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Iran: Taking a giant step backwards

"In the United States, attention has focused on the detention of four Iranian American dual nationals, three of whom have been charged by the government in Tehran with endangering Iran's national security. But according to human rights activists and ordinary Iranians who described the events, the effect of the crackdown has been far more widespread at home.

The first extensive detentions came in April aimed at people wearing clothes deemed not to comply with Islamic strictures. Security forces swarmed streets in Tehran and grabbed people wearing skimpy head scarves, short overcoats or tight shirts. By the end of the month, about 150,000 had been stopped or detained, the chief of the national police said. Most were held only briefly.

Since then, the campaign has widened. Student and union leaders have been arrested, and scholars have been harassed for refusing to sign statements denouncing Israel, human rights groups say. Private banks have come under attack for their interest rates."

So reports the LA Times. One can only speculate where Iran is headed. Either it will be the subject of attack because of its development of nuclear capacity or some sort of internal "explosion" will occur. With such a high percentage of young people in the country it is hard to imagine that they will tolerate whatever freedoms they enjoy being taken away from them. In all of this if the UN does impose sanctions [probably economic] the country and its people will suffer no what clamp-down there is on so-called dissent.

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