@PPkzd

[poyapakzad]

Ashgabat: the city of the living and the city of the dead

The city of the dead “Where are all the people?” – this question often arises when people see photos of the white-marbled capital of Turkmenistan. Indeed, new Ashgabat looks empty. Huge new buildings lined with marble, wide avenues, parks, gardens, fountains are all there, but there are no…

An absolutely fascinating post and photo-blog.

[fuckyeahfortran]

Profile of Noam Chomsky, Horizon magazine, 1971.

[poyapakzad]

Kafka's Tanks: an Early US Attempt to Enter the Gulf Arms Market

Collectively, the member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) form one of the largest and most lucrative markets in the world for the global arms industry. American companies in particular ...

Quote: “When reporting the incident to his seniors, Harold Dickson, the British Political Agent in Kuwait, remarked sardonically that Otto Kafka’s attempt was “not a very edifying procedure when their Government (the U.S.A) is supposed to be taking the leading part in the world today to try and stop war etc.” Dickson’s sentiment – although hypocritical given Britain’s colonial role in the region – feels remarkably familiar today, when the US has grown to become so dominant in the global arms trade that its annual sales, valued at $66bn in 2011, account for around three quarters of all sales globally.“

[garysick]

Iran After the Deal

Iran After the Deal |  What to Do When the JCPOA Expires By Gary G. Sick Any evaluation of the Iranian nuclear deal, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action or JCPOA, must consider three different time periods, each of which is roughly a generation. First, of course is the initial 10–15 year period of the agreement itself, in which extraordinary restrictions will be placed on all of Iran’s nuclear activities: from uranium mines to centrifuge production plants; from the configuration of its nuclear reactors to the operation of its enrichment facilities; and from the size of its uranium stockpile to the level of enrichment—all of this and more will be under the constant supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). It is correct to label these restrictions extraordinary. No other nation in the 47-year history of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) has ever voluntarily agreed to such intrusions into its nuclear activities. It is also correct to praise the complex and interlocking terms of the agreement. One creative element is the “snap back” provision, which permits the re-imposition of sanctions by the United Nations in case of serious breach of the agreement, with no veto right. The agreement also provides a special supervised channel for Iranian trade in peaceful nuclear materials and technical oversight provisions that have never been applied to any other country that is party to the NPT. One of the chief U.S. negotiators repeatedly compared the agreement to a Rubic’s Cube, since every part depends on every other part. As the limits and terms of the agreement came to be better understood, even its harshest critics generally acknowledged that they would dramatically raise the barrier for any Iranian attempt to break out. There were some remaining questions about enforcement mechanisms, such as fears that access to a suspect site could be delayed by up to 24 days or that access to Iranian military sites would be impeded. However, assurances from Yukiya Amano, the director general of the IAEA, and from U.S. Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz, one of the world’s leading nuclear physicists, who was intimately involved in the final negotiations, satisfied most of those concerns. By 2030 and certainly by 2050, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, now approaching age 80, will no longer be Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Similarly, most (if not all) of the leading political and clerical figures in Iran who carried out the 1979 revolution and who have governed Iran ever since, will no longer be politically active.By the end of debate, the key question was less about the operation of the agreement itself and more about what would happen when the extraordinary restrictions were removed after 10–15 years. That is, what would happen during the second generation, beginning in roughly 2030. Trying to look ahead that far, especially in a country such as Iran that is undergoing significant demographic and social changes, is impossible. There are, however, a few things that one can say with some certainty. By 2030 and certainly by 2050, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, now approaching age 80, will no longer be Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Similarly, most (if not all) of the leading political and clerical figures in Iran who carried out the 1979 revolution and who have governed Iran ever since, will no longer be politically active. And the United States could have changed presidents two or even three times. Assuming that the nuclear agreement holds throughout the first generation, moreover, Iran will have experienced years of reduced sanctions, potentially greater engagement in world commerce, and interaction with the international community. That is no guarantee of liberalization, of course, but at least some people believe that this agreement offers the best chance of such an outcome. They may or may not be correct; it is impossible to say where Iran will be in 2030 or 2050—just as it is impossible to predict the future of Saudi Arabia or Syria, Iraq, and ISIS. Many critics of the JCPOA warn that as soon as the agreement and its extraordinary restrictions expire, Iran will make a sudden rush to a bomb. Some opponents of the agreement even go so far as to say that, in fact, the deal, which recognized Iran’s right to peaceful enrichment, ensures that Iran will get the a bomb <http://www.reviewjournal.com/columns-blogs/charles-krauthammer/watch-iran-will-get-the-bomb>. This view overlooks—or simply dismisses—the fact that, as part of the JCPOA, Iran will have ratified the Additional Protocol of the NPT, which means that it will be subject to inspection and oversight by the IAEA in perpetuity. No country that has accepted the Additional Protocol has ever launched a nuclear weapons program. There is a first time for everything, of course, but the best predictor of Iran’s future behavior is its past, specifically the past 15 years or so of our experience with Iran. And that brings us to the final generation worth reviewing. For nearly a quarter of a century, we have heard frequent cries of alarm that Iran would have a nuclear weapon in two years or three years or five years. The warnings have always been wrong.The critique of the agreement with Iran starts with the assumption that Iran is determined to get a nuclear weapon and that the only way it can be stopped is by depriving it of one key part of the nuclear cycle: enrichment. The only way do that, the argument goes, is to sharply increase sanctions, maximize pressure in all forms, and demonstrate a clear willingness to use force if necessary to force Tehran to submit. What the critics fail to mention is that this is precisely the policy that the United States pursued over the decade and a half in which Iran made most progress toward the bomb. After the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in Iraq in 2003, after U.S. President George Bush labeled Iran as part of the “Axis of Evil,” and with U.S. forces encircling Iran in Afghanistan, Iraq, and the Persian Gulf, Iran made an offer that was not dissimilar to the starting point for the present agreement. The 2005 offer included what Iran called “concrete assurances” that Iran would not build a nuclear weapon, but it was far less detailed than the present agreement. The entire U.S. intelligence community later concluded with high certainty that at the time Iran made its move, it had already ceased any work that it might have been doing on nuclear weapons for two years. The offer was developed by Hassan Rouhani, who was then the secretary of the Iranian Supreme National Security Council, and conveyed to the West by Javad Zarif, who was at that time the Iranian ambassador to the United Nations. It insisted that Iran should retain the right to a full nuclear fuel cycle, including enrichment, although Tehran was willing to cap its centrifuges at only a few hundred. The Bush administration refused the offer on the grounds, as I was informed in a New York meeting with U.S. and British officials, that “even one centrifuge turning was one too many.” In subsequent years, the United States used all of its influence to bring maximum international pressure on Iran to cease its nuclear development. Eventually the United States was able to persuade its allies and others to impose sanctions on Iran to force it to cease its enrichment and other aspects of its nuclear program. This process reached its zenith under President Barack Obama, whose administration promoted and managed the most comprehensive array of sanctions ever imposed on any country that had not suffered a military defeat. At the same time, voices in Israel and the United States were calling for direct military action against Iran. While this was happening, Iran steadily ramped up its nuclear capacity. Between 2005 and 2013, Iran increased its number of centrifuges from near zero to approximately 20,000. Its stockpile of enriched uranium increased from zero to more than eight tons, including more than 200 kg (440 pounds) of uranium enriched to nearly 20 percent, which is within easy reach of the 90+ percent required for weapons grade. Under the relentless pressure of sanctions and threats of military attack, Iran became a latent nuclear power, a country that could potentially create enough fissile material for multiple nuclear weapons in less than a year. The dominant narrative in the United States is that U.S. sanctions brought Iran to the negotiating table. But, in private, Iranian negotiators claim that it was their determined drive to develop a nuclear capacity—at great cost—that brought the United States and othersto the table. Both may be correct. Today the authors of Iran’s original offer to the Bush administration are the president and foreign minister of Iran. They have negotiated a historic agreement with the world’s great powers that severely constrains any possibility of an Iranian nuclear weapon but which maintains the principle of Iran’s right to enrichment. Many of their own countrymen question the cost that was paid in the process. For their part, U.S. critics of the agreement must at least address the question of why Iran, when it was very close to having a nuclear weapons capability, chose instead to negotiate and to postpone any drive toward the bomb for at least a generation and probably forever. They should also ask why in 2030, absent a war, Iran would choose to go back to where it was, with far fewer constraints on its behavior in 2013. For nearly a quarter of a century, we have heard frequent cries of alarm that Iran would have a nuclear weapon in two years or three years or five years. The warnings have always been wrong, but by sheer repetition, this mantra has acquired the ring of truth. The terms of the JCPOA and its proper enforcement provide a unique opportunity to break the cycle of defeat.

[poyapakzad]

Quote: “It is perhaps time to step back and indeed ask if there is another way of responding to refugee crises than building fences and ever-strengthening the borders of Fortress Europe. Recent history provides compelling examples. Next year will see the sixtieth anniversary of the Hungarian uprising, and the exodus of approximately 200,000 refugees who fled the Soviet invasion. It was the first refugee movement of Cold War Europe, and the first to be played out after the 1951 Refugee Convention and the creation of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR). Equally significantly, it was the first major crisis to be televised, and people across the world were shocked to see the scenes of fighting in Budapest and of people trudging through the darkness and snow to reach the Austrian border.”

[poyapakzad]

On "Parskahayeren", or the Language of Iranian Armenians

Written by Afsheen Sharifzadeh, a graduate of Tufts University focusing on Iran and the Caucasus. Part of this narrative stems from the author's visits to Armenia and the Tehrani Armenian community...

QUOTE: “The Armenian varieties found in Iran belong to the Eastern subgroup, as do the dialects of Georgia, Nagorno-Karabagh, and Russia. However Parskahayeren is unique within the Eastern group in that it rejected the reformed Abeghian orthographical conventions of Soviet Armenia in 1922, and is thus confederate with its distant Western Armenian cousin in retention of the archaic Mashtotsian orthography originally used to write Classical Armenian (Grabar). Following the Armenian Genocide of 1915, the Western subgroup is now centered in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Israel, Egypt, and abroad, but was once native to the highlands dotting modern-day Turkey.“

[poyapakzad]

MRBlog | The Birmingham Quran and the Palimpsest of History - The Marginalia Review of Books

By Aaron W. Hughes We like nothing more than a really big story about religion. If we are religious, it makes us feel good about ourselves regardless of denomination. If we are not, we wait patiently for the other shoe to drop. The media, always ready to sensationalize, is quick to oblige.

QUOTE: “One can now choose one’s narrative. It would seem that many in the West did not want Muslims to enjoy their five minutes in the spotlight for the full amount of time. The story of the world’s oldest Quran was quickly used against Muslims, as a way to undermine the tradition. But Islam is no more a human affair than any other religion.“

[poyapakzad]

(via SHOWROOM)

[poyapakzad]

"What a difference a day makes." Her er resultatet af tre dages lukning af min Facebook-profil. Jeg har brugt to hele dage på at fixe, rydde og rengøre min lejlighed. Og jeg er stadig godt i gang.

[poyapakzad]

Flygtningedebatten handler om hierarki og privilegier

Aldrig har Højrefløjen været mere ærekær i forhold til at bevare “velfærdsstaten”, end når debatten har handlet om den globale flygtninge- og migrantkrise.

Ville du acceptere mere ulighed?, lyder det retoriske spørgsmål bag et batteri af selektiv og statisk tal-crunching under formodning om, at de progressive aldrig ville ofre velfærd og lighed af humanitære hensyn. Tænk om igen.

Ellers har man ikke tidligere skyet bort fra at kalde venstrefløjens velfærds- og lighedsdiskurs for nutidens ægteste konservatisme. Eftersom Højrefløjens rutinemæssige domesticering af Venstrefløjens begreber er motiveret af hierarki-forplejning, har det alle dage været elastik i metermål.

Diskussionen om bevarelsen af velfærd er heller ikke et detailspørgsmål om kvaliteten og størrelsen af vakuumemballerede madpakker til de ældre ude i kommunerne. Det handler slet ikke om velfærdsordninger, men om noget mere prekært: Det handler om bevarelsen af de bestående sociale hierarkier og privilegier -- eufemistisk kaldet sammenhængskraften. Heraf kommer også rystelsen over den angstfremkaldende “demografiske omvæltning” og afskedssangene til fortidens homogene vished. Nativismens storhedstid falder sammen med arbejderklassens svaghed og selvforagt, middelklassens -- samt i konsekvens heraf Socialdemokratiets -- sving mod borgerskabet. Man vil ikke dele sine ‘hårdtoptjente’ goder med snyltende “ikke-vestlige indvandrere”, og så giver det aldeles god mening for det reaktionære gemyt at appellere til den slagne arbejderklasses ‘sense of entitlement’.

[poyapakzad]

(via The Mike Wallace Interview: Erich Fromm (1958-05-25) - YouTube)

[poyapakzad]

(via To Have or To Be? - Erich Fromm - YouTube)

[poyapakzad]

Being Iranian in the U.S. and Germany

A review of National Narratives and Global Politics: Immigrant and Second-Generation Iranians in the U.S. and Germany, by Sahar Sadeghi. QUOTE:

“In the German context, Sadeghi’s Iranian interviewees all agreed that the national narrative places Germany as a refugee-accepting nation but that it is “not an immigrant-receiving nation” and thus is not an accepting place for foreigners (p. 107). Iranians of both the first and second generations described feeling perpetually foreign in Hamburg, where hard work, cultural accommodation, or other efforts would never provide them full belonging in Germany, a privilege described as being reserved exclusively for ethnic Germans. The closest they can come, she argues, is being marked as a “good foreigner” through appropriating cultural practices as a signal of integration into German society. Thus, Iranians in the United States and Germany both might experience discrimination and a sense of being racialized or marked, and thus both might experience “being without belonging.” The difference, according to Sadeghi, is that in the United States, this experience of being without belonging is contradictory to the national narrative, whereas it forms “an integral aspect” of the German one.

In Chapter 6, Sadeghi examines her Iranian respondents’ perceptions of the impact of global politics related to Iran on their experiences of belonging. She argues that global politics “stigmatizes and politicizes Iranians’ identities” which in turn negatively impacts their sense of belonging in diaspora. Specifically, most of her respondents felt Iran’s reputation in the U.S. and Germany was fueled largely by the media’s exclusive attention to “anti-West sentiments, religious fundamentalism, and a pursuit of nuclear weapons,” all of which lent it a reputation as a “hostile, defiant” country “associated with terrorism” (pp. 128-130). She argues that this reputation has marginalized Iranians, simply by association with Iran, resulting in negative impacts. Among Iranians in both countries, Sadeghi found common experiences among Iranians who felt the need to explain and defend their identities, a need which co-occurred with shame or discomfort, and even exclusion. But while Iranians in Germany associated their troubles with the German national narrative (not favorable to immigrants), Iranians in the United States associated their inability to acquire jobs, resources, or upward mobility with sour Iran-U.S. relations. Thus, her respondents in both countries believed that an improved international standing for Iran would also improve their lives abroad, enabling Iranians in Germany to be viewed more readily as “good immigrants” while Iranians in the U.S. would more easily attain “a neutral ethnic identity” and thus greater social mobility (p. 141). Sadeghi argues that these aims articulated by her interviewees are consistent with each nation’s narrative, demonstrating their impact on understandings of immigrant belonging.” (via Being Iranian in the U.S. and Germany | Dissertation Reviews)

[garysick]

This is as clear a statement of the verification capabilities built into the agreement as you will ever find. If the critics were actually looking at the facts of the matter (as opposed to the politics) this would settle it. Regrettably, Sen. Schumer had access to these facts, directly from the scientists themselves, and then chose to go instead with Netanyahu. And he wants to be called a leader!

[poyapakzad]

Iransk funk fra 70erne (pt. 2)

Hermed del 2 over mine yndlingssange fra den iranske funk- og rockæra fra 60erne og 70erne. (Se også part 1) 6. Nooshafarin: Gheble:

7. Kourosh Yaghmaei: Gole Yakh (Bemærk det episke overskæg)

8. Littles: Mahtab

9. Mehrpooya Abaas: Faryade Shadi (Tænk på Aristocats!)

10. Googoosh: Kie Kie

[poyapakzad]

Iransk funk fra 70erne (pt. 1)

Du ved, hvad du skal...du skal også se part 2  ;)

God fornøjelse.

1. Abbas Mehrpouya: Ghabile Leyli

2. Littles: Fatemah Sultan 

3. Moha Jamin: Ashk-e Roya E Bashkahe

4. Mohammad Nouri: Biya Bar-e Safar Bandim 

5. Googoosh: Nimeye Gomshodeh Man (læg mærke til dansen)

(Husk også at se part 2)

[poyapakzad]

Søndagsopsamling

·         “#‎Kobanê er befriet fra Islamisk Stat.” Deniz B. Serinci på Facebook.

·          “Udtrykket 'moderate muslimer' er en form for ringeagt…” via Facebook. Se også: Nathan Lean, New Republic: Stop Saying “Moderate Muslims.” You're Only Empowering Islamophobes.

·         Hvad er ’terrorisme’? 1, 2.

·         Aaron Bady, The New Inquiry: “Chris Kyle was a drone. The metaphor is apt on so many levels that it isn’t even a metaphor. It’s just a simple description. He was a drone, a machine for killing without conscience. You might even describe him as “un-manned.””

·         Han vendte den nazistiske racelære imod nazisterne selv og reddede på den måde mange iransk-jødiske statsborgere og deres ikke-iranske ægtefæller, venner og kolleger i Paris midt i besættelsestiden. Abdol-Hossein Sardari var iransk konsul i det besatte Paris. Han bliver kaldt 'den iranske Schindler' i ny bog.

·         Lisa Hajjar: "The "war on terror" is not the CIA's first venture into human experimentation. At the dawn of the Cold War, German scientists and doctors with Nazi records of human experimentation were given new identities and brought to the United States under Operation Paperclip. During the Korean War, alarmed by the shocking rapidity of American POWs' breakdowns and indoctrination by their communist captors, the CIA began investing in mind-control research. In 1953, the CIA established the MK-ULTRA program, whose earliest phase involved hypnosis, electroshock and hallucinogenic drugs. The program evolved into experiments in psychological torture that adapted elements of Soviet and Chinese models, including longtime standing, protracted isolation, sleep deprivation and humiliation. Those lessons soon became an applied "science" in the Cold War."

·         “Beyond a fringe, Muslims don’t regard al-Qaeda-ISIS as a legitimate form of resistance to imperialism.On the contrary, many see al-Qaeda-ISIS as the spawn of US–Saudi imperialism. Because it is.”

·         ”Hele denne forestilling om, at det liberale demokrati skulle have sejret er grotesk. Det liberale demokrati er nærmest kollapset.”

·         ” Et målbart skifte har fundet sted i, hvordan danskerne og europæerne i særdeleshed forholder sig til den israelsk-palæstinensiske konflikt.”

·         Ny dokumentar af Adam Curtis! Den hedder Bitter Lake. Se en trailer her. Du kan se den på BBC iPlayer, men hvis du bor udenfor England, skal du downloade tilføjelsesprogrammet Hola først.  

·         Jeremy Harding, London Review of Books: ”Laïcité is central to French Republicanism and – as Hollande said in his speech to the teachers – the Republic has ‘rites’ and ‘symbols’, which it pays to respect. Like any other cult, it requires sacrifices at the altar, among them young women’s headscarves. There will now be new measures to remind pupils of its fundamental place in the culture, including a ‘laïcité day’ in December, on the anniversary of the separation of church and state (in 1905). Another plan is to educate pupils about ‘the media’: after all, they’ll be kept busy on line if they want to deepen their understanding of religion when there’s nothing to engage with in the classroom.”

·         Camille Robcis , Jacobin Magazine: “Race and ethnicity are not recognized in French politics because republicanism assumes that we are all equal before the law, that all particularisms (race, religion, sexual orientation) can and should be abstracted, privatized, and neutralized in the public sphere. Rather than citing Voltaire again and again, the proponents of this republican model should have in fact cited Rousseau. Within this framework, private interests are always suspect and the general will is always universal and always good. It is this abstract universalism that undergirds France’s official policy of intégration.”

·         Arthur Asseraf, Jadaliyya: “France’s colonial history and the hypocritical origins of Republican values cannot explain the current situation. What is colonial here is the analysis rather than the events, the narcisissm that leads to the belief that everything is still about France, the West, and its values, even though many other dynamics are at stake. While recent violence knows no location and no boundaries, focusing on this as an attack on the Republic plays into the hands of the murderers themselves.”

·         Mayanthi Fernando, The Conversation: “French Muslims are also caught in the contradictions of the French model of citizenship. The French state ostensibly recognizes individuals as individuals rather than as members of a community, but it also consistently discriminates against minorities. Because France refuses to recognize communal identities, however, it is difficult to voice claims of discrimination based on communal belonging. For example, because citizens are supposed to forgo particular racial, cultural, and religious attachments in lieu of a French national identity, the state refuses to collect census data about racial or religious belonging. This makes it hard to gauge racial and other disparities in government, higher education, and the workplace. Yet social science research shows that nonwhite immigrants and their descendants as a group suffer systematic discrimination on the basis of their race, culture, and religion.

Indeed, race and religion come together in the term “Muslim,” used to identify a population of North and West African descent whose members a few decades earlier were referred to as immigrants and foreigners, or with terms that marked their ethnicity (e.g. Arabs). Muslim citizens and residents suffer disproportionately high levels of unemployment and face discrimination in the hiring process. CVs with Muslim-sounding names are often rejected on that basis alone, and Muslims are disproportionately imprisoned, due in part to racial profiling and differential treatment in the criminal justice system. Muslim children attend overcrowded, underfunded public schools.” Læs resten her.

·         Ole Sandberg, Modkraft: “En uge efter det terroristiske angreb på ytringsfriheden, rapporterede internationale medier at det franske politi havde anholdt og sigtet mindst 54 mennesker udelukkende for at have ytret sig. Dagen efter var tallet steget til over 100 og det stiger stadig.

Under disse statslige angreb på ytringsfriheden er folk ikke blot blevet fængslet for at give udtryk for sympati med terroristerne, men også for alt fra at poste ironiske kommentarer eller satire-tegninger på Facebook over at komme med dumsmarte bemærkninger i fuld tilstand, til slet og ret at nægte at deltage i politiske manifestationer på sin arbejdsplads. Børn helt ned til 8 år er blevet afhørt af politiet for "terrorstøtte".

Flere af de anholdte er allerede blevet dømt og der er blevet uddelt straffe på op til to års fængsel alene for ytringer. De sigtede vil også blive registreret som potentielle terrorister, hvilket kan indskrænke deres frihedsrettigheder for resten af livet.” Læs resten her.

·         Richard Seymour, Jacobin Magazine: ”Thankfully, all those who were recently beseeching hashtagged international solidarity, and rallying to the defense of free speech, will not have abandoned the fight so soon. They will not let the Ahmeds down. They will spring into action with the swift, passionate alacrity that we have already seen they are capable of. Won’t they?”

·         ”Efter nogle timer gik det op for demonstranterne, hvoraf nogle er erklærede nynazister, at de i virkeligheden havde promoveret immigranternes sag.”

·         Jeg så den her nyhed for et par dage siden, men jeg troede ved første øjekast (på Twitter) at det var satire. Virkeligheden overgår fantasien. Den amerikanske formand for generalstabscheferne, general Martin Dempsey, har udstedt en essay-konkurrence til ære for den afdøde saudiske konge Abdullah Bin Abdul-Aziz. Dempsey deler sit syn på kongen: "I found the king to be a man of remarkable character and courage."

·         Terrorsympatisøren Halfdan Rasmussen:

·         Tidligere vært på Aftenshowet Abdel Aziz Mahmoud tager afstand fra terror: En Muslim Tager Afstand | DR2

·         Satiriker Karl Sharro’s guide til de seneste uroligheder i Yemen:

“As is generally known, Yemenis consume the stimulant drug Qat in huge quantities. What is less known is that Sunnis refer to it is as Qat, while Shias refer to it as Qit. Children of mixed marriages call it Qit-Qat.” The Confused Person's Guide to Understanding Yemen

·         Se også (satire): As a Muslim, I condemn Ebola:

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