Michael de Laine

By Michael de Laine, The Copenhagen Voice, 4 November 2009

“We don’t have bread, we don’t have water - what do we want atoms for?”

According to Mohsen Makhmalbaf, that is what the Iranians are saying about their country’s attempts to enrich uranium for power generation (or nuclear weapons, depending on who you believe). And the comments are symptomatic of the popular dissatisfaction with the regime in Iran after the controversial re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as president earlier this year.

Makhmalbaf, prize-winning film director, author and editor, was the spokesman for Mir-Hossein Moussavi, the reform politician who also stood as presidential candidate, and for the Green Movement.

Addressing a meeting on Monday, arranged by the Politiken newspaper, Makhmalbaf said the opposition Green Movement has the support of about 40 million of Iran’s 70 million citizens, the young, the middle class and the educated.

“All those who want change support the Green Movement,” he claimed.

The poorly educated support Ahmadinejad in the hope that the president will introduce changes that will benefit them, while the Revolutionary Guard supports the president to ensure that their grip on the largest part of the nation’s economy remains intact.

The Green Movement was started shortly after the presidential election, when protesters demanded removal of Ahmadinejad from office. Green was originally the symbol of Moussavi’s campaign, but after the election it became a symbol of unity and hope for the protesters.

Although the Iranian government prohibited any gatherings of protesters in Tehran and across the country, significantly slowed down internet access and censored any form of media supporting the opposition, hundreds of thousands of Iranians marched in defiance. Many were arrested, and several were killed by the police and militia forces Basij.

“The government has used everything in its arsenal of weapons to suppress the Green Movement, but has failed,” added another speaker, Hossein Bagherzadeh, a human rights activist.

Bagherzadeh’s concern about how the demonstrations planned for today would develop was well placed. The demonstrations mark the 30th anniversary of occupation of the US embassy in Teheran by conservative Iranian students, but also support the Green Movement.

Reports indicate that police have used tear-gas, and possibly arms, against the demonstrators, while the Basij militia have reportedly changed into civilian clothing to infiltrate the demonstrations and arrest demonstrators.

The meeting’s third speaker, journalist Alireza Nurizadeh, the director of the Centre for Arab and Iranian Studies in London, said the Green Movement represents “civilised opposition to the Iranian regime”.

He cast doubt on the legitimacy of Ahmadinejad as president: “Ahmadinejad is only in power because of Khameini and the Revolutionary Guards.”