UANI's Rouhani Accountability Tracker: Update

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 22, 2014
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UANI's Rouhani Accountability Tracker: Update
Iranian President has Failed to Bring Real Change to Iran

New York, NY - Today, United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) released the second in a series of periodic updates regarding Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's record in office. 

As UANI's Rouhani Accountability Tracker shows, nearly 300 days into his term as President, Rouhani has wholly failed to match his rhetoric with substantive reforms in Iran.  

This is particularly true when it comes to the human rights situation in Iran, which has deteriorated to a level even worse than what was seen under former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Meanwhile, Iran's nuclear program continues to advance, its military support for the Assad regime in Syria continues, and the Iranian people are still suffering.

Iranian Officials are Boasting They "Have Won in Syria" and "The Americans Have Lost It"

• IRGC Malayer Unit Commander Col. Mohammad Eskandari declares, "IRGC commanders have prepared and equipped 42 divisions and 138 battalions in [Syria], and are fully prepared to fight the enemy...Today's war in Syria is really our war with America." Other leading Iranian officials have boasted, "We have won in Syria...The regime will stay. The Americans have lost it."   
• According to Afghans and Western officials, "Iran has been recruiting thousands of Afghan refugees to fight in Syria, offering $500 a month and Iranian residency to help the Assad regime beat back rebel forces."   
• "Western security officials are investigating allegations that Iran supplied Chinese-made bombs filled with chlorine gas to the Syrian regime after satellite images emerged of a Syrian supply flight at Tehran's main airport."

Under President Rouhani, the Human Rights Situation in Iran has Worsened.

• In the first 20 days of May, at least 73 prisoners have been executed, an average of more than 3 per day. Since Rouhani assumed office, there have been at least 629 executions, including more than 280 in 2014 alone.
• Despite Rouhani's promises to ease Internet restrictions, six young men and women were arrested and detained in Tehran for making a tribute video to Pharrell Williams' hit song "Happy," which they posted on YouTube. They were then forced to express remorse for their "guilty" act on state television.
• The life of former presidential candidate and opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi "is now being endangered by his continued detention," as he was "taken to hospital...for urgent heart complications." Rouhani had pledged to free Reformist leaders Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi.

Under President Rouhani, Iran Continues to Develop its Nuclear Program, Hold a Hardline in Negotiations, and Stonewall Nuclear Inspectors.

Lack of Diplomatic Progress

• The fourth round of nuclear talks in Vienna yields no "tangible progress." A Western diplomat criticized Iran's lack of "realism" and "flexibility."

Hardline Positions

• Nuclear negotiator Abbas Araghchi on the Arak heavy water reactor: "It is ridiculous that the power of the reactor would be cut from 40 megawatts to 10 megawatts."   
• Iran's nuclear chief Ali Akbar Salehi on centrifuges: "To meet the annual fuel needs of the Bushehr plant, we must have 50,000 first generation centrifuges." This is 30,000 more centrifuges than Iran currently possesses and much more than the few thousand the international community is seeking to limit Iran to in a final nuclear deal.

Illicit Activities

• According to a confidential UN report, Iran's continued development of ballistic missiles in violation of multiple UN Security Council resolutions is "posing an acute challenge" to the nuclear negotiations.   
• A U.S. official says Iran has been "very actively" engaging in efforts to "buy banned components for its nuclear and missile programs in recent months...a period when it struck an interim deal with major powers to limit its disputed atomic activity."

Stonewalling Inspectors

• The IAEA "is no nearer to closing the books on...allegations that Iran worked on nuclear arms in the past," as Iran has still yet "to go into deeper explanations of its work on detonators that have a variety of uses, including sparking a nuclear explosion."

Under President Rouhani, Rampant Anti-American Hostility Has Continued

• As Iran completes work on a large-scale mock-up of a U.S. aircraft carrier, Iranian naval commander Admiral Ali Fadavi says "that he is prepared to order suicide attacks, drone strikes, and missile technology to 'destroy the U.S. Navy.'"
• Against strenuous opposition from the U.S., Iran nominates as its next UN ambassador Hamid Aboutalebi, "a member of the group of radical students that seized the U.S. embassy on Nov. 4, 1979" and held 52 Americans hostage in Tehran for 444 days.

Click hereto view UANI's resource on "Rouhani's Record in Office."
Click hereto view UANI's Rouhani Accountability Tracker.
Click hereto view UANI's Geneva Interim Agreement Tracker.

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