Five major international broadcasters — Voice of America, British Broadcasting Corp., Deutsche Welle, Audiovisuel Extérieur de la France and Radio Netherlands Worldwide — recently called on Iran to stop jamming radio and TV signals targeted at that country.

WASHINGTON --- If you think China and Iran are where the fight for Internet freedom are centered, you may want to reconsider.

According to Bob Boorstin, Google’s Director of Corporate and Policy Communications, the crucial battles today are elsewhere.

“India is number one,” he said, when I asked which country was at the top of his list. Another is Russia, where he said the problem is the corrupt private individuals who may soon hold the Internet for ransom.

"You may soon be paying large fees to mysterious figures,” he predicted, for Internet access there.

While Israeli leaders are sending warnings of potential strikes against Iran's nuclear installations, a group of Iranian-Israelis are transmitting a different message. RADISIN, a private Farsi-language radio station, airs Iranian music, poetry and current affairs shows aiming to spread peace between the Israeli and Iranian people.

The Syrian crisis is well nigh the biggest blow to the current Iranian regime's prestige since it was established in 1979. It is now safe to argue that Iran is squandering the soft power it has been exercising among the various Muslim groups around the globe.

What this brief overview argues is that Turkey has consistently tried to avert recourse to intervention and war in the Middle East and to promote diplomatic approaches that rely exclusively on soft power.

More than a thousand young activists were flown here earlier this week for a conference on “the Islamic Awakening,” Tehran’s effort to rebrand the popular Arab uprisings of the past year. But there was a catch. No one was invited from Syria...That inconvenient truth soon marred the whole script.

Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has officially launched a Spanish-language satellite TV channel, saying it would deal a blow to "dominance seekers" – remarks that were an apparent dig at the US and the west. The launch is Tehran's latest effort to reach out to friendly governments in Latin America.

It is time for Ankara to recognize that there are serious differences between it and Tehran's regional visions. All in all, Iran's lack of democracy limits the scope of this country's foreign policy. Iran cannot generate the soft power that would show it to be a natural supporter of all pro-democratic movements in the Islamic world.