We can't coddle Iran

Later this month, tens of millions of people will celebrate Nowruz, the Iranian new

year. Hopefully, it will be the last the Iranian people will mark under the radical Islamist dictatorship that oppresses them. Iranians are doing what they can to demand the human rights denied to them. The United States and other democracies must assist them in their plight.

Iran's rogue regime has long engaged in ``ongoing, systematic violations of human rights,'' according to the State Department's annual reports on human rights. Those in power engage in torture, flogging, amputation and stoning. Dissidents are subject to arbitrary detention, imprisonment, violence and murder -- both by the regime and by affiliated vigilante groups. Women and ethnic and religious minorities such as Bahai, Jews and Ahvazi Arabs suffer systematic, official discrimination and persecution.