TIRANA’S KORRIERI BRINGS BAD LUCK TO TEHERAN
by Ardian Ndreca

55 Pesedhjetepese Newspaper
Oct 10 2007
Albania

Last Sunday, on 7 October the Korrieri newspaper published a strange
interview with the Iranian Ambassador to Tirana, in which the Tehran
representative sang his government’s praises and listed its successes.

In the morning of the following day, in the Tehran University campus
several hundred students met Mr Mahmud Ahmadinezhad with whistles
and calls: Death to the dictator, Ahmadinezhad is like Pinochet,
and so forth.

This shows that Korrieri is a bird of bad omens.

Certainly, we have fresh memories of the statements by ambassadors
of former communist Albania, who lauded to the skies the successes
of Enver Hoxha [former Albanian communist dictator] and his clique,
making them the laughing stock of the whole world which knew the sort
of rascals they and those who ordered them from Tirana were.

The whole world, including those who put their microphones and their
newspaper columns at the disposal of the Iranian obscurantist dictator,
had a fit of laughter that day.

It is not the first time that this has happened with Ahmadinezhad.

The world press and international organizations know that he and
his regime have little familiarity with freedom, but the Korrieri
journalist – a poor fool! – was not aware of it as none of his
questions dealt with the essentials of Iran’s position in the world.

For his part, the ambassador proved to be an utter ignoramus as he
was unable to avoid even the commonest of traps. So unaware was he
of the real state of things as to declare that it was no problem for
Iran if Albania joined the European Union, but ultimately he woke up
to the reality when he was asked whether Berisha backed Iran’s nuclear
policy, or whether Bush’s Albanian visit created a problem for Iran.

We learned little about the vilayet [province] the journalist came
from.

Certainly, it is ridiculous for a Persian diplomat to be checkmated
by an ordinary newspaperman, but as a Latin saying goes, ‘mala tempora
current’ [we live in bad times].

However, the truth is rather different.

Iran tortures and kills old and young alike for such ‘crimes’ as
unseemly dress, indecent painting (of women, not walls), or opposition
to the policy of the pasdaran [Iranian revolutionary guard corps];
Iran kills the Kurds and other ethnic minorities for political motives;
Tehran’s legislation is reminiscent of the Middle Ages; in Iran there
is no freedom of the press or speech; public and secret torture is
applied there, and amputations are normal penalties; women enjoy no
rights: their existence is worth half of men’s, they can inherit only
half of what otherwise would belong to them. According to Hoseyn Ali
Montazeri, a Khomeini follower, in 1988 criminal fanatics hanged some
Iranian women after torturing and raping them.

As Amir Taheri noted in the Wall Street Journal, a wave of terror,
the most savage since 1988, is sweeping over Iran now. It has some
150,000 people sitting in its prisons, and Ahmadinezhad has issued
orders to build 33 new ones.

Korrieri stays silent about all these monstrosities, because perhaps
it does not know of them, but it does know – as one gathers from the
interview – that Persian was the second language in Elbasan some 200
years ago.

The wretched journalist might have asked the ambassador what punishment
would have been meted out to Omar Khayyam if he was alive, as the poet
sang to wine and women: would he have been shot, or hanged, or simply
given 50 lashes? Or he might have asked how come that Persia was the
second language in Elbasan and then why it was no longer used. This
is rather surprising, since until the 20s and the 30s some 90 per
cent of Albanians were illiterate, so one is prompted to ask where
on earth these illiterates learned Persian 200 years ago.

We understand full well the malice of both the interviewers and those
who stand behind him. And although we have been among those few who
have asked Mr. Berisha to leave the Islamic Conference for good,
the hypocrisy of the political force which Korrieri represents is
disgusting.

The ‘comrades’ clung to power from 1997 to 2005, enriched themselves
to unimaginable proportions, but did not take the trouble to get
Albania out of the Islamic Conference.

In those days the Tirana government was some sort of a filial of the
Athens government, but it did not say a single word about Iran. All
of us know those interested in presenting Albania as being linked to
Iran and other states like it.

Our neighbours, who have not yet been able to free themselves of their
primitive feelings, want us to look like dangerous barbarians as much
as possible and they are ready to pay for that. The Albanian market
is full of people who, regardless of their little worth, are ready
to sell themselves. These can be found in the left-wing parties,
but a lot of them can be found in the right-wing parties too.

Certainly, it was no coincidence that the Turks seized a ship laden
with weapons a sovereign state such as Albania had sold to Armenia.

Only a poor fool can mistake Azerbaijan for Albania and hence consider
the selling of weapons to Armenia unacceptable.

Still – let us repeat – Korrieri was a bird of bad omen for the
Iranian regime. Before giving an interview, an Iranian ambassador
must put some dry garlic in his pockets for luck, at least to cover
up the heavy smell of hypocrisy.

However, if the democratically-minded youth of the noble Indo-European
people of Iran continue what they have already started, I am afraid
the ambassador of the Iranian dictatorial regime will no longer give
us the pleasure of reading his interviews full of deep learning and
supposed Attic salt.