ReportIran
Offering a distinguished honorary doctorate degree to Mohammad Khatami, the former Iranian president by a British University is a fortunate sign of failed Neo-Conservatives and Israeli lobby media manipulation on demonising Iran and prominent Islamic figures, said Majid Khabazan, an Iranian journalist living in Britain.
In a speech at the Foreign Press Association (FPA) Tuesday evening 31 October in London, Khabazan said, "this clearly shows that millions of dollars investments especially by the US congress and Bush administration on media aiming to distort the facts in favour of what the warmongers are advocating has not been successful among the European elites."
FPA invited a panel on Tuesday to open up a discussion about the honoured degree and Khatami's record on human rights.
Apart from Khabazan, Hamid Sabi an Iranian Jew and a lawyer and campaigner against Islamic Republic of Iran and Peter Tatchell from Outrage, a hardline campaigner on human right issues were in the panel.
Despite the criticism from some well known anti-Iran political figures in the UK and huge media publicity against Mr Khatami, who also heads International Centre of Dialogue Among Cultures and Civilizations (ICDACC), St Andrews university has defended itself on honouring Khatami for the Law degree.
The degree was honoured in a special ceremony on Tuesday after university principal and vice-chancellor Dr Brian Lang read a message the university had received from the Vatican in connection with Mr Khatami's visit saying - "Inter-cultural dialogue and inter-religious dialogue are the vital necessities of our time. What better place than a university to carry forward this discussion?"
Referring to the huge investments that Israeli lobbies are making on major media publications in the UK and even new media such as internet and weblogs, Khabazan admired those who despite the massive media attacks against Muslims in general, or Islamic countries like Iran and specially in the last few weeks against a prominent Islamic figure such as Khatami, were brave enough to stand firm on their decision to honour the degree.
Khabazan called the media tycoons who tend to control and manipulate the news stories, "the real tyrants of the modern age" and added, "Thanks God independent figures in the UK proved that the tyrants hegemony over the media has not been successful in achieving their goals."
"The university is honouring a man not a system or the government of Iran and criticising Khatami and seek to put all the responsibilities of the Iranian governments on his shoulder is unfair and unjust," he emphasised.
Speaking to the journalists, human right campaigners and analysts on Iranian issues at the gathering Khabazan argued that in fact the Neo-Cons have never been happy of the presidency of a reformist figure such as Khatami as they, in essence, are against any democratic and reformist movement in Iran and indeed in the Middle East as a whole.
"Speaking about promoting democracy in the Middle East by the US is a gesture to posture the main goal which is the control over the natural resources of the region," said Khabazan adding that, " whereas the background of coup d'etats against the democratic governments such as Dr Mohammad Mossadeq in 1953 shows the opposite."
On a recent media campaign against Khatami a weekly in the UK printed a loose legal claim filed by the Iranian lawyer calling it a major attempt for arresting Khatami when he travels to the UK.
The Sunday Times wrote last Sunday,"The Metropolitan police have confirmed that they are investigating complaints lodged by two Iranian exiles who claim they were falsely imprisoned and brutally tortured while Khatami was in office."
The right wing weekly did not name the source at the Metropolitan police despite the fact that the authorities had very soon rejected the claim for "insufficient grounds."
Mr Hamid Sabi, who filed the complaint, on answering to a question from the audience at FPA was forced to admit that his act was politically motivated and he knew that he does not have enough evidence for the lawsuit.
But he did not answer that how the unfounded claims against Khatami could strongly appear in one of the major publications in the UK.
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