"A State Department official involved with the Iran democracy portfolio recently told me that approximately $66 million was approved by Congress, with half going to U.S. government-funded broadcasters—the Voice of America Farsi language service and Radio Farda. There's currently a fight over the broadcasting content, with hardliners such as Senator Tom Coburn arguing that the Farsi language broadcasting should be more aggressively hostile to the Tehran regime and promote uprisings. The list of recipients of the other $33 million is classified, in order to protect recipients who may be targeted by the Iran regime. But part of that money has reportedly been distributed through U.S.-based human rights groups and outfits such as Freedom House, the National Endowment for Democracy, the International Republican Institute, and the National Democratic Institute.
...
The Tehran regime has long had a truly horrific record of jailing and torturing students, bloggers, journalists, academics, trade unionists, women demonstrators, and think-tank people with ties to western colleagues, and even the lawyers for some of these people.
Since the Bush Administration announced that it would fund opposition groups, the Iranian government has arrested intellectuals, writers, and activists who have participated in conferences abroad that were sponsored by private NGOs, and accused them of being involved in American-backed efforts to overthrow the regime. Surely if the U.S. wanted to promote democracy in Iran, it would have been better not to discuss it so loudly. In making these high-profile announcements, perhaps the Bush Administration was trying to signal to Congress, the public and the Iranian diaspora that this is something it is committed to. The international consequences may not have been carefully thought out."
http://harpers.org/archive/2007/05/sb-20070504crjk
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