Most members just chose to make speeches warning of the dire threat posed by Iran’s nuclear program or criticizing the U.N. Security Council for failing to move fast enough on its own parallel effort to impose new sanctions on the regime of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is apparently being granted a visa to come to New York for the NPT meeting.
The House finally appointed conferees to meld the two already passed versions of the Iran sanctions bill and Congress is not waiting for the Obama administration to finish up with the UN track.
The Senate has already appointed conferees for the Iran sanctions bill, but the House has not. People on the Senate side continue to believe that House Foreign Affairs Chairman Howard Berman, D-CA, is holding up on appointing conferees to stall the conference as a favor to the administration, but Berman’s office denies that.
The Voice of America is becoming the Voice of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Recent programming choices have revealed a creeping bias toward opponents of the pro-democracy movement and de facto supporters of the regime.
By conducting business in Iran, KPMG provides support to the regime which is not wanted by the majority of the Iranian people. This regime must be isolated politically and economically by all democratic minded people. For the Islamic regime, the decision to continue to repress the people and at the same time pursue nuclear weapons to intimidate other countries comes down to a simple cost-benefit analysis.
We at the Progressive American Iranian Committee (PAIC), a human rights organization, gratefully appreciate your effort in introducing resolution to punish Islamic regime’s officials responsible for human rights abuses against freedom and peace loving Iranian people. This letter was sent to Senator John McCain, Senator Joe Lieberman, Senator Robert Casey, Senator Dick Durbin, Senator Carl Levin, Senator Lindsey Graham, Senator John Kerry, Senator David Vitter, Senator Ted Kaufman, Senator Susan Collins, Senator Sam Brownback, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, Senator Evan Bayh, and Senator Jon Kyl.
The General Assembly this afternoon recognized the International Day of Nowruz, a spring festival of Persian origin, and moved back the dates of the next high-level dialogue on Financing for Development, as it continued its sixty-fourth session.
A bipartisan group of Senators, led by Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Joseph Lieberman (I-CT), today announced their intention to introduce legislation that will impose targeted sanctions against members of the Iranian government responsible for human rights abuses.
Given the importance of this session, we, a network of international human rights organizations and civil society groups, will be holding a protest in front of the United Nations offices in Geneva on Monday February 15 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., in order to condemn the systematic violations of human rights in Iran and express solidarity with the democratic movement of our people in Iran.
