The recent Iranian election fiasco has been a blessing in disguise for President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. His reelection was confirmed by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, the vote count was ratified by the Council of Guardians, and the presidential oath of office was taken in front of a majority of parliamentarians. Consequently, while those officials may object to his actions, their ability to counter them is limited. If Ahmadinejad fails, so, too, will they for having sanctioned his authority. But in order to hold any public position in the future — and he can be elected to a third, nonconsecutive, presidential term [...]
On June 20, 2009, as she watched demonstrators at an Iranian reformist protest gather on Tehran’s Kargar Avenue, Neda Agha-Soltan, 27, was suddenly shot in the chest and killed, ostensibly by a nearby Basij militiaman. Had this tragic incident taken place just a few years earlier, it might have been lost to history. As it happened, however, two separate amateur videos of Neda’s shooting and subsequent death were quickly posted online, where they spread virally around the Internet. If bearded ayatollahs were the iconic image of Iran’s 1979 revolution, the tragic killing of this young Iranian woman has become the [...]
TOKYO — Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) knew that this weekend’s general election was going to be tough. But despite consistently dismal polling, many members likely didn’t expect quite the pummeling they took. The opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) on Sunday romped to a landslide win, taking more than 300 seats in the 480-seat House of Representatives. The victory brought more than 50 years of almost uninterrupted rule by the LDP to a dramatic end, and has left the DPJ not only holding power for the first time, but also as the biggest party in both houses of [...]
