LATEST: Support for Detained Opposition Leader Mousavi…From Ayatollah Khomeini’s Great-Grandson

Amid a possible campaign within Iran against the interim nuclear deal, the former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, Fereydoun Abbasi, has denounced the agreement.

Abbasi, who was appointed by President Ahmadinejad in 2011, said Iran had unnecessarily accepted Western conditions to “curb the level of its enrichment upon the request of others”: “A hero is one who will not give concessions and [can] get concession from a powerful rival.”

He declared that suspension of enrichment of 20% uranium would “keep [Iran] from reaching development on schedule and by reliance on indigenous knowledge and technology.”

Abbasi criticized President Rouhani’s “ambiguous and passive” nuclear policies for undermining Iran’s national will, and he called for “spin doctors” in the nuclear talks to be “unmasked”.

Abbasi’s remarks came as 100 of Iran’s 290 MPs tabled a bill commanidng the Government to produce 60% enriched uranium.

Hossein Naqavi Hosseini, a member of Parliament’s National Security Committee, said the 60% uranium is needed “to provide fuel for submarines and other facilities in case the western anti-Iran sanctions are intensified”.

Military-grade uranium is above 90%.


Support for Detained Opposition Leader Mousavi…From Ayatollah Khomeini’s Great-Grandson

Using Instagram, the great-grandson of the late Ayatollah Khomeini has posted support for Mir Hossein Mousavi, the 2009 Presidential candidate who has been under strict house arrest since February 2011 — he is sitting between Mousavi and former President Mohammad Khatami:

Poets Mousavi and Ekhtesari Arrested

The opposition website Kalemeh reports that poets Mehdi Mousavi and Fatemeh Ekhtesari have been arrested by the Revolutionary Guards.

The site said the two have been detained since early December.

In recent weeks, security forces have seized a number of Iranian cyber-activists and underground musicians in what appears to be a crackdown on cultural activities.