Saman Rasoulpour

Even though the IAEA chief Mohammad El Baradei’s February 22, 2008 report to the ‎Agency’s board of governors on Iran’s nuclear dossier says that Iran has made “quite ‎good progress” in its cooperation with the agency while it is still not in a position to ‎guarantee the peaceful nature of Iran’s nuclear program, and as the West seems to have ‎concluded that it must assertively confront the oil rich country, the government of the ‎Islamic Republic of Iran has interpreted the event as a “victory for the Iranian nation in ‎its perseverance of its rights and has called on the public to celebrate the event in ‎mosques.‎

President Mahmud Ahmadinejad announced on national radio television to the Iranian ‎nation that the IAEA’s report was a “great historic victory” and added that, “No signs ‎exist for Iran’s deviation in its nuclear program. Any opposition to the nuclear issue is in ‎reality a childish game.”‎

In his congratulatory message to the leader of the Islamic regime ayatollah Khamenei, ‎Ahmadinejad wrote, “I assure you that this beloved nation and your children of the ‎revolution in the government of the Islamic Republic stand perseverant, united and in ‎complete disregard to the outcries of its bad-wishers to defend the tall principles of the ‎Islamic revolution and till the complete attainment of their rights.”‎

In separate statements of support, Saeed Jalili, the senior Iranian nuclear negotiator said, ‎‎“The report in fact proved the entitlement of Iran on the nuclear issue.” Soltanie, Iran’s ‎representative at the IAEA similarly said, “I congratulate the publication of this historic ‎document by the only specialized international agency which has confirmed all the ‎statements of the Islamic republic of Iran while negating all the claims of the enemies of ‎this great nation.” Gholam Hossein Elham, the spokesman of the Iranian government also ‎called the IAEA report a “nuclear victory” for Iran and congratulated ayatollah Khamenei ‎and the Iranian nation on the occasion.‎

Following the publication of this report, Iranian government agencies celebrated what ‎Ahmadinejad called the “great nuclear victory” by buying and distributing sweets among ‎government employees. At the universities, sweets were distributed to students, at most ‎banks customers were given candy, etc, while many people essentially did not know what ‎had happened. Almost no newspaper in Iran published the full text of El Baradei’s report. ‎The state run ISNA student news agency did run the full text but the translation. The ‎number of people who actually go to ISNA for their news source is extremely limited.‎

According to the report, many questions continue to remain about the country missile ‎technology development, suspicious high voltage detonators, bridgewire detonators and ‎uranium enrichment activities in one of its industrial centers and the setting up of new ‎centrifuges. Iran has also denied access to individuals as requested by the Agency, ‎arguing that such individuals did not exist. But apparently none of these are important. ‎What seems to be important is that with the publication of the IAEA report, the state run ‎radio and television broadcast national and revolutionary hymns by the minute as a ‎celebration of the report. The massive circulation Hamshahri newspaper, published by ‎Tehran’s municipality had an interesting headline: “How the Nuclear Dossier Was ‎Terminated?” The headline of another government newspaper Iran was “Iran’s Great ‎Nuclear Victory.” Keyhan, another newspaper run by a state appointed editor wrote this, ‎‎“Iran’s nuclear dossier is now at its most sensitive historic point. For the first time ‎because of Iran’s extraordinary cooperation which was completely unexpected by the ‎West, Iran’s nuclear dossier is now completely closed.” Non-government newspapers ‎were more cautious in their reporting on the event. Etemad for example called the report ‎double edged, while Kargozaran newspaper headlined, “El Baradei’s Latest Report this ‎year.‎

Following the announcements of the Islamic Propagation Organization and the National l ‎Mosque Council, all the mosques in the country celebrated the event on Saturday and ‎performed prayers to celebrate this “victory” while Ahmadinejad himself participated in ‎one of the gatherings.‎