Blatter in Tehran With The Cheetah

Sepp Blatter, the head of FIFA visited the Biodiversity Museum at Pardisan Park on Thursday as part of his visit to Iran last week. Football fans in Iran were overwhelmed to hear that Blatter supported Iran's environmental initiative to use the Asiatic Cheetah which is an endangered species in Iran, as the emblem of Iran's team at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. The Cheetah is now extinct in all of Asia except Iran .Based on a conservation project starting during my first term in 2001, NGOs, specialists and international organisations began a conservation project. The project was evaluated as successful in preventing the extinction of the Cheetah in its first phase. I signed the second phase of the project with UNDP last week. We spoke about the need to promote environmental awareness for football fans world wide and when Blatter named the visit a Cheetah Coalition I noted that we could also propose an international mechanism for this important purpose. Blatter welcomed the proposal which I will follow.

A Call for Putin

Dr. Massoumeh Ebtekar called for immediate release of Greenpeace Activists http://www.tehrantimes.com/politics/111863-irans-environmental-chief-urges-russia-to-release-greenpeace-activists- No government in any part of the world should use violence and deprivation as tools against civil organizations and environmental activists who care for the future of the earth (Iran's Environment News Agency) Following the detention of 30 Green Peace activists protesting against Russia's oil drilling in the arctic who were further charged with hooliganism and piracy by a court in Russia, Dr. Massoumeh Ebtekar called for immediate release of these activist. "Given that this act is directly in relation to non-exploitation of new hydrocarbon resources in the arctic and aimed at stopping the global warming, it is indeed an act of compassion and apprehension," said Dr. Massoumeh Ebtekar, head of Department of Environment of Iran and winner of the « Champion of The Earth » title in 2006, in an interview with Iran's Environmental News Agency. "I expect that by realizing this fact, the government of Russia would at once order the release of these activists," added Massoumeh Ebtekar. She noted that: "No government in any part of the world should use violence and deprivation as tools against civil organizations and environmental activists who care for the future of the earth, and as a champion of the earth, I call upon the Russian government to scrutinize every dimension of this case and act to remove the restrictions off these Greenpeace activists.