Only fools are surprised and disappoined by the barbaric behavior of the Iranian regime. I remember in 1979, listening to the BBC excoriate the Shah and rant about the CIA and the colonialists that had support the Shah regime, totally oblivious to the monstrous nature of the regime that was replacing the Shah. At last, the world is waking up to the true nature of the Iranian regime. But it is not a new turn in the policy of the regime. It is just the true fact of what was always there.
By Roger Hardy
BBC Middle East analyst
BBC Middle East analyst
It was, as it was surely intended to be, a grim spectacle.
Iranian state television showed the defendants - sitting in rows in a courtroom in Tehran, dressed in pyjama-like prison uniforms - as they confessed to taking part in a plot to undermine the Islamic Republic.
They included some of the country's most prominent reformist intellectuals. Many looked tired and nervous in front of the cameras.
It was the latest of Iran's mass trials. In all, more than 100 people stand accused of provoking unrest after the disputed presidential elections in June.
'Maximum punishment'
One of the best known of those in the dock, Saeed Hajjarian, is so severely disabled his "confession" had to be read by another defendant.
"I committed big errors through my inaccurate analyses of the recent elections," the statement read, "and I apologise to the Iranian nation."
A former intelligence official, Mr Hajjarian survived an assassination attempt in 2000, when a gunman shot him in the head at point-blank range.
Since then, he has become an outspoken critic of the regime and one of the main ideologues of the reform movement.
According to the official Iranian news agency, he is charged with "acting against national security… spreading suspicion of vote-rigging… and provoking illegal protests".
One of the prosecutors has demanded that he receive the maximum punishment, which in such cases could mean a death sentence.
The former Iranian President Mohammed Khatami - himself a leading figure within the reform movement - has condemned the confessions heard in court as invalid.
He is far from alone in his reaction.
Many Iranians - as well as lawyers and human-rights activists abroad - believe these are Soviet-style show trials.
Crushing the reformists
The regime is sending a clear message.
On trial are not merely prominent individuals but the reform movement itself.
Prosecutors have called for two of the main reformist parties - the Islamic Iran Participation Front and the Islamic Revolution Mujahidin Organisation - to be outlawed.
Both flourished during the Khatami presidency (1997-2005) when, for a while, it seemed the reformist trend was unstoppable.
If these two parties are shut down, that will send an unmistakable message to the newest incarnation of reform in Iran - the Green movement that emerged to protest at the 12 June elections.
The movement, which has former President Khatami's support, is led by Mir Hossein Mousavi, the main opposition candidate in the elections.
Arresting and putting on trial Mr Khatami and Mr Mousavi - as some hard-liners are demanding - would be a far riskier strategy than anything the regime has done so far.
But it is signalling that if the Green movement persists with its protests, it too will be crushed.
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