Amidst increasing international pressure on Iran’s nuclear program, and continued controversy for the delayed release of one of three American hikers, reports come of a third Iranian diplomat defecting in Europe.
Farzad Farhangian, the press attaché at the Iranian Embassy in Brussels, left the embassy and defected to Norway on Friday, AP reported.
Farhangian follows the defections of two other Iranian diplomats, Hossein Alizadeh, who defected last Monday; and Mohammed Reza Heydari, who defected in January.
“I don’t consider myself anymore a diplomat standing beside a brutal Iranian regime,” said Alizadeh in an interview with the AP.
The defections symbolize the Iranian regime’s power slipping further and further from a people with exceedingly high discontent for the ruling power, say analysts.
Rioting went into full force following the supposedly rigged presidential election results in the summer of 2009. The elections denied popular reformist Mir-Hossein Mousavi of victory, and confirmed the then incumbent Iranian President Ahmadienjad for a second term.
The post-presidential election rioting resulted in the largest group demonstration in Iran since the Islamic revolution of 1979.
Since the regime squashed the demonstrations using military police throughout major Iranian cities, discontent among most Iranian citizens has remained dormant. Yet what has been referred to as the “Green Revolution” is still active and silently growing in Iran.
Farzad Farhangian, the press attaché at the Iranian Embassy in Brussels, left the embassy and defected to Norway on Friday, AP reported.
Farhangian follows the defections of two other Iranian diplomats, Hossein Alizadeh, who defected last Monday; and Mohammed Reza Heydari, who defected in January.
“I don’t consider myself anymore a diplomat standing beside a brutal Iranian regime,” said Alizadeh in an interview with the AP.
The defections symbolize the Iranian regime’s power slipping further and further from a people with exceedingly high discontent for the ruling power, say analysts.
Rioting went into full force following the supposedly rigged presidential election results in the summer of 2009. The elections denied popular reformist Mir-Hossein Mousavi of victory, and confirmed the then incumbent Iranian President Ahmadienjad for a second term.
The post-presidential election rioting resulted in the largest group demonstration in Iran since the Islamic revolution of 1979.
Since the regime squashed the demonstrations using military police throughout major Iranian cities, discontent among most Iranian citizens has remained dormant. Yet what has been referred to as the “Green Revolution” is still active and silently growing in Iran.
