Return to Transcripts main page

Your World Today

Iran Nuclear Dispute; Cartoon Row; Sunni Frustration

Aired February 02, 2006 - 11:59   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

ANNOUNCER: Live from CNN Center, this is YOUR WORLD TODAY.
HALA GORANI, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Today, Vienna coming up in New York and the U.N. The international dispute over Iran's nuclear efforts moving closer to a confrontation. Iran shows no signs of backing down.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is a matter of, in fact, a warning not to make a mistake and not go towards confrontation.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

JIM CLANCY, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Gunfire in Gaza a response to newspaper cartoons in Europe. Depictions of the prophet Mohammed clashing with the principles of press freedom.

GORANI: And he says civil war is already a reality. The explosive thoughts of one of Iraq's most influential Sunni politicians.

It is 6:00 p.m. in Vienna, Austria; 7:00 p.m. in Ghana.

I'm Hala Gorani.

CLANCY: I'm Jim Clancy.

Welcome to our viewers throughout the word. This is CNN International and YOUR WORLD TODAY.

Hello, everyone.

The nuclear dispute with Iran moving now to what is termed by some as a critical stage. The United Nations nuclear watchdog agency in Vienna trying to decide whether it should refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council.

GORANI: For its part, Iran is making serious threats of its own about how it would respond if that indeed happened.

CLANCY: We're going to take you live to Vienna in just a moment.

GORANI: But first, a look at what's at stake right now, referral to the U.N. Security Council.

The IAEA is widely expected to report Iran's nuclear activities to the Security Council sometime during their emergency session. That would essentially give the council oversight of Iran's nuclear program.

CLANCY: What would happen then? More meetings, actually. A referral to the U.N. Security Council is just a first step in what could be a very long diplomatic process.

So why all of the fuss? Well, the U.S., the European Union and Russia seem to be coming together on this one. China, too. They say they want to send a serious signal to Iran to back down, which takes us to Vienna and to our senior international correspondent, Matthew Chance.

Matthew, no chance of a vote this day, but is a vote inevitable in the coming hours?

MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I think a vote is inevitable in the coming days. What's happening now is that this draft resolution which is on the table, which would result in a report to the United Nations Security Council by the U.N.'s top nuclear monitoring agency here in Vienna, that's being discussed by the various 36 members of the board of governors of the IAEA. They're taking the document back to their various capitals to prepare statements, to prepare their positions on it.

What diplomats are telling us here in Vienna is that already the simple majority necessary within the board of governors to have this resolution passed has already been achieved. As we've seen, it has the backing of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council as well, and so there are no concerns about that.

They're merely now in the process of trying to build as much consensus as possible to send as clear a message as possible about the will of the international community to Iran.

Well, Mohamed ElBaradei is the director-general of the U.N.'s nuclear watchdog agency. Here's what he had to say earlier.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MOHAMED ELBARADEI, DIRECTOR-GENERAL, IAEA: There is a window of opportunity. There is a disagreement among board members whether to report the Iranian issue now to the security council or at a later stage. But all who have spoken on the issue, even those who are supporting Security Council reporting, are making it very clear that the Security Council is not asked at this stage to take any action, definitely not before I submit my report in March.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHANCE: Well, Iran, as far as it's concerned, says that any involvement of the United Nations Security Council would, in its words, mark an end to diplomacy, said if that happens it would fully resume all of its uranium enrichment activity, something the international community is trying to stop. It also says it will end its voluntary snap IAEA inspections of nuclear facilities on the ground.

And so the discussions that are being had here and the outcome of those discussions may well set the international community and Iran on a collision course in the months ahead -- Jim.

CLANCY: Matthew, just very quickly, isn't all of this trying to win time for Russia to negotiate some kind of compromise with Iran?

CHANCE: I think it is. I think it's trying to win time for all of the parties, in fact. Russia certainly has a lot diplomatically staked on this. It has the only negotiated solution, perhaps, plan, at least, on the table at the moment.

That would mean that Iran would have its uranium enriched on Russian soil. That would provide some degree of international oversight, of course, to make sure it doesn't enrich it to the weapons-grade level. It would also deny Iranian scientists the kind of sensitive equipment -- sensitive technology, rather, that the international community is trying to keep out of their hands. But that requires time, it's still got to be negotiated.

This buys Russia and China that time in the hope that they can preserve their economic ties, from their point of view, with Iran.

CLANCY: Matthew Chance, senior international reporter there, talking to us from outside IAEA headquarters in Vienna.

Thank you, Matthew.

Coming up in just a few minutes, we're going to hear directly from Iran's ambassador to the IAEA there. He's adamant Iran is not doing anything wrong -- Hala.

GORANI: Jim, there is growing outrage in parts of the Muslim world over the publication and the reprinting of cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed. The caricatures first ran in a Danish newspaper in September and have been reprinted in other European countries.

Our European political editor, Robin Oakley, reports.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ROBIN OAKLEY, CNN EUROPEAN POLITICAL EDITOR (voice over): Palestinian gunmen Thursday surrounded the European Union offices in Gaza, firing weapons and demanding an apology for cartoons of the prophet Mohammed which have appeared in European newspapers.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We call on the governments of Denmark, France and Norway to apologize officially. Otherwise, demonstrations will be held and we will shell the headquarters of the EU and all European nations in Gaza.

OAKLEY: Islamists have been outraged by the caricatures, including one showing the prophet with a turban shaped like a bomb which first appeared last September in a Danish newspaper and which has been shown in pixelated form on the Arab TV station Al-Jazeera. Islam forbids any representation of the prophet. CNN, too, has pixelated the pictures so as not to offend viewers.

Protest marchers have been burning the Danish flag. Some Arab nations have closed their Copenhagen embassies. And Danish goods from companies like Dairy Jat Ala (ph) have been boycotted in countries like Saudi Arabia.

FINN S. HANSEN, MANAGING EDITOR, ARLA: And five days away, no, a tsunami of consumer reaction has totally brought our business to a standstill.

OAKLEY: The French newspaper "France Soir" reprinted the cartoons Wednesday.

SERGE FAUBERT, EDITOR IN CHIEF, "FRANCE SOIR"(through translator): We wanted to reaffirm a fundamental principle, the freedom of expression. We can't accept that a religious dogma, whatever it is, forbids illustrators to draw freely.

OAKLEY: But with the political dimension of the row escalating, that decision brought the sacking of the paper's managing editor. And French Muslims plan legal action.

DALIL BOUBAKEIR, MUSLIM COUNCIL HEAD (through translator): You don't have the right to say that prophet Mohammed, a prophet that we venerate every minute of every day is someone who founded a terrorist religion.

OAKLEY: European nations are now seeking to cool the fury without sacrificing their societies' basic principles.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Danish government condemns any expression, action or indication that attempts to demonize groups of people on the basis of their religion or ethnic backgrounds. It is the sort of thing that does not belong in a society that is based on respect for the individual human being.

OAKLEY (on camera): Cartoons may seem trivial, but this has become a fundamental clash between deeply-held religious convictions and equally passionate commitments to the Western traditions of free speech. Diplomats concede things are likely to get worse before they get better.

Robin Oakley, CNN, London.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CLANCY: All right. It's quite a controversy. It's the subject of our inbox question today.

GORANI: Now, we are asking you, do you think European newspapers went too far when they published cartoons of the prophet Mohammed?

E-mail us your thoughts, YWT@CNN.com. We'll read some of them later right here on the program.

Now, the Palestinian Authority scrambling to find cash for its 137,000 government workers. It wasn't able to meet payroll Thursday because Israel is refusing to turn over about $55 million in monthly tax transfers following the election victory of Hamas.

A Palestinian spokesman says Saudi Arabia and Qatar may provide aid by the weekend. The United States and other international donors are also threatening to withhold aid unless Hamas renounces violence and recognizes Israel's right to exist.

CLANCY: The judge in the Saddam Hussein trial has ordered an 11- day-long break in testimony to try end the boycott. The deposed Iraqi dictator and several co-defendants are refusing to take their place in the courtroom. They accuse the judge of bias. The judge was born in Halabja, a town that Saddam Hussein allegedly wiped off the map with a chemical attack.

Via video hookup on Thursday, though, the defense watched two prosecution witnesses accuse one of the co-defendants and other Saddam Hussein loyalists of torture.

GORANI: When Saddam Hussein was in power, Sunni politicians, of course, ruled the land. Now with Shia factions predominant, the Sunnis are feeling frustrated and fearful.

Michael Holmes has the story from Baghdad.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Tariq al-Hashimi is one of his country's most powerful Sunni politicians. What he says is taken seriously. And he's saying some serious things.

TARIQ AL-HASHIMI, IRAQI ISLAMIC PARTY: I think people are not prepared to tolerate what's going on.

HOLMES: The people he's talking about are Iraq's Sunni population, all-powerful under Saddam, politically and socially marginalized, they say, in the new Iraq. Al-Hashimi says, increasingly, men in Ministry of Interior uniforms are carrying out raids on Sunni neighborhoods.

HASHIMI: They're conducting (ph) Arab Sunni people from their houses, in fact, and people next day felt, after a few days we discovered them being tortured heavily, some of them being killed, their bodies thrown in the garbage. And this is going on.

HOLMES: The Interior Ministry fiercely denies its men are involved in such things, blaming criminals. Al-Hashimi says, in either case, if the attacks on Sunnis continue they will start to fight back.

HASHIMI: It is (INAUDIBLE) for everybody to go for self-defense.

HOLMES: His party, the Iraqi Islamic Party, is part of the major Sunni coalition following December's election. He is widely heard in the Sunni community and he has a list of demands. The release of all detainees held by the U.S. but not charged with anything, there are thousands in that position. Iraq army protection from the kidnap squads, his people, he says, don't trust the police. And there is a deadline for those demands to be met.

HASHIMI: Seven to 10 days, not more.

HOLMES (on camera): Have you heard anything yet?

HASHIMI: Not yet.

HOLMES: Do you expect to?

HASHIMI: I'm not optimistic.

HOLMES (voice over): If he doesn't hear, he is threatening mass Sunni civil disobedience, including marches and strikes. Chillingly, he says a surge in tit-for-tat killings for Shias and Sunnis in Baghdad neighborhoods signals to him the start of civil war.

HASHIMI: It's not been declared. (INAUDIBLE) has not been declared.

HOLMES (on camera): Al-Hashimi has other demands, too, political ones. With serious negotiations due to begin on the composition of the new government, Sunni parties which finished a distant third in the elections expect serious involvement, top ministry posts, even the presidency.

HASHIMI: The problem is not about the quantity. The problem is about the quality, decision-making process. This is the most important thing.

HOLMES (voice over): With the political landscape in Iraq so delicately poised and the security situation problematic, rising Sunni anger on the streets is the last thing those in power here want to see.

Michael Holmes, CNN, Baghdad.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CLANCY: Still ahead, should Iran have nuclear capabilities?

GORANI: It's a dispute, it's a question that's been going on, and now it's at the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency in Vienna. They're trying to decide whether to send Iran to the Security Council.

Iran's response coming up. We'll have a conversation with the country's ambassador to the IAEA.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CLANCY: Welcome back to our viewers in the United States and around the world.

We want to go back to our stop story, and that is the dispute over Iran's nuclear ambitions.

International Atomic Energy officials, as we told you, have been meeting in Vienna. They're trying to decide whether they should refer Iran to the U.N. Security Council.

Now, Iran's ambassador to the IAEA sat down and talked with CNN's Becky Anderson. He warned such a move could provoke Tehran to start full-scale uranium enrichment.

Here's that interview.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

ALI ASGHAR SOLTANIEH. IRANIAN AMBASSADOR, IAEA: Iran is looking for peaceful settlement. Iran is looking for cooperation with Europe and Russia and other countries. And we want peace in this region.

Therefore, this is a matter of warning for making a historical mistake in the IAEA in Vienna, and this would be a new chapter which would be unfortunate decision. Therefore, this is a matter of, in fact, warning not to make a mistake and not to go towards confrontation.

BECKY ANDERSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Are you warning the West or are you warning the U.S. at this point?

SOLTANIEH: Well, if we review what unilateral policy of U.S. has caused, the difficulties in the region, ignoring the international expectation with what happened in Iraq with the assumption, the wrong assumption on the WMDs or so, therefore, what we are worrying that the same mistake will be made, particularly the mistake is that Iran is not Iraq. They have to understand that.

And I'm sure that European friends and China and Russia all understand that Iran is trying to have a peaceful settlement of this issue. And, therefore, we are warning that Europeans and others will not permit U.S. to take all this tremendous progress which we have made so far, following the negotiations that we had with the Europeans, cooperation with IAEA to take us (ph) hostage.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CLANCY: All right. Iran's nuclear dispute among the diplomats. And we hear all the -- and we just hear some of it there. That's one thing.

GORANI: All right. But trying to sell fish on the streets of Bandar Abbas is another.

CLANCY: Up later, we're going to take a closer look just at what ordinary Iranians have to say about this controversy, their country and their own lives.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: I'm Daryn Kagan at CNN Center in Atlanta. More of YOUR WORLD TODAY in just a few minutes. First, though, let's check on stories making headlines here in the U.S.

Police in New Bedford, Massachusetts, are looking for an 18-year- old suspect in the overnight attack of three men at a gay bar. Police say that Jacob Robeta (ph) is violent, armed and dangerous. The charges against him could include hate crimes.

In an exclusive interview with CNN, the bartender at the Puzzles lounge talks about what happened last night.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PHILLIP, PUZZLES LOUNGE BARTENDER: He pulls out a handgun from out of his pocket, fires one shot directly up in the air, which got everybody's attention. And we all moved away. And he gets up and proceeds to shoot the first person that he attacked with a hatchet in the face, then turns to the second person that he attacked with a hatchet and shot him twice in the head.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KAGAN: Stay with CNN throughout the day for the latest developments in this developing story

Andrea Yates was released from a Texas jail this morning. She headed to a state mental hospital to wait for her retrial next month.

Yates was convicted in 2002 of drowning three of her children in the bathtub. Her two other children also were killed, but she wasn't charged in those deaths. An appeals court overturned the conviction last year.

More weather woes in the New Orleans area. Severe weather blew in overnight, undoing post-hurricane repairs and creating even more damage. High winds ripped away a temporary roof patch at Louis Armstrong International Airport, and at least one home collapsed as the storms moved through a neighborhood heavily damaged by Hurricane Katrina.

And this just in to CNN, word from the White House that President Bush is expected to look for about $18 billion in new emergency spending for Katrina aid. More on that just ahead.

CNN's "LIVE FROM" is coming up at the top of the hour.

Meanwhile, YOUR WORLD TODAY continues after a quick break.

I'm Daryn Kagan. I'll see you tomorrow.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CLANCY: Welcome back to YOUR WORLD TODAY here on CNN International. I'm Jim Clancy.

GORANI: I'm Hala Gorani.

Here are some of the top stories we're following for you this hour.

CLANCY: The board of the International Atomic Energy Agency delaying its decision on whether to send Iran to the U.N. Security Council until Friday.

GORANI: Iran says if the matter goes to the U.N., then it will begin large-scale uranium enrichment. The so-called EU3, Britain, France and Germany, formally introduced a draft resolution after reaching an impasse in negotiations with Iran. The U.S. ambassador to the IAEA says Iranian documents submitted this week point to a military dimension of their nuclear program.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GREG SCHULTE, U.S. AMBASSADOR, IAEA: It's troubling for a number of reasons. First off, it demonstrates that the Iranians continue to not cooperate with the IAEA.

There have been multiple requests over the years for information for access to key individuals. They provide some information, they don't provide full information. They provide some access, they don't provide full access.

The report also highlighted many of the open issues that remain that have not been clarified by the IAEA. And the report for the very first time raised questions of significant concern to the board of governors, and that's questions about military applications, questions about what are the Iranians doing to potentially take their uranium activities and link it to actual nuclear weapons?

(END VIDEO CLIP)

GORANI: On the other side of the dispute, the Iranian ambassador to the IAEA says he hopes this latest move won't hamper all the progress that was made during the negotiations between Tehran and the Europeans.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SOLTANIEH: Iran is not Iraq. They have to understand that. And I'm sure that European friends and China and Russia all understand that Iran is trying to have a peaceful settlement of this issue. And therefore, we are warning that Europeans and others will not permit U.S. to take all this tremendous progress which we have made so far following negotiations that we had with the Europeans, cooperation with the IAEA, to take us (ph) hostage.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CLANCY: All right. What is he talking about, his friends? He is talking about the economic relations that exist between all of those places and Tehran.

Russia, which is really selling the technology, the nuclear energy technology to the Iranians, has billions of dollars at stake. China has new oil deals also worth billions of dollars. Those two countries have a lot at stake, as do the Europeans.

Our own Becky Anderson is there at IAEA headquarters.

This has driven Russia particularly to take up the role of chief negotiator between Iran and the rest of the world. What's happening?

ANDERSON: You're absolutely right. Let me just remind you what happened today here in Vienna this Thursday.

A meeting broke up here at about 4:15 local time. Officially, members get together again at 3:00 p.m. local time Friday. But between now and then, there will be an awful lot of closed-door negotiations, of course. ElBaradei, the head of the IAEA, described discussions today as reaching a critical phase, but said this is not a crisis.

Well, a crisis it may not be, but this is certainly a critical week. Remind ourselves that world powers agree that Iran should be reported to the U.N. Security Council. But reported being the operative word. They decided that on Monday, but let me tell, reported being the operative word. That means, Jim, of course, as you know, that the IAEA can continue its work in Iran and indeed that the U.N. Security Council can debate the issue, but can't discuss or won't discuss sanctions at this point.

Now, have we got to a breakthrough at this point? We're getting China and Russia to sign up to that draft resolution. It's certainly a window of opportunity, as Mr. ElBaradei has suggested. Certainly, to a certain extent, gets Iran's back up against the wall, and essentially means it's running out of time for negotiations.

So getting to the point that you raised, Russia becomes extremely important in this respect. Now, there is a proposal on the table, a Russian proposal on the table, that Iran shifts its large scale energy-related enrichment activities to Russia. And that would effectively mean the potential bomb making materials that the world believes Iran has or is making would be out of the Islamic Republic's hands.

Now, that offer was initially rejected by the Iranians. They are now saying that they will still discuss it. Indeed, the Iranian ambassador here at the IAEA said to me last night that they want to talk about the dimensions of that offer. One of the editorial writers in "The New York Times" earlier today suggests that all of this is just a red herring, giving Iran more time. Discussions, though, continue. Russia extremely important at this stage -- Jim.

CLANCY: A bit more time, but time, it would seem, in one way or another, is running out. Thank you. Becky Anderson reporting live from IAEA headquarters.

We're going to have more here on YOUR WORLD TODAY. We're going to be taking a closer look beyond the dimension that we're talking about right now, a closer look at Iran itself.

GORANI: For many who live there, it's been a way of life for too long and it's caused some Iranians to take drastic measures, just to survive. Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

GORANI: Welcome back. You're with YOUR WORLD TODAY on CNN International.

The ongoing nuclear standoff is the farthest thing from the minds of many Iranians. Their main concern is poverty, unemployment and the daily struggle.

As chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour tells us, their plight has revealed startling revelations about life in the Islamic state.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR, CNN CHIEF INTL. CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Bandar-Abbas is Iran's biggest commercial port, but many of its people are poor after three decades of economic mismanagement. Iran's new president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has come here today to promise that he'll change all that. An important message, especially now that he's confronting the West over Iran's nuclear program.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): All of our neighbors, Pakistan and India have nuclear technology. Why is the U.S. barring us from having it?

AMANPOUR: Most Iranians agree but they also want to tell their president about their troubles at home. Today, these special mailboxes have been set up so they can send him their personal letters.

Tell me why you're sending letters to the president?

"Because we really think he'll deal with our problems," she says. "He's ready to listen to our complaints and resolve them, like our job and housing problems."

"He may or may not help us," says this woman, Zora, "but his presidency is enough for us and we thank God."

Partly because of his humble background, partly because of his fundamentalist Islamic faith the president has many supporters here, like this local government official.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): I want Iran to be developed, an Iran that will fight global arrogance. A fully pure Iran. And our president Mr. Ahmadinejad is really doing that.

AMANPOUR: But there are skeptics looking on like Ali whose letter to the president is an invitation.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): He says, he's one of us. So I ask him, please, spare a moment to come and see how we live. There are 11 people in my house and I am the only breadwinner.

AMANPOUR: Ali lost his job two years ago, but somehow he has to provide for all those who depend on him.

President Ahmadinejad says he has come to help the poor, people like you. As has he done?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): We haven't seen anything tangible so far. Mr. Ahmadinejad, instead of dealing with our problems, is confronting other countries like the U.S. And Israel, and that will make things worse. Today when I saw you, I just wanted to spill out all of my troubles because nobody in this country listens to me.

AMANPOUR: But President Ahmadinejad's fiery rhetoric does draw crowds. His speech in Bandar-Abbas attacks on the U.S. And despite threats of harsh economic sanctions which could drive the country further into poverty, he defiantly pledged not to be bullied into abandoning Iran's nuclear program.

MAHMOUD AHMADINEJAD, IRANIAN PRESIDENT (through translator): I declare to the big powers of the world that Iran and Iranian government will follow the path to achieve peaceful nuclear technology.

AMANPOUR: Later, back in the capital Tehran, the president held a press conference.

(on camera): You have said over and over again that your priority is to serve the people. We've been talking to some of the people, particularly in Banderabas, which you just visited, and they tell us that they've heard these slogans over and over again and their life doesn't change and they get poorer.

AHMADINEJAD: I don't know which people you've interviewed. If you mean the tens of hundreds of thousands of people who were there and were chanting slogans in support of the government, the president and his programs, if you mean those people, the answer is clear. If you mean imaginary people that you have interviewed, so be it.

AMANPOUR (voice-over): But there's nothing imaginary about poverty in Iran.

(on camera): This is southern Tehran, an Ahmadinejad stronghold. He based his presidential campaign around a promise to make life better for Iran's poor. But if Iran is further isolated, if sanctions are imposed, he'll have a hard time delivering. Iran itself says that 20 percent of its people live below the poverty line while many outside sources say it could be double that figure.

Back in Banderabas, poverty is driving Ali to despair. Tonight, like every night, he'll cruise the streets using his own car as a taxi. On a good night, he can make $8. But gypsy caps like his are illegal and if he's caught, he'll get a $10 fine.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): This dilapidated car is my only source of income and I have nothing else. I see absolutely no light for the future.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CLANCY: A better tomorrow. That's what it's about, beyond the political controversy. We're going to have more of Christian Amanpour's reporting from Iran straight ahead, on right here on YOUR WORLD TODAY.

GORANI: We'll look at how the new hardline government is cracking down on cultural freedom, denying access to everything from rock music to some Web sites.

Stay with us.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CLANCY: Iran's government has not only been raising concerns around the world, but also inside the Islamic republic itself.

Chief international correspondent Christiane Amanpour gives us a look at the life for Iranian people, in particular the slow erosion of cultural freedom.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

AMANPOUR (voice-over): There are two Irans, two kinds of people. Here, the Islamic hard liners whose defiant message dominates public prayers that are held every Friday.

And here, a hidden nation of people who are both fearful of the hard liners and desperate for a dialogue, not a screaming match, with the world. We went looking for some of those voices and we found them underground, literally, squeezed between this high rise and a highway, young musicians who are rarely heard outside this sound proof bunker.

They must play in the shadows because in the Islamic Republic of Iran it's impossible for rock groups to get a permit to play in public.

(MUSIC)

AMANPOUR (on camera): How many times have you been able to perform publicly here?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five times.

AMANPOUR: Five times in how long?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Five years.

AMANPOUR: In five years.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That makes it one concert per year.

AMANPOUR: Is that enough?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No. We would rather play every day. AMANPOUR (voice-over): But that's not likely to happen under Iran's new Islamic fundamentalist president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He wants only traditional Persian or classical Western music on the government airways, not what he calls indecent, obscene Western music. And this suits the president's many hard lined allies just fine. We came to this mosque to hear from them.

(on camera): Why are young pop groups here not allowed to perform in public?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): What they are playing is propagating European and American cultures. So we demand that Mr. Ahmadinejad confront this kind of music. This is an Islamic Republic.

AMANPOUR (voice-over): Any hope the West might somehow influence change in Iran seems to be fading. With the new president, religious hard-liners are consolidating their hold on power and on people's lives. Freedoms enjoyed under Iran's previous reformist president are slipping away.

ESSA SAHARKHIZ, EDITOR (through translator): A large number of journalists, writers and artists have packed their bags to leave the country. But those who can't do so have to accept whatever restrictions are imposed on them.

AMANPOUR: He should know. At the end of the reform era, many of his newspapers were shut down by Iran's conservatives. So for many people, life under the conservative government has become a constant game of cat and mouse.

There are over a million blogs in the Farsi language, making it the world's fourth largest Web community. And the sites range from the political to the personal. This man runs his own Web site about media technology.

(on camera): Are you able to go anywhere on this Internet? Can you go to any site you want?

MUSTAFA GHOVANLAN, JOURNALIST/BLOGGER (through translator): No, we can't access sites that are pornographic or immoral but also a number of political Web sites written in the Farsi language, like "The Voice of America."

(in English): Access denied.

AMANPOUR: Access denied. And now that the conservatives have won, do you think it will have an effect on your blogging, on your freedom on the blog?

GHOVANLAN (through translator): What's happened after these elections is that the bloggers have been put off from politics, so young people in Iran are now more interested in recreation.

AMANPOUR (voice-over): An astonishing two-thirds of the Iranian population is under 30. And whatever hopes the West may pin on them, for now it seems they want to escape. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: From what I've seen, they just want to be free. They just want to have a good time. We can see boys and girls freely skiing together, sitting down together, listening to the same music. We are happy and have smiles on our face. This is one of the first times this has happened on a ski resort in Iran.

AMANPOUR: Ali Asadri (ph) is managing Tehran's snowboarding challenge.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We try to take the barriers for it a little bit and make some changes to the norms.

AMANPOUR: For instance, at this unusual nighttime ski show. There's a deejay and he's allowed to blast his music because it's a techno version of an ode to one of Islam's most important religious figures. With everyone here now feeling out the limits of the new administration, playing hit and run with the sensors is practice to perfection, especially by Tehran's actors and artists.

To get her play on, this director had to rewrite some Bertolt Brecht scenes because unmarried sex is forbidden in Iran.

AZITA HAJIAN, THEATER DIRECTOR: You're an artist, so you need the art, so you try to make it in any situation.

AMANPOUR: But the situation has just become much more challenging. As we heard from the regime's true believers at the mosque.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Since President Ahmadinejad came to power he gave us our ideals back. The ideals we fought for 25 years ago.

AMANPOUR: But with President Ahmadinejad on a collision course with the outside world, opposition leaders like Reza Khatami the former president's brother, are worried that the people will pay the price.

(on camera): If the West puts a lot of pressure on Iran, what will the result be?

REZA KHATAMI, OPPOSITION PARTY LEADER: You can isolate the government of Iran but it doesn't mean that you should isolate the Iranian people. I think opening the doors is the best way, not closing the doors.

AMANPOUR (voice-over): Tonight, as the lights go out on this performance, no one can predict how Iran's bigger drama will end.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CLANCY: Iran certainly on the world stage. Christiane Amanpour standing by in London. We've got a couple of minutes, Hola. Let's see if we can find out some more.

GORANI: Christiane, a quick first question. What have people told you off-camera on both sides of this cultural question that perhaps they weren't willing to say on camera?

AMANPOUR: Well, to the big question as the Western leaders want, will the Iranian people eventually to overthrow this government -- they have no stomach, I've found, for any revolutions or any over-the- top politics. And I think what they're really doing is hunkering down and trying to see how they can best survive what is most definitely a new much more conservative government, one that harks back to the early days of the revolution.

The reformers have said that the more pressure the West puts on, the more it plays into the hands of the hardliners. The hardliners believe that the nuclear issue is the one thing the Iranian people stand behind them on, and therefore they know they have the people behind them. Although I don't believe the people want go as far as confrontation with the rest of the world.

And the conservatives also say they feel the West has taken the nuclear crisis as an excuse for regime change, that this is all about trying to get this government somehow to disintegrate and disappear. And they feel very strongly that they never got enough from the Europeans over their last round of negotiations, most particularly in the area of security guarantees.

CLANCY: Christiane, is it really a matter of national pride? And the nuclear issue is something that they can take pride in. They equate it with the progress they may not have in other areas?

AMANPOUR: It actually is. I mean, they basically say us to, Israel has it, Pakistan has it, India has it. They're all friends and they do business with the West, why can't we have it? What they don't understand - and what they don't accept is that it's Iran's accusations about it being a sponsor of state terrorism, those reasons why the West is afraid of Iran having a weapon. The people there want a peaceful program, but of course that's against what the West wants.

CLANCY: Christiane Amanpour, we have to leave it there. Great work. Really some great insights into Iran.

GORANI: Fascinating stories.

And this has been YOUR WORLD TODAY. Thanks for watching. I'm Hala Gorani.

CLANCY: I'm Jim Clancy. Stay with CNN.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com