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Iran's New Terrorist President |
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Tuesday, 19 July 2005 |
 Born in the town of Garmsar, east of Tehran, the 49-year-old Ahmadinejad is the son of a blacksmith.
After finishing high school, Ahmadinejad went to Elm-o Sanaat
University in 1975 to study engineering. Soon the whirlwind of Islamic
revolution led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini swept him from the
classroom to the mosque and he joined a generation of firebrand Islamic
fundamentalists dedicated to the cause of an Islamic world revolution,
In 1979, he became the representative of Elm-o Sanaat students in the
Office for Strengthening of Unity Between Universities and Theological
Seminaries, which later became known as the OSU.
The OSU was set up by Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti, who was at the time
Khomeini’s top confidant. Beheshti wanted the OSU to organise Islamist
students to counter the rapidly rising influence of the opposition
Mojahedin-e Khalq among university students.
The OSU played a central role in the seizure of the United States embassy in Tehran in November 1979.
During the crackdown on universities in 1980, which Khomeini called the
“Islamic Cultural Revolution”, Ahmadinejad and the OSU played a
critical role in purging dissident lecturers and students many of whom
were arrested and later executed.
In the early 1980s, Ahmadinejad worked in the “Internal Security”
department of the IRGC and earned notoriety as a ruthless interrogator
and torturer. In 1981, Ahmadinejad, along with a number of “the Line of
the Imam [Khomeini] students, began working in the Prosecutor’s Office
and in Evin Prison, where he collaborated with .Mohammad Kachui (Warden
of Evin) and Assadollah Lajevardi (Tehran Prosecutor General), both
notorious henchmen in Evin Prison. As a vicious torturer, Ahamdinejad
led firing squads in early 1980s and personally fired coup de grace at
executed prisoners.
In 1986, Ahmadinejad became a senior officer in the Special Brigade of
the Revolutionary Guards and was stationed in Ramazan Garrison near
Kermanshah in western Iran. Ramazan Garrison was the headquarters of
the Revolutionary Guards’ “extra-territorial operations”, a euphemism
for terrorist attacks beyond Iran’s borders.
In Kermanshah, Ahmadinejad became involved in the clerical regime’s
terrorist operations abroad and led many “extra-territorial operations
of the IRGC”. With the formation of the elite Qods (Jerusalem) Force of
the IRGC, Ahmadinejad became one of its senior commanders.
Brig. Gen. Mohammad Jafar Sahraroudi, then Ramadan Garrison’s commander
recruited Ahmadinejad in 1989 for the assassination in July 1989 in
Vienna of Dr. Abdul-Rahman Qassemlou, the Secretary General of the
Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran. Sahraroudi lead the operation in
which he was also wounded. Austrian authorities returned him and his
accomplices to Tehran, however.
Ahamdinejad was the commander of one of the two hit squads, the first
team being led by Sahraroudi himself. He also received the weapons and
ammunition for this operation from the Iranian embassy in Vienna and
gave them to members of both hit-teams.
Ahmadinejad also had extensive contacts with Hossein Sheikh-Attar,
among those involved in the assassination of Shapour Bakhtiar, and
convicted in absentia by a Paris court.
As Tehran’s Mayor, Ahmadinejad played an important role in facilitating
the activities of the terrorist outfit, “Headquarters to Commemorate
the Martyrs of Global Islamic Movement,” that was formed in 1982 and
has in recent months engaged in extensive recruitment in Tehran and
other cities for volunteers for suicide operations against targets
outside Iran, especially in Iraq.
Ahmadinejad served for four years as the governor of the towns of Maku
and Khoy in northwestern Iran. In 1993, he was appointed by Minister of
Islamic Culture and Guidance Ali Larijani, a fellow officer of the
Revolutionary Guards, as his cultural adviser. Months later, he was
appointed as the governor of the newly-created Ardebil Province.
In 2003, Ahmadinejad became the Meyer of Tehran and began using his
position to build up a strong network of radical Islamic
fundamentalists who want to revive the ideals and policies of Ayatollah
Khomeini. Beyond the shallow facade of a "populist" figure, no one
should doubt that the mullahs' Islamic Republic under its new President
will move with greater speed and determination for more human rights
abuses, continuing sponsorship of terrorism, and the drive to obtain
nuclear weapons.
Ahmadinejad’s four and half-month record is as follows:
Human rights:
92 hangings or death sentences.
12,500 arrested in Tehran alone, 64 percent of whom were between 25 to
29 years of age and 55 percent of those were without high school
diplomas.
Four journalists arrested.
Further gender segregation in public premises.
Increasing practice of humiliating street punishments.
Nuclear:
In his speech at the UN General Assembly. Ahmadinejad again insisted on
continuing with the banned nuclear activities and refused to comply
with the requirements of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). On
September 24, the IAEA's Board of governors passed a resolution
censuring the mullahs' non compliance and requiring that Iran should be
referred to the UN Security Council.
The Iranian regime kept its nuclear activities concealed from
international observations for 18 years until it was unveiled by the
National Council of Resistance of Iran based on information provided by
the PMOI's sources inside Iran.
Fundamentalist views:
"We did not have a revolution in order to have democracy".
(Ahmadinejad, United International Press, May 24, 2005)
"A nation which is armed with faith and martyrdom will never experience defeat and submission".
Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, speaking at the Imam Hossein
University in Tehran run by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, 26
September 2005
On Ahmadinejad:
“Ahmadinejad was a founder of the group of young activists who
swarmed over the embassy wall and held the diplomats and embassy
workers hostage for 444 days”.
John Simpson, BBC Journalist
"He was one of the top two or three leaders. The new president of Iran is a terrorist."
Kevin Hermening of Mosinee, Wisconsin, who was a 20-year-old marine
guard when the embassy was seized, said that Ahmadinejad was one of his
interrogators the day of the takeover.
"It (Iran) certainly does sponsor terrorism. There's no doubt about that at all."
Tony Blair speaking at a parliamentary committee
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