110 Years of the Ayatollah's Iran A Government which has been seen to be bloody and oppressive by outsiders, which has sacrificed over one million of its own people in a futile war; such a government you would think would have lost any support it once had. The remarkable thing about Iran is not only that the revolution has survived, but that it still commands the loyalty of most of the population. Last month a BBC documentary team reported from inside Iran on the occasion on the 10th anniversary of the revolution, but in the wake of the Salman Rushdie affair, and the acute worsening of relations that followed, such glimpses into Iranian life are likely to become increasingly rare.

2Since the previous story was compiled, the Ayatollah has sought the death sentence for British-based writer Salman Rushdie. In the eyes of the Ayatollah and the rest of the Muslim world, Rushdie's crime was to have deeply insulted Islam with his book, 'The Satanic Verses'. The affair has reopened the conflict of values between Islam and the West, conflict that puts the New Zealand Government in an awkward position. One the one hand it has protested the Ayatollah's incitement to murder, and on the other hand it has tried not to push the point so hard as to jeopardise New Zealand's meat trade with Iran. Foreign Minister Russell Marshall has changed this however, by accusing Iran of virtual state terrorism.