Prospectus

Issue date: 3/10/10 Section: News

Mehdi Saharkhiz, of Wayne, New Jersey, acts as a conduit for reformists in Iran, posting photos and videos on his blog and YouTube channel. (Michael Karas/The Record/MCT)

From coffee shops in Ridgewood, N.J., his home in Wayne, N.J., and anywhere there is cell service, a 28-year-old Iranian is broadcasting the ongoing uprising in his home country - one of a growing number of people intent on helping share with the world what happens on the streets of Tehran.

Mehdi Saharkhiz - known as "onlymehdi" on his blog, YouTube channel and Twitter feed - has been posting photographs and videos of opposition protests in Iran since the disputed Iranian presidential election last June sent thousands of protesters into the streets and triggered a brutal crackdown by the regime.

"For me, it's about getting the word out there," Saharkhiz said.

Videos and images like the ones Saharkhiz posts have become crucial to scholars, journalists and ordinary people who want to know what's going on inside an increasingly closed-off Iran.

"I think it's been critical, and we've seen what may in fact be a real birth of citizen journalism," said Gary Sick, an Iran scholar and adjunct professor at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs. "The coverage basically after the initial demonstrations in June has been extremely sparse except for the things that people are sending out."

Indeed, much of the post-election media coverage has centered around Iran's military ambitions and the possibility of imposing more sanctions on the country. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton this month cautioned that Iran's armed forces were becoming increasingly important in the country's decision-making. And a recent report by the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency accused Iranian leaders of having worked to produce a nuclear warhead.

But the story of the opposition movement continues, recorded and shared by an online community.

For example, on Feb. 11, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was largely successful at keeping demonstrators out of a main square in Tehran when he gave a major speech celebrating the regime's anniversary.

Satellite images available through Google - not television cameras - showed a square that wasn't filled and buses that brought in supporters from outside Tehran. Saharkhiz showed photos of the buses on his site, too.

Continued...

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