Singaporeans are urged to Watch Iranian Post Election Struggle

[uncleyap]

http://uncleyap-news.blogspot.com/2009/06/singaporeans-are-urged-to-watch-iranian.html


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Singaporeans are urged to Watch Iranian Post Election Struggle









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3 Iranian presidential candidates and supporters had claimed Massive Election Frauds and defy clampdown in continued protests. Iranians of the current generation had probably not done this before. Their fathers probably had taken part in Anti-American protest and taking of US Embassy during the Jimmy Carter era. They are struggling against authoritarian / totalitarian regime alike the famiLEE LEEgime although they are of different background.

Without taking support on either side, this is still a struggle that offers experience and lessons to people of the world, especially Asians to watch and learn. In the scenario of Iran, election irregularities can be expected, as the infrastructure of government & election commission are closely coupled with the presidential incumbent the biasness can come either voluntary or unintentionally, just like in any long ruling regime the independence of civil servants and bodies of enforcements are expected to be skewed towards the incumbent ruler.

It is a valuable learning opportunity for Singaporeans, hence I urge Singaporeans to watch closely on the developments in Iran.

Huge pro-reform rally defies crackdown threats


<cite class="vcard"> By ANNA JOHNSON and ALI AKBAR DAREINI, Associated Press Writers Anna Johnson And Ali Akbar Dareini, Associated Press Writers </cite> – <abbr title="2009-06-15T08:19:02-0700" class="recenttimedate">23 mins ago

</abbr>
<!-- end .byline --> TEHRAN, Iran – More than 100,000 opponents of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad have defied an Interior Ministry ban and were streaming into central Tehran to cheer their pro-reform leader in his first public appearance since disputed elections he claims were marred by fraud. Security forces are watching quietly, with shields and batons at their sides.


Monday's outpouring for reformist leader Mir Hossein Mousavi — swelling as more poured from buildings and side streets wearing the trademark green of his campaign — followed a decision by Iran's most powerful figure for an investigation into the vote rigging allegations.


THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.


TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Tens of thousands of supporters of pro-reform leader Mir Hossein Mousavi are streaming through the center of Tehran in a boisterous protest against election results that declared President Mamoud Ahmadinejad the winner.


The crowd — many wearing the trademark green color of Mousavi's campaign — was headed toward the capital's huge Freedom Square in the largest display of opposition unity since Friday's elections ended with Mousavi claiming widespread fraud.


There was no sign of violence or challenges from security forces. Anti-riot stood by with their helmets off and shields at their sides. '


The march Monday came hours of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, ordering an examination into Mousavi's claims of vote rigging. But it was unclear how the investigation will proceed.



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Sammyboy.Com Thread








posted by uncleyap at 11:41 PM






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[uncleyap]

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/18/20090615/tpl-one-protestor-shot-dead-at-tehran-ra-b04fc5e.html

One protestor shot dead at Tehran rally: local photographer

22 mins ago
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Iranian supporters of defeated presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi march in Tehran Enlarge photo


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• Protestors and police clash at Tehran rally: AFP
• Defiant Iran opposition stages rally amid world outcry
• Defiant Iran opposition stages rally
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Have your say: Iran



One protestor was shot dead and several were wounded during a Tehran rally on Monday attended by hundreds of thousands of people demonstrating against the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a local Iranian photographer told AFP.

 

[Alu862]

It only shows that democratic elections still don't lead to peace.

Also shows how much a loser CSJ is. Even Iranian opposition can ignite the people.

 

[Leongsam]

http://uncleyap-news.blogspot.com/2009/06/singaporeans-are-urged-to-watch-iranian.html
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That's all they're ever going to do..... WATCH.

If you expect any ACTION out of sinkies, you're going to have to wait a long long time.... a few more generations perhaps. :p

 

[uncleyap]

This shows that elections can be cheated without GRC system. That is why famiLEE LEEgime can reduce their Notorious GRCs.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/ml_iran_...lYwN5bl90b3Bfc3RvcnkEc2xrA3NwZWVkb2ZpcmFudg--

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Speed of Iran vote count called suspicious


<!-- end .related-media --> <cite class="vcard"> By JASON KEYSER, Associated Press Writer Jason Keyser, Associated Press Writer </cite> – <abbr title="2009-06-15T18:35:57-0700" class="recenttimedate">7 mins ago

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<!-- end .byline --> CAIRO – How do you count almost 40 million handwritten paper ballots in a matter of hours and declare a winner? That's a key question in Iran's disputed presidential election. International polling experts and Iran analysts said the speed of the vote count, coupled with a lack of detailed election data normally released by officials, was fueling suspicion around President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's landslide victory.


Iran's supreme leader endorsed the hard-line president's re-election the morning after Friday's vote, calling it a "divine assessment" and appearing to close the door on challenges from Iran's reformist camp. But on Monday, after two days of rioting in the streets, he ordered an investigation into the allegations of fraud.


Mir Hossein Mousavi, Ahmadinejad's reformist challenger, claims he was robbed of the presidency and has called for the results to be canceled.
Mousavi's newspaper, Kalemeh Sabz, or the Green Word, reported on its Web site that more than 10 million votes were missing national identification numbers similar to U.S. Social Security numbers, which make the votes "untraceable." It did not say how it knew that information.


Mousavi said some polling stations closed early with voters still in line, and he charged that representatives of his campaign were expelled from polling centers even though each candidate was allowed one observer at each location. He has not provided evidence to support the accusations.


His supporters have reported intimidation by security forces who maintained a strong presence around polling stations.


Observers who questioned the vote said that at each stage of the counting, results released by the Interior Ministry showed Ahmadinejad ahead of Mousavi by about a 2-1 margin.


That could be unusual, polling experts noted, because results reported first from Iran's cities would likely reflect a different ratio from those reported later from the countryside, where the populist Ahmadinejad has more support among the poor.


Mousavi said the results also may have been affected by a shortage of ballot papers in the provinces of Fars and East Azerbaijan, where he had been expected to do well because he is among the country's Azeri minority. He said the shortage was despite the fact that officials had 17 million extra ballots ready.


Interior Ministry results show that Ahmadinejad won in East Azerbaijan.


The final tally was 62.6 percent of the vote for Ahmadinejad and 33.75 for Mousavi — a landslide victory in a race that was perceived to be much closer. Such a huge margin also went against the expectation that a high turnout — a record 85 percent of Iran's 46.2 million eligible voters — would boost Mousavi, whose campaign energized young people to vote. About a third of the eligible voters were under 30.


Ahmadinejad, who has significant support among the poor and in the countryside, said Sunday that the vote was "real and free" and insisted the results were fair and legitimate.


"Personally, I think that it is entirely possible that Ahmadinejad received more than 50 percent of the vote," said Konstantin Kosten, an expert on Iran with the Berlin-based German Council of Foreign Relations who spent a year from 2005-06 in Iran.


Still, he said, "there must be an examination of the allegations of irregularities, as the German government has called for."


But Iran's electoral system lacks the transparency needed to ensure a fair election, observers said. International monitors are barred from observing Iranian elections and there are no clear mechanisms to accredit domestic observers, said Michael Meyer-Resende, coordinator of the Berlin-based Democracy Reporting International, which tracked developments in the Iranian vote from outside the country.


He noted that the election was organized and overseen by two institutions that are not independent, the government's Interior Ministry and the Guardian Council, a 12-member body made up of clerics and experts in Islamic law who are closely allied to the supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.


Meyer-Resende said that to be sure of the results announced by the Interior Ministry, it must release data all the way down to the level of each polling station.


One of the central questions was how 39.2 million paper ballots could be counted by hand and final results announced by authorities in Tehran in just over 12 hours. Past elections took at least twice as long.


A new computerized system might have helped speed the process in urban centers, where most Iranians live, though it is unclear if that system was extended to every small town and village. And each ballot — on which a candidate's name was written in — would still have to be counted by hand before any data could be entered into a computer, aggregated and transmitted to the Interior Ministry in Tehran.



"I wouldn't say it's completely impossible," Meyer-Resende said. "In the case of Iran, of course, you wonder with logistical challenges whether they could do it so fast."



Susan Hyde, an assistant political science professor at Yale University who has taken part in election monitoring missions in developing countries for the Carter Center, agreed that would be uncharacteristically fast.



"If they're still using hand counting, that would be very speedy, unusually speedy," she said.



The Interior Ministry released results from a first batch of 5 million votes just an hour and a half after polling stations closed.
Over the next four hours, it released vote totals almost hourly in huge chunks of about 5 million votes — plowing through more than half of all ballots cast.



Arshin Adib-Moghaddam, a professor of Middle East politics at the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies, said a major rigging process would require the involvement of powerful advisory bodies, including those in which one of the other candidates and a key Mousavi backer are prominent figures.



"Given that Mohsen Rezaei, one of the other presidential candidates, is the head of the powerful Expediency Council, for instance, it is highly unlikely that he wouldn't have received any information of such a strategic plan to hijack the election," Adib-Moghaddam said.

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[uncleyap]

That's all they're ever going to do..... WATCH.

If you expect any ACTION out of sinkies, you're going to have to wait a long long time.... a few more generations perhaps. :p

In KL mata had to fire tear gas to disperse Iranian protesters at embassy. LKy old dog thief might had smelled the tear gas there.

However those are Iranians, and not Malaysian.

For Singaporeans if they paid sufficient attention and learn and then commented, that is good enough for the time being.

 

[uncleyap]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090616...lYwN5bl90b3Bfc3RvcnkEc2xrA3N0YXRlcmFkaW83aw--

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State radio: 7 killed in Tehran clashes

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Play Video <cite class="caption"> Reuters – Tens of thousands in Iran protest </cite>

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• Slideshow:Iran Election
• Play Video Video:Bloodshed at huge rally in Tehran <cite>BBC</cite>
• Play Video Video:Man shot dead in Iran protests <cite>Australia 7 News</cite>

<!-- end .primary-media --> <cite class="caption">AP – Some hundreds of thousands of supporters of leading opposition presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, …</cite>

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<!-- end .related-media --> <abbr title="2009-06-15T22:00:07-0700" class="recenttimedate">1 hr 19 mins ago</abbr>
<!-- end .byline --> TEHRAN, Iran – Iran's state radio says seven people died in clashes in Tehran after an "unauthorized gathering" following a mass rally over alleged election fraud.


The radio report says the seven died in shooting that erupted after several people at the gathering Monday night in western Tehran "tried to attack a military location."


More than 100,000 opponents of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had marched through Tehran earlier Monday protesting alleged vote rigging in last week's elections.


The report Tuesday gave no details. It was the first official confirmation of the shooting in Tehran's Azadi Square. Witnesses there saw at least one person shot dead and several others seriously wounded after shooting from a compound for volunteer militia linked to Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guard.

 

[uncleyap]

The scenario in Iran is somewhat close to Thug-Sin's scenario, that both sides have supporters, and like Thug-Sin, Ahmadinejad's supporters are lesser then his opponents and are poorer peasants from more remote areas of the country. However where it differs with Thailand, DAP of Thailand did not specifically want to install any particular PM, they just want to see Thug-Sin down, whereas in Iran the massive supporters want to install a particular reformist Maousavi.

Similar with Thailand, the Iranian unrest result from rejection of poll results. In Iran a poll fraud is claimed but in Thailand, there wasn't such claim, the DAP camp just want to oust Thug-Sin or any of his proxy.

Similar with Thailand, it turned up to be confilict between two camps of activive supporters and none is going to back down.
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Thousands rally to support government in Tehran


<!-- end .primary-media --> <cite class="caption">AP – In this photo taken May 16, 2009, reformist Mahdi Karroubi, left, and Iran's reformist former vice president, …</cite>

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<!-- end .related-media --> <cite class="vcard"> By ALI AKBAR DAREINI and NASSER KARIMI, Associated Press Writers Ali Akbar Dareini And Nasser Karimi, Associated Press Writers </cite> – <abbr title="2009-06-16T08:18:24-0700" class="recenttimedate">1 hr 2 mins ago</abbr>
<!-- end .byline --> TEHRAN, Iran – Thousands of people waving Iranian flags and pictures of the supreme leader massed Tuesday at a rally organized by Iran's clerical regime in an apparent attempt to reclaim the streets hours after saying it would recount disputed presidential ballots.
The government barred foreign media from covering the rally in north-central Tehran, where government officials urged the crowd not to let the election divide the nation and said the unrest would not threaten Iran's Islamic system.
The clerical government appears to be attempting to defuse popular anger and quash unrest by announcing the limited recount even as it cracks down on foreign media and shows its strength by calling supporters to the streets.
"This nation will protect and defend its revolution in any way," Gholam Ali Haddad Adel, a prominent lawmaker and Ahmadinejad supporter, said as the crowd in Vali Asr square pumped their fists in the air and cheered in support, images on state-run television showed.
Iranian state media said the government organized the rally to demand punishment for those who protested violently after a larger demonstration Monday by hundreds of thousands of supporters of reformist challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi, the pro-reform candidate who has said he won Friday's election. Mousavi has demanded the government annul President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's victory and conduct a new election.
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Monday that the government would conduct an investigation into the election. The move seemed intended to calm protester anger but was followed by a rally of hundreds of thousands of people that presented one of the greatest challenges to Iran's government since it took power in the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Iran's state radio said seven people were killed in clashes from that protest — the first official confirmation of deaths linked to the street battles following the disputed election.
Witnesses saw people firing from the roof of a building used by a state-backed militia after some Mousavi supporters set fire to the building and tried to storm it.
Mousavi supporters had called for demonstrations Tuesday but Mousavi said in a message in his Web site he would not be attending any rally and asked his supporters to "not fall in the trap of street riots" and "exercise self-restraint."
Ahmadinejad traveled to Russia Tuesday after delaying a trip for a day but did not mention the Iranian election or unrest. Instead, he focused on the traditional target of the Islamic Republic's ire, the United States.
"America is enveloped in economic and political crises, and there is no hope for their resolution," he said through an interpreter. "Allies of the United States are not capable of easing these crises."
An Iranian state radio announcement Tuesday that seven people were killed in Monday's protests was the first confirmation of deaths linked to the three days of violent demonstrations that started Saturday after the election results were announced. It said people were killed during an "unauthorized gathering" at a mass rally after protesters "tried to attack a military location."
"Those who voted for Mr. Mousavi. Those who are creating unrest. Those who break glass, smash windows, and vandalize. Those who threaten people. It is not the right thing to defend these people," said Adel, a former parliament speaker.
Foreign reporters in Iran to cover last week's elections began leaving the country Tuesday after Iranian officials said they would not extend their visas.
Authorities restricted other journalists, including Iranians working for foreign media from reporting on the streets, and said they could only work from their offices, conducting telephone interviews and monitoring official sources such as state television.
The rules prevent media outlets, including The Associated Press, from sending independent photos or video of street protests or rallies.
Khamenei ordered the Guardian Council, an unelected body composed of 12 clerics and experts in Islamic law closely allied to the supreme leader, to investigate the election results after he met with Mousavi on Sunday. Mousavi also sent a letter to the supreme leader outlining his allegations.
A spokesman for the Guardian Council, Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei, was quoted on state television as saying the recount would be limited to voting sites where candidates claim irregularities took place. He did not rule out the possibility of canceling the results, saying that is within the council's powers, although nullifying an election would be an unprecedented step.
Mousavi said Monday he was not hopeful that the council would address his charges because he believes they are not neutral and have already indicated support for Ahmadinejad.
Unlike past student-led demonstrations against the Islamic establishment, Mousavi has the ability to press his case with the highest levels and could gain powerful allies. Some influential clerics have expressed concern about possible election irregularities and a fierce critic of Khamenei, former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, is part of the ruling establishment.


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[Alu862]

It also shows how stupid Americans were in 2000. Why didn't they take to the streets to demand re count so that Al Gore could have been the winner?

 

[uncleyap]

Sounds like anti-Thug-Sin protests and crack down years ago repeating in Iran. Sounds like Myanmar cracking down against marching monks again also.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/ml_iran_...lYwN5bl90b3Bfc3RvcnkEc2xrA2lyYW5zdG9wbGVhZA--

Iran's top leader warns of protest crackdown

<!-- end .related-media --> <cite class="vcard"> By ALI AKBAR DAREINI and NASSER KARIMI, Associated Press Writers Ali Akbar Dareini And Nasser Karimi, Associated Press Writers </cite> – <abbr title="2009-06-19T10:11:28-0700" class="recenttimedate">22 mins ago</abbr>
<!-- end .byline --> TEHRAN, Iran – Iran's supreme leader sternly warned Friday of a crackdown if protesters continue their massive street rallies, escalating the government's showdown with demonstrators demanding a new presidential election.
In his first response to a week of protests of the disputed election, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said opposition leaders "will be held accountable for all the violence, bloodshed and rioting" if they do not halt the rallies.
Khamenei also said the balloting had not been rigged, and he sided with hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, offering no concessions to the opposition. He effectively ruled out any chance for a new vote, lauding the June 12 election as an expression of the people's will.
"Some of our enemies in different parts of the world intended to depict this absolute victory, this definitive victory, as a doubtful victory," Khamenei said at a Friday prayer service at Tehran University attended by tens of thousands of people. "It is your victory. They cannot manipulate it."
The speech created a stark choice for candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi and his supporters: Drop their demands for a new vote or take to the streets again in blatant defiance of the man endowed with virtually limitless powers under Iran's constitution.
Pro-Mousavi Web sites had no immediate reaction to Khamenei's warning. They did not announce changes in plans for a march at 4 p.m. Saturday from Revolution Square to Freedom Square, site of a massive rally Monday that ended with fatal clashes between protesters and a pro-government militia.
"We are all feel a little angry, worried and disappointed after the speech," said one Mousavi supporter, responding by e-mail to The Associated Press.
"We are waiting for Mousavi's reaction. He is our hope to protect our votes," added the Tehran resident, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of government retaliation.
Monday's demonstration was followed by three consecutive days of protest that have posed the greatest challenge to Iran's Islamic ruling system since the 1979 Islamic Revolution that brought it to power.
So far, the government has not stopped the protests with force despite an official ban on them. But Khamenei opened the door for harsher measures.
"It must be determined at the ballot box what the people want and what they don't want, not in the streets," he said. "I call on all to put an end to this method."
And Khamenei added, according to Press TV, Iranian state television's English-language channel: "Extremism in the country, any extremist move, will fan another extremist move. If the political elite want to ignore the law or break the law then they are taking wrong measures, which are harmful, and they will be held accountable for all the violence, bloodshed and rioting."
He accused foreign media and Western countries of trying to create a political rift and stir up chaos in Iran. Iranian leaders often blame foreign "enemies" for plots against the country, but Khamenei's comments suggest Iran could remain cool to expanding dialogue with the West and the offer of opening talks with Washington.
The House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly Friday to condemn Tehran's crackdown on demonstrators and the government's interference with Internet and cell phone communications.
The resolution was the strongest message yet to Iran from the U.S. government and was initiated by Republicans as a veiled criticism of President Barack Obama, who has taken a cautious line on the election dispute, expressing sympathy with protesters but avoiding condemnation of the Islamic government.
He said Tuesday that opposition to Ahmadinejad represented "a questioning of the kinds of antagonistic postures towards the international community that have taken place in the past, and that there are people who want to see greater openness and greater debate and want to see greater democracy."
Khamenei reacted strongly, saying Obama's statements contradicted the president's stated goal of opening dialogue with Iran and the conciliatory tone of other recent American messages.
"The U.S. president said 'We were waiting for a day like this to see people on the street,'" Khamenei said. "They write to us and say they respect the Islamic Republic and then they make comments like this. ... Which one should we believe?
Khamenei remained staunch in his defense of Ahmadinejad, saying his views were closer to the president's than to those of former President Hashemi Rafsanjani, a powerful patron of Mousavi.
Ahmadinejad watched the sermon from the front row and conservative candidate Mohsen Rezaei could be seen in the audience.
State television did not show Mousavi in the crowd of thousands, which spilled out of the open-sided campus pavilion and filled surrounding streets.
Iran's Arabic-language state TV channel said before the service that Mousavi, Rezaei and reformist candidate Mahdi Karroubi would attend. Karroubi confirmed that but it was not clear from broadcasts of the sermon if he or Rafsanjani were in fact there.
Khamenei said the 11 million votes that separated Ahmadinejad from his top opponent, Mousavi, were proof that fraud did not occur.
"If the difference was 100,000 or 500,000 or 1 million, well, one may say fraud could have happened. But how can one rig 11 million votes?" Khamenei asked.
Khamenei said Iran would not see a second revolution like those that transformed the countries of the former Soviet Union and pointed a finger at the U.S., Britain and what he called Iran's other enemies.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and other European Union leaders expressed dismay over the threat of a crackdown. The British Foreign Office told Iran's charge d'affairs in London that Khamenei's comments were "unacceptable and had no basis in fact," a spokesman said on condition of anonymity in line with policy.
The Foreign Office summoned the Iranian ambassador but said that in the end, the more junior diplomat attended the meeting with political director Mark Lyall Grant.
In Switzerland, Iranian Nobel Peace laureate Shirin Ebadi said Iran should hold a new election observed by international monitors, adding that more than 500 people have been arrested since the balloting. Her human rights office in Iran was raided last year, its files confiscated and several members subsequently arrested.
Khamenei's address was his first since hundreds of thousands of Mousavi supporters flooded the streets, evoking the revolution that ended Iran's U.S.-backed monarchy. On Thursday, supporters dressed in black and green marched in downtown Tehran in a somber, candlelit show of mourning for those killed in clashes since the election.
Khamenei said the street protests would not have any impact.
"Some may imagine that street action will create political leverage against the system and force the authorities to give in to threats. No, this is wrong," he said.
The supreme leader left open a small window for a legal challenge to the vote. He reiterated that he has ordered the Guardian Council, an unelected body of 12 clerics and Islamic law experts close to the supreme leader, to investigate voter fraud claims.
The council has said it was prepared to conduct a limited recount of ballots at sites where candidates claim irregularities.
Ahmadinejad has appeared to take the growing opposition more seriously in recent days, backtracking Thursday on his dismissal of the protesters as "dust" and sore losers.
The crowds in Tehran and elsewhere have been able to organize despite a government clampdown on the Internet and cell phones. The government has blocked certain Web sites, such as BBC Farsi, Facebook, Twitter and several pro-Mousavi sites that are vital conduits for Iranians to tell the world about protests and violence.
Text messaging, a primary source of spreading information in Tehran, has not been working since last week, and cell phone service in Tehran is frequently down. The government also has barred foreign news organizations from reporting on Tehran's streets.
The BBC said it was employing two new satellites to help circumvent Iranian jamming of its Persian-language service.
Google said it was launching a Persian-to-English translation service and Facebook said Iranian users could now use a Persian version of its site as a way of easing communication to the outside world.
___
Associated Press writer Michael Weissenstein in Cairo, Anne Flaherty in Washington and Raphael G. Satter in London contributed to this report.