A Becon of Freedom

Fire of Liberty
Rachael Zarbarkes Friedman has a good update on Akbar Ganji's continued hunger strike against the mullahs in Tehran's Evin Prison. Though Ganji is considerably weak as water due to his two month refusal of food, he continues to inspire countless numbers of the Iranian public with his principled stand against the theocratic masters. While Ganji will probably suffer a lot of physical distress through his hunger strike, you still have to applaud his brave stand for democracy and liberty for the Iranian public. Just look at what Ganji's stand against tyranny has inspired:

“If anything ever happens to Mr. Ganji,” says Fakhravar, who was himself arrested for criticizing the regime and sentenced to eight years in prison, “a revolution will happen in Iran…. [Ganji] knows his blood will create real turmoil, which the country will never come out of.” He continues, “Ganji is not a member of a particular opposition group or party, but every group loves him and has respect for him. The whole society will rise up.”

Fakhravar is hardly sanguine about the reaction such a popular uprising would generate — after all, he knows how the regime treats its critics. Still, he continues to make his views known, and has in fact just published his second book, he says, The Scraps of Prison, written half in Farsi and half in English. “[Iranian president Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad is the naked image of the Islamic Republic, without any mask,” Fakhravar says. “By all means, they will beat the hell out of the people. We want the world to look at us, so we won’t be forgotten. If the regime sees so many eyes on it, it won’t be as hard on us.”

As though by way of example, Fakhravar mentions one individual in particular, Sweden’s Fred Saberi, whom he credits for helping to call attention to the plight of Iran’s dissidents and ameliorate their treatment, including by securing temporary releases from prison. Fakhravar feels the U.S. government is also paying attention. Asked how dissidents reacted to President Bush’s statement calling for Ganji’s release, he says, “As a matter of fact, it had the most wonderful reaction, and not just among the opposition. For the first time we really felt the U.S. government and the American people are behind the Iranian struggle — that the support was not just rhetoric.”

After reading this piece and many more on Akbar Ganji and his devotion to freedom and democracy in Iran, I'd have to agree with The New York Sun that he's the Iranian version of Havel.