...President George W. Bush will share responsibility for a nuclear Iran given his own failure to act more firmly against the Islamic Republic or to allow Israel to do so, thereby failing to make good on his pledge not to allow the world's most dangerous regimes to get the world's most dangerous weapons. But it is now Mr. Obama's watch, and for a year he has behaved like a President who would rather live with a nuclear Iran than do what it takes to stop it.
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Iran's human rights record began deteriorating after President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad came to power in 2005. Today Iran is second only to China in capital punishment - 270 people were hung in 2010 and another 12 so far in 2010. Total executions in the Persian year, which started on March 21, 2009, passed 440 according to the Mojahedeen-e Khalq (MKO) organization, a Paris-based opposition group whose tally is based on executions reported by state-run media.
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NIGDE, Turkey -- Light snow was falling when the two young men set out on horseback for the border to flee Iran. By the time they were deep in the mountains, it had become a blinding blizzard, the temperature had dropped below freezing, and they were barely alive.

An Iranian firm closely linked to Tehran's nuclear program acquired special hardware for enriching uranium, despite sanctions intended to keep such equipment out of Iran, according to officials with knowledge of the matter.
In recent weeks, the officials said, an Iranian procurement firm obtained critical valves and vacuum gauges made by a French company that until December was owned by U.S. industrial conglomerate Tyco International. The French and U.S. firms said they knew nothing of the case.
Western authorities are still struggling to understand precisely how the valves and gauges in question reached Iran. The International Atomic Energy Agency is investigating the matter, according to a Vienna-based diplomat, and Western intelligence agencies also are investigating, The Wall Street Journal has learned.
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Human Rights Activists reported on 29 March that Abdolreza Ghanbari, a school teacher and a university lecturer for over 14 years, has been sentenced to death by the Revolutionary Court. According to HRANA, judge Salavati issued the execution order due to accusations of mohareb for suspicious ties with various groups. The evidence for the accusation was emails and connection to foreign television stations.
According to the report, Ghanbari was arrested 13 January 2010 by security forces.
In recent months, branch 15 of the Revolutionary Court has sentenced several people to death under the orders of judge Salavati. So far two of the execution orders have been carried out (the death of Mohammad Reza Ali Zamani and Arash Rahmanipour).
ISDCI condemns the use of the death penalty particularly against political prisoners and calls on all human rights and democracy defenders around the world to denounce the Iranian regime for continued gross violations of human rights and politically motivated killings. ISDCI believes the only effective way to end state-sponsored atrocities in Iran is to heed the Iranian people's call for an end to the illegitimate rule of clerical dictatorship in Iran.