others. As young people were dying and many were losing their eyes to shotgun fire, Iranians in many countries began organizing and holding protests to support their compatriots.

Australia’s announcement came one day after British anti-terrorism police announced the arrest and indictment of an Austrian citizen for stalking the headquarters of Iran International television network in London. The network and its journalists have been under threat at least since last November and under police watch.

Earlier this month the Australian Senate expressed concerns about credible allegations of intimidation and threats against Australians, residents and their families, urging the responsible ministers to provide an update to the Parliament and the Australian public on the government’s current assessment of whether persons connected to the regime are undertaking such behavior in Australia.

O’Neil praised the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (Asio). “I’m pleased to say our agencies were on to it like a shot. Asio tracked the operation and shut it down immediately,” she said.

She defended the right of Australian citizens to criticize a foreign regime and added that security agencies were “not going to stand back and have Australians or indeed visitors to our country watched and tracked by foreign governments on our soil.”

The Islamic Republic has long threatened, killed and kidnapped dissidents in democratic, and neighboring countries where they found refuge. The history of these attacks goes back to the 1980s and as recently as last year and as far the United States, where rights activist leader Masih Alinejad in New York was the alleged target of two separate terrorist plots.

The danger to Iranian dissidents abroad is real but O’Neil said, “This is Australia, this is our democracy, and if you engage in activities like this, you will be discovered.”

“To those states who operate in the shadows, I have a simple message – we are watching you. Where our national interest is served by calling out your operations, we will. And to those in Australia making their voice heard, we are acting to protect you.”

In response to a question by Iran International’s correspondent Samira Gharaei about a report on Monday that Iran has supplied new drones to Russia, Ned Price said that the US has been warning about this expanding “two way” relationship since last year.

Price reiterated that “we are taking action to do everything we can to counter this relationship and to counter the transfer of technology…we have exposed this linkage and we are continuing to galvanize countries around the world to maintain focus on this.”

He went to characterize the alliance between Moscow and Tehran as a “profound threat to the people of Ukraine but also a security relationship that has the potential to be a threat way beyond.”

Asked about Iranian opposition leaders coming together and potentially forming a council to counter the Islamic Republic, Price said the United States cannot make decisions for Iranians but it is eager to listen to both those inside the country and activists in the diaspora, and will continue to hear a wide spectrum of voices.

Price also confirmed that US Special Envoy for Iran Robert Malley was heading a delegation that has arrived in Saudi Arabia to hold discussions with Gulf Cooperation Council countries on air and missile defense, challenges presented by Iran and issues of counter terrorism.

Elsewhere, Price warned about the dangers posed by Iran’s nuclear advances and its export of terrorism, in the context of US Chinese areas of cooperation.

Following more than five months of protests, numerous calls made by Iranian politicians from across the spectrum to do away with violent crackdown, finally prompted the government to reluctantly announce a partial amnesty for jailed protesters and promises to release more prisoners including intellectuals.

However, a call for protests on February 16 has been made on social media and many Iranians have called on businesses in Tehran and other Iranian cities to shut down the CC-cameras that might be used by security forces to identify protesters.

The call for the protest came on the anniversary of the 1979 revolution on February 11 when the Iranian government rallied its supporters and reportedly forced some government officials and students to take part in the rallies.

Many politicians and pundits in Tehran have voiced guarded praise for the partial prisoner amnesty, but they have also called on the clerical regime to be more tolerant of protests to regain some of its lost legitimacy.

Government officials and state-owned media presented conflicting and exaggerated figures for the number of those who took to the street in the stage-managed rallies. Asr Iran website in Tehran featured a report questioning the validity of these numbers, adding that exaggerated figures could be counter-productive and insulting.

Like Fars news agency, hardliner daily Kayhan put the number of those taking part in the rallies at 20 million and called it the highest figure in 44 years. Asr Iran argued that the figure is unbelievable, just as the 2010 number of 50 million, which was too exaggerated for a country with a population of just over 75 million at the time.

Asr Iran noted that a comparison of the figures for 2010 and 2023 shows that some 30 million Iranians are no longer interested in taking part in the pro-government rallies. It called such fabricated news as treason, although it said that "millions" of Iranians were present in the rallies but did not cite an exact number.

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Asr Iran warned that whatever the figures, the people's presence does not necessarily mean that they are happy about the government's performance. Furthermore, their presence should not prompt the government to ignore the absence of a larger number of people who chose not to take part in the rally. The website quoted Iran’s ruler Ali Khamenei as saying, "They may not like the Islamic Republic, but they certainly like Iran."

The website also said that the protests during the past months gave an added motivation to government supporters to take part in the demonstrations. In fact, this was what some Iranians told the state television in stage-managed interviews that were broadcast throughout the day on Saturday.

Asr Iran added that it was foolish to doctor photos to portray the number of pro-government demonstrators more than their actual numbers.

Media in Tehran generally ignored massive rallies by Iranian expats in Washington DC, Los Angeles, Chicago, Paris, London, and several other European and Australian cities. However, it suggested that Iranian officials should keep monitoring the number of people who take part in progovernment demonstrations in Iran.

In another development, welcoming the amnesty for political prisoners, centrist daily Ham Mihan wrote on Sunday that "The amnesty and the promise of further pardons were good news, but "There will be no essential change in this regard as long as foreign-based media remain as the point of reference for Iranians." Ham Mihan added, "This requires the overhaul of the media as an institution. The media should be taken out of the war of narratives and returned to the arena of reflecting the truth."

Hossein Ta’eb stated that today "we no longer have aerial bombardments and missiles" and instead a "hybrid war" is taking place.

The clerical regime has blocked thousands of website for the past two decades, but expanded its Internet restrictions at the beginning of antigovernment protests in September.

"The Internet is in control of the enemy, so we have to restrict it to deny the enemy success in its hybrid war," added Taeb.

Islamic Republic officials use the term “enemy” to refer to the United States and its allies.

During a speech at Tehran Polytechnic University (Amirkabir) on Monday, he also attributed support by celebrities for public protests to "hybrid war", claiming that in a hybrid war the fans of a celebrity must get excited to create violence.

Ta’eb also referred to Prince Reza Pahlavi's appreciation for the prominent Sunni cleric Mowlavi Abdolhamid's criticism of the government, saying "we do not have ethnic and religious differences, and Shia and Sunni live together, but some people want to take advantage of this."

He once again accused the US of seeking to create "social rifts" in Iran, so that "both sides in the society will clash first, and then they clash with the government".

He did not say who exactly he meant by the two sides and did not provide any evidence for his claims.