Iran Detains Another Iranian-American

Urban Planner, A U.S. Citizen, Believed Held Since May 11th

(AP)  Iran has detained an Iranian-American consultant working for George Soros' Open Society Institute, the latest U.S. citizen connected to a non-governmental organization to be seized in the country, the institute said Wednesday.

The detention of Kian Tajbakhsh comes amid a crackdown on NGOs at a time when Iranian authorities accuse the United States of using critics and dissidents to overthrow the country's hard-line government.

Tajbakhsh, an urban planning consultant who has also worked for the World Bank, was detained on or about May 11, the Open Society Institute — a private foundation that encourages democracy-building — said in a statement.

"We are concerned for his safety and call for his immediate release," the statement said, adding that the 45-year-old Tajbakhsh has worked as a consultant for the institute since 2004 "with the knowledge of the Iranian government."

Iranian officials could not be reached to comment on the detention.

Earlier this month, Iranian authorities earlier this month arrested Haleh Esfandiari, director of the Middle East Program at the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson Center for Scholars. Esfandiari, also an Iranian-American, was charged Monday with setting up a network to overthrow the Islamic establishment, the government announced.

The Wilson Center denied the charges. "Haleh is a scholar and has never been a spy," said Lee H. Hamilton, the center's president and director. Esfandiari's work had involved bringing Iranian scholars and others to the U.S. to give talks on the situation in Iran.

The detentions come as tensions have mounted between the United States and Iran, even as the two countries prepare to hold ambassador-level talks in Baghdad on calming Iraq's violence.

The United States accuses Iran of backing militants in Iraq and of seeking to build nuclear weapons, accusations that Tehran denies. U.S. Navy ships with 17,000 sailors and Marines moved into the Persian Gulf on Wednesday for air training exercises in a show of military force off Iran's coast.

Esfandiari had been in Iran visiting her ailing 93-year-old mother but was prevented from leaving in December, when her passport was stolen. She was interrogated repeatedly before her eventual arrest and has since been held at Iran's notorious Evin prison, where dissidents are often held.

When it announced the charges against Esfandiari, the Iranian Intelligence Ministry accused Soros' New York-based Open Society Institute of being involved in the plot to set up the network to overthrow the government.

The institute said Wednesday that Tajbakhsh had been consulting "to facilitate public health, humanitarian assistance and urban planning projects that we undertook openly and with the knowledge of the Iranian government." He is also a senior research fellow at the New School in New York City, it said.

Another Iranian-American, journalist Parnaz Azima, who works for the U.S.-funded Radio Farda, has been prohibited from leaving Iran since her passport was seized in January. She has been interrogated several times by intelligence agents since, the journalists rights group Reporters Without Borders said in a statement Wednesday.

Another American, former FBI agent Robert Levinson, disappeared in March after going to Iran's resort island of Kish, and his whereabouts are unknown.

Reporters Without Borders said a French-Iranian journalism student, Mehrnoushe Solouki, was arrested in February. She was released in March on bail but her passport was taken away and she has been unable to leave the country, it said.

[bluestardad]

Leave Iran alone. If you dont start anything there wont be anything! We are holding 5 of their people too! BUSH IS TRYING TO GET US INTO ANOTHER WAR PUSHED BY AIPAC AND ISRAEL!

[grazinggoat]

Tajbakhsh, an urban planning consultant who has also worked for the World Bank, was detained on or about May 11, the Open Society Institute %u2014 a private foundation that encourages democracy-building %u2014 said in a statement

-Read a consultant in Governement Toppling for the undercover CIA Institute Inc/ Open Society Institute.

[randalds]

When I read the headline I was hoping against hope that the citizen they'd grabbed was George W. Bush. Imagine my disappointment when I checked out the story and saw it wasn't him. (sigh) Oh well, maybe someday my dreams will come true. One can hope.

[xzavierbrown]

RandalDS..its pretty much comfirmed that YOU REALLY DONT GIVE A RAT'S ARSE about but your hatred for BUSH. it defines the whole liberal rant.

[whoopeedoo]

RandalBS just likes to foam at the mouth and expose his anti-Americanism for all of us to read. A pissant. A guy who claims a military record yet disses the troops at every opportunity and urges appeasement of Islamofascism.

A sorry clown who Soros probably sends a check to - maybe he should send Randy to Iran too - incarceration with Ahmedinejedad's benevolent boys might make the pissant beg for Bush.

[radiob-2009]

RandalBS just likes to foam at the mouth and expose his anti-Americanism for all of us to read. A pissant. A guy who claims a military record yet disses the troops at every opportunity and urges appeasement of Islamofascism.

A sorry clown who Soros probably sends a check to - maybe he should send Randy to Iran too - incarceration with Ahmedinejedad's benevolent boys might make the pissant beg for Bush.
Posted by whoopeedoo



I have read Randals post, I have never read him trash the troops. Bush yes the troops no, they are not the same.Soros you should really read up on as Soros has made more money off of the Bush presidency than he did off of the Clinton presidency. Soros may appear to backing the democrats with funding while he and his hedge fund have been making money hand over fist off of the Bush adminstration. Kian Tajbakhsh whom this article is about is a employee of Soros. Do the math.

[randalds]

I have read Randals post, I have never read him trash the troops.

Posted by radiob at 09:02 PM : May 23, 2007

Thanks Radiob, far too many of Bush's robotic followers equate trashing Bush with trashing America or the troops, when nothing could be further from the truth (not that they have a handle on the truth either). As a patriotic citizen and a Vietnam veteran I consider it to be my duty as an American to trash Bush every chance I get, because he is the single worst threat to my country in it's history. Nothing in our history, not any war or natural disaster or any terrorist attack is or has been as dangerous to our freedom as Americans then George W. Bush. He is without a doubt the most un-American president in our history. He doesn't care about the people, the troops or even about our freedoms and rights. He lies and twists the truth and trades in fear mongering to spread his war for profit and at the cost of our troops lives. A hundred years from now his grandchildren will be spending money he left them that is still soaked in our troops blood and he doesn't care about it. The most American thing I can do is to oppose this monstrosity in any manner I can. As a proud American I owe it to my country to do it.

[retmilspouse]

I don't know what years RandalDS served in Vietnam but it was probably under a Democrat president. The Kennedy administration had Diem killed to supposedly shorten the conflict, well we all know how that played out. And LBJ added the millions of dollars into the war that was eventually used for corruption. They were the ones that continued the war there and for him to say that Bush is the worst that he has seen and has blood on his hands is a joke.

[randalds]

I don't know what years RandalDS served in Vietnam but it was probably under a Democrat president.

Posted by retmilspouse at 11:42 PM : May 23, 2007

Actually (if I wasn't an atheist I'd say "God forgive me"!) I swore in under Richard Milhouse Nixon. (shudder) At the time and up until 7 years ago I'd thought he was a terrible president (not the worst, George HW gets that "honor" in my book), but he was NOTHING compared to the complete flop of a loser who dares to sit in the same seat as some of the giants that came before him. There are not word enough or derogatory enough to describe the current resident of the White House.

[randalds]

They were the ones that continued the war there and for him to say that Bush is the worst that he has seen and has blood on his hands is a joke.
Posted by retmilspouse at 11:42 PM : May 23, 2007

Oh and I didn't say that Bush was the worst president ever (as it seems as that's who your took it). I said he was and is the worst THING that has ever happened to America. Worst anything that has ever happened to America. Anything. War, flood, earthquake, terroist attack, anything. He is the worst ANYTHING that has ever happened to America. No one or nothing else is even close.

[feelfree1]

Re: "Iran has detained an Iranian-American consultant working for George Soros' Open Society Institute..."

She is fortunate that she is being detained in Iran. A spy caught like this in the U.S., would almost certainly be whisked off to a secret torture center.

[p-syrus]

CBS News has learned that Iran is continuing to make progress on its expanded efforts to enrich uranium %u2014 in spite of covert efforts by U.S. and other allied intelligence agencies to actively sabotage the country's nuclear program.

"Industrial sabotage is a way to stop the program, without military action, without fingerprints on the operation, and really, it is ideal, if it works," says Mark Fitzpatrick, the former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Non-Proliferation and now Senior Fellow in Non-Proliferation at the International Institute for Strategic Studies.

-----

Oh! Looky here! CBS has another story which just might shed some light on why Iran is choosing to arrest american citizens and other westerners at this time.

The operating dicta in geo-politics: quid pro quo.

[toldyouso21]

It is really, really hard to feel sorry for people detained in Iran. They knew what the country was like before they ever took their sorry azzes back there. If they are dumb enough to go--they should be detained--if not outright executed. Iran is a crazy regime and they are disillusioned idiots--who somehow think: I can't be harmed--I am an American. Sorry Bush we won't bite--If a person sticks their silly azz head in a lions mouth--then most do not blame the lion when it snaps its jaws shut on their neck. After all a lion will do what a lion does.

An get a clue Iranian-Americans or Syrian Americans or Jordanian Americans or African Americans or whoever you are--if you return home to your crazy azz country and they jail you or torture you or kill you--you will face more derision and disgust from the many Americans instead of sympathy--You went back to your former hell hole? Okay.....then you got what awaits in a hell hole....enough said.

[toldyouso21]

He lies and twists the truth and trades in fear mongering to spread his war for profit and at the cost of our troops lives. A hundred years from now his grandchildren will be spending money he left them that is still soaked in our troops blood and he doesn't care about it. The most American thing I can do is to oppose this monstrosity in any manner I can. As a proud American I owe it to my country to do it. Posted by RandalDS at 09:36 PM : May 23, 2007


While I am certainly no lover or supporter of Bush and believe this story is just war baiting, I find in retrospect that RandalDS may hate Bush because he reminds him a lot of himself. When his personal opinions on subjects are debated or contested, he appears to lie (or at least exaggerate) are derisive and venal and steer clear of the actual subject as he throws diatribes and accusations around.

Radiob may take up for him--but he probably has not seen RandalDS or his alterego JDUB in action on the illegal amnesty blogs--there--the REAL RandalDS comes out and that creature is as rabid and hateful and dismissive as any neo con--he offers no discourse--only diatribes and nasty comments. If ever he is to be taken seriously by anyone--he would offer more than rabid political bile once in a while--if he is at all capable.

[toldyouso21]

Oh and I didn't say that Bush was the worst president ever (as it seems as that's who your took it). I said he was and is the worst THING that has ever happened to America. Worst anything that has ever happened to America. Anything. War, flood, earthquake, terroist attack, anything. He is the worst ANYTHING that has ever happened to America. No one or nothing else is even close.
Posted by RandalDS at 11:53 PM : May 23, 2007


Well.. I do happen to agree with this--except perhaps we underestimate Gonzales and Cheney--they can be the worst 3 things....but specifically, what is unforgiveable about Bush is that he appears to fail to learn from what are obvious errors. In his book to admit any wrong is a weakness and therefore cannot happen.

But a person cannot admit a wrong or failure, then they can never self correct because they fail to acknowledge the errors in what they are doing--hence the war--and the continued dying and the 2nd surge on Bagdhad which keeps being given later and later dates to succeed.

retmilspouse wrote:

"They were the ones that continued the war there and for him to say that Bush is the worst that he has seen and has blood on his hands is a joke."

He's the worst President I've ever had to endure - and he most definitely has blood on his hands.

That's my opinion - prove me wrong. :-)

[neoconrcrazy]

This jackel Bush is provoking another war - Seymour Hersh told us about it weeks ago in the New Yorker magazine -

our government is putting its dirty finger in a sunni-shia proxy war in Lebanon and covert operations in iran meant to destabilize (as if that was necessary!) even more the ME.

i would expect Congress to start reacting otherwise we'll be faced with another bushit folly.

[neoconrcrazy]

"since been held at Iran's notorious Evin prison, where dissidents are often held."


is that prison like ours in iraq ? Abu Ghraib?


do the iranians dog-collar their prisoners, water-board them, attack-dog them, force them to have......, like we do ?

[juwboy]

Hey, neoconRcrazy,

As I'm typing, Palestinians are down on their knees in the streets of Gaza praying for the return of the Israeli Army to protect them from the feral, ski-masked, gun-toting thugs of Fatah and Hamas.

Let me repeat that:

PALESTINIANS ARE DOWN ON THEIR KNEES IN THE STREETS OF GAZA PRAYING FOR THE RETURN OF THE ISRAELI ARMY TO PROTECT THEM FROM THE FERAL, SKI-MASKED, GUN-TOTING THUGS OF FATAH AND HAMAS.

[bluestardad]

It is not anti Semitic to believe there are millions of other good people in the Middle East with valid concerns!

Even Eisenhower had problems with Israeli groups but he did not let them buy him!

READ AS THEY BRAG ABOUT THEIR INFLUENCE ON OUR GOVERNMENT!
http://www.aipac.org/forms/join_aipacClubs.htm


Founded in 1953 by Isaiah L. "Si" Kenen, AIPAC's original name was the American Zionist Committee for Public Affairs. According to UCLA political science professor and author, Steven Spiegel, "the tension between the Eisenhower administration and Israeli supporters was so acute that there were rumors that the administration would investigate the American Zionist Council. Therefore, an independent lobbying committee was formed, which years later was renamed [AIPAC]." [SPIEGEL, p. 52].[citation needed] Today, AIPAC has over 100,000 members.[1]
Activities and stated goals, AIPAC's stated purpose is to lobby the Congress of the United States on issues and legislation "to ensure that the U.S.-Israel relationship is strong so that both countries can work together" to meet the challenges of "stopping Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons..[2] It regularly meets with members of Congress and holds events where it can share its views. AIPAC has been effective in gaining support for Israel among members of Congress and White House administrations.
The New York Times described AIPAC on July 6, 1987 as "a major force in shaping United States policy in the Middle East."

[infidel_us]

Good! The fewer "Iranian-Americans" we have over here, the better off we all are! If anyone can get Soros to go over there, we'd be in the land of strawberry soda! :)

[infidel_us]

do the iranians dog-collar their prisoners, water-board them, attack-dog them, force them to have......, like we do ?
Posted by neoconRcrazy at 05:44 AM : May 24, 2007

Nope. They just disappear and are never heard from again.

[ov442]

Apparently Iran makes them play ping pong and wear Unmatching jump suits, and laugh and joke while eating on camera.
...Per the british soldiers they captured.

[randalds]

Nope. They just disappear and are never heard from again.
Posted by Infidel_US at 08:56 AM : May 24, 2007

Just like in Bush's CIA "black" prisons.