UK Shows it's "Support" For the People of Iran.

In a written statement to the House of Commons made yesterday, June 18th, Her Majesties Treasury confirmed that it had seized a total of US$1.6bn of Iranian assets. Although un-redacted the statement which can be read here http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wms/?id=2009-06-18a.22WS.0 is as vague as it is short so it is impossible to tell exactly which round of sanctions against Iran the assets were seized under. Either way I don't see the economic situation in Iran improving anytime soon.

As for the Iranian election itself the Guardian Council revealed that it has received 646 separate allegations of voting irregularities. While the announcement didn't go detail the exact nature of the allegations it did break them down into five separate categories ranging from the minor such as party officials being refused entry to polling stations (a standard practice in UK elections) to more serious allegations of buying votes by directly bribing voters. Of course these will all have to be investigated thoroughly and be seen to be investigated but to put that figure in perspective there were around 1000 alleged irregularities in Florida alone during the 2000 US election and there were 252 allegations of fraud in the UK's 2005 General Election. If I was feeling especially pedantic I could report 4 separate voting irregularities I witnessed at a single polling station in June's European election.

In a statement in Knesset Meir Dagan, the head of Mossad, Israel's foreign intelligence agency announced that he expects the Iranian protests to burn themselves out over the next couple of days and declared that Israel would prefer it if Ahmadinejad continued as Iran's president. As you would expect from a statement from the head of an intelligence agency this can be interpreted in a number of ways. At first it could be seen as an attempt by Israel to distance itself from the protests by diffusing the situation. It could also be seen as an attempt to further inflame the situation by challenging the protesters to keep the protests going for as long as possible while boosting Mousavi's popularity by portraying him as more anti-Israeli then Ahmadinejad. Read alongside Israeli Foreign Minister, Avigdor Lieberman's statement that Israel will have a problem with Iran regardless of who is president I take the statement to mean that Israel wants the Iranian protests to go on for as long as possible.

In his first public appearance since the election Iran's Supreme Leader endorsed Ahmadinejad as the properly elected president and called for the protest to end decrying them as the work of foreign provocateurs, specifically the British. A fairly accurate statement it has to be said. The British media are interpreting this as an indication that Iran is about to violently put down the protests. Although such a violent solution may become necessary I think it's mainly wishful thinking on Britain's part because if the primary objective of bringing down Iran's Supreme Leader fails MI6's secondary objective is to provoke a violent response from the Iranian authorities in order to increase sectarian divisions and bring about long term unrest in the country.

And on a much more important issue do you think F1 supremo Max Mosley has realised yet that continous and ridiculous rule changes are ruining the sport?