• Confiscation of 32,000 satellite dishes in the Hamadan Province

In spite of mullah Rouhani’s empty gestures in New York and his preposterous words, the medieval regime of the mullahs, fearing angry and disaffected people, tries desperately to shut down all means of people’s free access to information.
In one case, the mullahs’ intelligence news agency known as Mehr, reported on October 8 about confiscation of 32,000 satellite dishes in the Hamadan Province in the first half of the Persian year (until September 22). Describing this suppressive measure, the commander of regime’s police in Hamadan Province said: “The satellite causes the youth to prematurely become adults.” He described the police force as “the frontline in the soft war” and said: “the police force first issues a warning, then it obtains a written commitment, and then in case of refusal, it firmly acts.”
Additionally, on September 28, the IRGC announced in the city of Shiraz that 800 antennas and receivers of satellite channels were “symbolically” run over by armored personnel vehicles and roller trucks as a “value action for confronting the cultural aggression by enemies of the revolution and the system” in presence of “the officials of the province and the city of Shiraz.” Concurrent with this “value action” in Shiraz, mullah Rouhani at the Council of Foreign Relations in New York said: “In Iran, everyone has easy access to satellite networks, even on the rooftops of houses in every village you see satellite dishes.”
Meanwhile, Mahmoud Vaezi, Rouhani’s Minister of Telecommunications, rejected legality of using Facebook and Twitter and said that the plan was not to unblock Facebook and Twitter. [Agence France Presse, October 7]
Despite all the suppressive measures, regime’s officials of all ranks continually express their fear by referring to “about 60% of Tehran’s residents use satellites”, “99% increase in discovery of satellite equipment”, and “doubling of people’s use of satellites.”

Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran
October 9, 2013