The Mullah's End??

The Mullahs’ Dead End?
By Jamie Glazov
FrontPageMagazine.com | Monday, July 14, 2008

Frontpage Interview's guest today is Hassan Daioleslam, an Iranian human rights activist and political scholar. Daioleslam was born in Tehran in 1957. After finishing his primary and high school in Tehran, he entered the Polytechnic University of Tehran in 1974. In the years after the 1979 Iranian Islamist Revolution in Iran, he became a student movement leader standing up against Khomeini's repression and mass executions. He eventually left the country and settled in France. During the 1980s and early 1990s, Daioleslam was active with Iranian secular movements, human rights activities and the defense of Iranian political prisoners.

In 2001, Daioleslam moved to the United States and concentrated on political research. Since 2005, he has been collaborating with two independent Iranian journalists inside Iran focusing on the Iranian Regime's lobby in the U.S. His reports have been largely published by major Farsi websites and several US journals. Daioleslam has frequently appeared as an expert guest on the Voice of America-TV as well as on other outlets of Persian media.

FP: Hassan Daioleslam welcome back to Frontpage Interview.

Daioleslam: I am delighted to be back.

FP: In our last interview we discussed the new calls for negotiating with Iran. You talked about the fact that negotiating with the Iranian government is really not new and that it has been going on for the last three decades to no avail. So if we should not negotiate with the Mullahs and if as you have argued before, military action against Iran is a disastrous option, what course of action is left? What could the US do to curtail the Iranian nuclear ambitions and stop its drive to dominating the Middle East?

Daioleslam: Before suggesting a realistic and viable approach, we must first understand the situation in Iran. There are a range of suggested solutions there. Unfortunately, many of them are based on a very poor or wrong understanding of the state of the Iranian government. Probably the main reason for that is the sophisticated misinformation campaign of the Iranian lobby in the US. A clear example of such misinformation campaign is the war mongering boastings of Trita Parsi, the president of the Iranian lobby NIAC that suggests Iran is so powerful now that the US has to share the Middle East with them – as if Middle East is someone’s to give and someone’s to get. An accurate understanding of the internal state of affairs of the Iranian regime places numerous winning cards in the hands of the international community to stop the Mullahs’ drive to expansionism and nuclear weapons.

FP: So what is the situation in Iran? Ahmadinejad has a good grip on the country, yes?

Daioleslam: The Iranian regime is experiencing its most difficult situation of the past thirty years. As some Iranian analysts are arguing, the regime is at a turning point that will eventually decide the fate of the Clerical rule. The governmental figures use words such as: “economic disintegration,” “political impasse,” “leadership crisis,” “unprecedented social unrests,” and “total corruption” to describe the conditions in the country.

FP: Could these words be just excessive rhetoric rather than the reality of the situation?

Daioleslam: Good question. Let me quote some of the Iranian politicians. Recently, there was a very interesting dialogue between two famous politician and analysts in Iran. Saeed Hadjarian was interviewed by Abbas Abdi. They are considered as the pillars of "reformist" faction. Let's read an excerpt of the dialogue:

A. Abdi: It has been a while that the people I encounter ask me about the future, they want to know what will happen. Apparently, for many, the future of the country is uncertain. Do the people ask you the same question?

Hadjarian: Yes. They have no clue about their tomorrow and feel insecure. The government can't control anything. There is actually anarchism in the country. The government is being disintegrated. It is like the end of the time. We have descended in the hell.

Another Iranian commentator, Ahmad Zeidabadi, compared the regime's difficulties to a “seven head dragon”.

Ibrahim Yazdi, the former foreign minister and one of the most experienced Iranian politicians, went even further and recently talked about the regime's total impasse:

"I believe that the regime as a whole is going to a total impasse. There is something wrong that whatever they do, the situation gets worst. The Economic situation is worsening and Ahmadinejad is bringing the economic disintegration.

The situation is so bad that the regime should quickly opt for a historical and fundamental turn."

FP: How does this situation affect the outcome of the Iranian nuclear issue?

Daioleslam: There are two distinct views about the Iranian choices and the path it will eventually take. There are those who believe that the regime is in such a weak position that it will finally surrender to the international pressure. Ibrahim Yazdi for example said:

"At the end of the war with Iraq, Iran was in such a bad position that finally accepted the UN resolution. We are in the same position now because the catastrophic political and economic situation will force the regime to surrender to internal exigencies in much worst conditions. Briefly, if we take into account the two experiences of war with Iraq and the US embassy hostage taking, we should be concerned that the regime would eventually surrender to the UN resolutions in such bad terms that the national interests would be jeopardized."

There is also another view which I personally believe will dominate. This point of view is that the regime cannot or should not retreat. Any retreat is like a breach in a dam and will only stop with the regime's total surrender. This is the dominant belief among the Iranian leadership. As Rafsanjani has recently declared: "if we retreat on this issue, we will allow our enemy to interfere with all the issues of our country."

FP: Ok, so some critics argue that, because of this situation, there may be some flexibility from the Iranians on the nuclear impasse. The deal that the West is offering Tehran is very sweet and might be hard for them to turn down.

Daioleslam: Let me explain this further. In order to understand the Iranian regime's dilemma, we should go back to 2002-2003 when the regime passed a fundamental turning point. The result was the emergence of the Revolutionary Guards as the dominant force in Iran, symbolized later by Ahmadinejad's ascendance to power. That turning point is the root cause of the actual gloomy conditions in Iran and the mullahs’ incapacity to accommodate the demands of the international pressure.

FP: Elaborate on this please.

Daioleslam: Ok, I will try. Let’s start with a question. Why in 2005, did the Iranian leadership replace Mohammad Khatami, a smiling and internationally greeted president with a radical and repelling personality as Ahmadinejad? Note that in Iran, despite the masquerade of elections, presidents are selected rather than elected. It is naïve to believe that Ahmadinejad's triumph was the result of a popular democratic process. The 2005 elections were particularly rigged. For the first time in the three decade history of the Clerical rule, all the candidates (except the lucky winner) publicly talked about massive intervention of the Guards and organized cheating.

So, the question is why the Iranian regime underwent such a radical transformation. Why was there a need to unify the power under the Guards' control?

FP: Are you suggesting that Ahmadinejad was Tehran’s answer to a challenge?

Daioleslam: Exactly. In 2002- 2003, the Iranian clandestine nuclear program was uncovered and the regime was under immense pressure. At the same time, Iraq was invaded by the coalition forces and Tehran was faced with US massive presence. These two new elements were on top of the most important threat that regime was facing: the internal unrests and a growing social and political dissent movement.

To face these three challenges, regime had two choices: First choice was to come clean in nuclear dossier, get along with new regional geopolitics and finally liberalize the political atmosphere inside the country. We know that Tehran did not follow this path. The Ayatollahs opted for the second choice:

- Confronting the new regional order and using it as a stepping stone for their expansionism,

- Buying time to advance the nuclear program, and

- Crushing the social and political movements.

All three of these elements required means of implementing them: Mullahs' armed forces- The Pasdaran Army (Revolutionary Gaurds); Hence Ahmedinejad’s presidency. The current catastrophic economic, political and social conditions, international isolation and placing the whole region at the verge of a dangerous war, are all consequences of this strategic choice by Tehran.

FP: Are these conditions irreversible, or can the regime get out of this?

Daioleslam: Let's for the sake of argument imagine that tomorrow, the West gets tenfold more generous and even offers the whole Middle East on a tray to the Iranian regime. And then in return, requests that Iran abandon its nuclear program. Since the nuclear program has been largely under the Guards' control and because of the missile program directly related to the nuclear program, the first step in verification should have to be total access to the suspected Iranian military bases and weapon facilities controlled by the Guards. Tehran will undoubtedly refuse. In Iran the Revolutionary Guards are the dominant power players. They have operations in many Middle Eastern countries. They have strategic military build ups in Iraq, Lebonan and several other countries. They have direct and active partnerships with radical groups in the region. They have direct involvement with Iraqi government. Can they possibly open their doors to the Western observers and inspectors?

Furthermore, for the past five years, Iran with the help of their lobby machinery in the US, has played the role of victim, targeted and harassed by the Israel-US hawks. How can they afford to lose this card and become guilty of pursuing a secret and advanced nuclear weapon program?

If the scope of Iranian weapon program becomes visible, the Western public opinion will push for a Libya or North Korean scenario: to bring and end to their whole nuclear program. Iran will not genuinely agree to any meaningful inspection of their facilities.

FP: One could argue that the incentives are so high that the Iranian regime would accept all these consequences.

Daioleslam: In order to predict what kind of incentive would bring the Iranian to a negotiating table, we should first understand how much Iran has spent on their nuclear project. I mean political cost, economic cost and diplomatic cost. The nuclear program has been the single most important project in Iran for almost three decades. It has bled the oil rich country to poverty. What can the West pay Tehran for stopping a program that is so heavily invested in? For Ayatollahs, this project is a weapon of power projection in Islamic world and not a weapon of deterrence.

FP: What about the argument that Iran should be given security guarantees in return for stopping the nuclear program?

Daioleslam: Iran's main threat comes from the Iranian people. What kind of international guarantee could reconcile the Iranians with their rulers? Iran's surrender to the international exigencies will weaken the regime against the Iranian people. A clerical rule, confined to its borders and under strict international inspection is a naked king before its subjects. More than anyone else, mullahs know that.

Remember the end of war with Iraq. Immediately after Iran was forced to accept the cease fire, a huge demand for social and political freedom grew in the country. Khomeini responded by massacre of political prisoners and then, to fill the vacuum of the war, he issued the infamous fatwa against Salman Rushdie. The repeat of this scenario would be almost impossible for the regime.

FP: Based on your argument, the Iranian regime on one hand is incapable of retreating from its nuclear aspirations and accommodating the international community. On the other hand Tehran is suffering from a catastrophic economic, social and political situation. What is the impact of this dilemma on the Iranian leadership?

Daioleslam: Confusion. Weakness. Chaos. The lack of authority in the government is so obvious that even if the West comes to Tehran for surrender, we would not know whom we should surrender to! Just a few days after the 5+1 proposal, there was a fight between different factions each claiming to have the final authority to respond to the proposal.

FP: Is this state of disorientation well perceived in the Western capitals?

Daioleslam: I believe that the decision makers are aware of the economic, social, political and the leadership crisis in Iran. Of course it does not prevent the Iranian lobby to stick to its traditional campaign of projecting a powerful and unified Iranian leadership. To give an example, let's go to the predictable CFR Iran expert, Ray Takeyh, a champion of distorting the Iranian reality. He recently wrote in the Washington Post:

"Although Iran's theocratic regime is perennially divided against itself, it has sustained a remarkable consensus on the nuclear issue. In today's political climate, neither Western sanctions nor offers of incentives will fracture state unity."

Of course, a newspaper reader in Iran sees that instead of this imaginary "unity", there is a disintegrated leadership.

FP: Is the crisis in leadership an additional hurdle for a hypothetical deal with Iran?

Daioleslam: Absolutely. Many in Iran compare the current situation in Iran to the last year of Iran’s war with Iraq in 1998. At that time, Iran was forced to accept the UN resolution “drank the cup of poison” as Ayatollah Khomeini described it. Now, Iran has to drink a more potent poison while the regime lacks Khomeini's authority to minimize the political and social consequences. The patient is weaker, the poison more fatal and no one in the Iranian leadership capable of drinking it.

FP: Mr. Daioleslam, thank you for joining us.

Daioleslam: Thank you for the opportunity to share my views with your readers.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jamie Glazov is Frontpage Magazine's managing editor. He holds a Ph.D. in History with a specialty in U.S. and Canadian foreign policy. He edited and wrote the introduction to David Horowitz’s Left Illusions. He is also the co-editor (with David Horowitz) of The Hate America Left and the author of Canadian Policy Toward Khrushchev’s Soviet Union (McGill-Queens University Press, 2002) and 15 Tips on How to be a Good Leftist. To see his previous symposiums, interviews and articles Click Here. Email him at jglazov@rogers.com.

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Chief Propaganda arm of Islamic Republic exposed

Sheema Kalbasi, the award winning author, has a few question for Mr. Trita Parsi and his Islmaic republic certified outfit/lobby; the self-proclaimed/appointed organization, which supposedly represents Iranian-Americans, NIAC:

Reprinted from Sheema's blog:

Trita Parsi: Man of the Year!The National Iranian American Council (NIAC) has been at the forefront of lobbying against continued Congressional funding of Voice of America-Persian service; Radio Farda; and grants for Iranian civil society. Now it turns out that NIAC accepted not one grant from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), but three: here,and here.
And so a few open questions:
1) If you believe all Iranian civil society activists don’t want these programs and, indeed, they backfire, why did you reapply for grants in 2006 and 2007?

2) In your grant applications, did you tell the National Endowment for Democracy that your programs were successful when you now say the programs are counterproductive?
Did it take you three years to come to this conclusion, or did you believe differently in 2005 and 2006?
3) For the sake of transparency, will you release publicly the reports you issued to the National Endowment for Democracy so we can compare your statements to them with those in your letter to Congress? Do you not believe that a discrepancy would equate with fraud? Will you return the money you took from NED if a discrepancy exists?

4) You demand that the State Department should release to you and the public the names of Iranian civil society activists who have accepted grants, participated in conferences funded with the Congressional Iran civil society grant, or participated in citizen exchange programs supported with the Congressional Iran civil society funding. Will you publicly release the names of the Iranian groups with whom you have worked during your three years of receiving NED funding? Are these groups representative of democracy activists and independent civil society or do they represent the reformist faction of the Iranian government? I hope that you should not oppose transparency.

5) You cite Akbar Ganji in support of your efforts to cut off funding to Radio Farda. Are you aware of reports that Mr. Ganji is seeking to start his own radio program? Do you not believe that Iranians should have access to as many voices as possible? You also differentiate between Iranian civil society activists that fled Iran in recent years, Akbar Atri, for example, and those who remain in Iran, like Mr. Ganji. In what country does Mr. Ganji now live? Has he returned to Iran after coming to the States?

6) While you seek a cut-off of Congressional funding for democracy in Iran, do you feel the same way about the funding George Soros gives to civil society activists? After all, the Iranian government cited Mr. Soros' grants in their recent crackdown. Do you believe U.S. policy should adhere to whatever the Iranian government says?

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Congratulations to Mr. Mohammad Navab on Leaving CASMII

This is great news. One down, many more to go.

Check out VF's expose of NIAC, too.

Vigilante Freedom:

Back in July we wrote about The National Iranian American Council Mr. Mohammad Navab, a member of NIAC, (see here,here, and here) and indicating that he was also a board member of the Campaign Against Sanctions And Military Action In Iran (CASMII). Today, we received a comment from Mr. Navab: (see here):

Dear allThank you for your efforts towards the well being of this great nation. I, like you wish to see the best continuing for this phenomenal country (the most interesting in human history) and the people of other countries. One clarification that needs to be made though is that I am not a member of CASMII and I would highly appreciate this correction to be made in your analyses.With thanks and best wishes,Mohamad Navab

The IP and Email address both trace back to UCLA, where Mr. Navab teaches, so I’m relatively comfortable saying its him. Thinking that perhaps we had made a mistake when we identified Mr. Navab as a CASMII board member, and wishing to correct, I returned to the link we had provided to the CASMII site where Mr. Navab’s name was found, and found this: Access Denied.
Well, I thought, that’s odd. With a little help I found A google cache here:(captured as .PDF here, with additional pages here and here). Mr. Navab had served as a board member of CASMII when our article was written. Mr. Navab has now been removed from CASMII’s website and is no longer listed as a Board member. It seems that Mr. Navab has chosen to distance himself from CASMII, and he picked a good time to do it. From CASMII this week, “Friendly American Encounter with Revolutionary Guard“.

An American peace delegation which visited Iran recently has described a striking friendly encounter with some three hundred members of the Revolutionary Guards. In a statement, the head of the delegation has strongly debunked the US administration’s decision to label these soldiers as terrorist and has called on Americans to oppose a new war of aggression.

Of course the evidence that IRGC has assisted in the killing of American soldiers is overwhelming. So we were pleased to hear that Mr. Navab has chosen to no longer be with the CASMII Board of Directors, and we congratulate him on that decision.

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Say No to Participation of AI and HR

Source

Please Read the Below Statement and Sign here

I Say No to Participation of Amnesty International and Human Rights watch in a Gathering Organized by NIAC that is a Mockery of Human Rights in Iran

A Mockery of Human Rights by National Iranian American Council (NIAC)

NIAC, a group that has never condemned the human rights violations of the Islamic Regime and is committed to the unconditional relations between the US and the Islamic Regime, is forming a panel discussion to discuss: “Human Rights in Iran and U.S. Foreign Policy Options.” The Amnesty International is among the four sponsors of this event and the representative of both Amnesty and Human Rights Watch (HRW) will participate in the panel discussion.

Please act NOW to stop the legitimization of lobby groups by the International Human Rights Organizations.


Dear freedom loving friends,

Four institutions have sponsored a conference organized by the National Iranian American Council (NIAC) in D.C. on July 26, 2007 under the title, “Human Rights in Iran and U.S. Foreign Policy Options”. What is greatly shocking and disturbing is that one of these four sponsors is Amnesty International and that the representatives of both Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch are supposed to participate in a panel discussion at this gathering. It is shocking because NIAC is an organization that has been lobbying for establishing the unconditional relations between the U.S. and the Islamic Regime of Iran (IR) since its inception, and has not shown any concern whatsoever about the human rights violations in Iran. We don’t need to go far to prove these claims about NIAC.

Everything that this organization does whether it is an event for youth, forming a conference, supporting the anti-war movements, dealing with Iranian/American issues or local politics, it is all directly or indirectly designed to serve one and only one purpose: Establishing relations between the United States and one of the most brutal violators of human rights, the Islamic Regime of Iran. A careful look at the NIAC website, its public statements, public events, and its nonpartisan support of the U.S. political figures who share NIAC vision in dealing with the Islamic Regime, would be enough to show you what NIAC really stands for. Not only does NIAC not deny this, but like all other lobby groups declares very proudly that it does so because of its love for Iranian people!

On the issue of human rights, we have challenged Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch to find one statement issued by NIAC since its formation in condemning the Islamic Regime for violating the basic human rights of Iranians. Not even one single sentence has been issued by NIAC in condemnation of IR for stoning, torture, execution of political prisoners, or the treatment of women and religious minorities. If you check the NIAC website, you cannot find any reference to human rights in its mission statement, goals, programs or anywhere else. None of the many urgent actions issued by Amnesty International to stop imminent execution of political prisoners or stoning of men and women to death, has been distributed by NIAC.

This event is a mockery of human rights and an insult to all those who have paid dearly in Iran for standing for their rights. We have to let AI and HRW know this and keep reminding them of their real mission in condemning human rights violations in Iran instead of promoting an organization that does not have any concern about human rights violations in Iran .

Please use the following contact information for the representatives of AI and HRW in this event and urge them not to participate. Just one quick phone call or writing a short line or two would go a long way in voicing our outrage with NIAC and its promoters.

Please note that although Ms. Alex Arriaga has been named as one of the participant in panel discussion but when we called her to verify, she indicated that Mr. Janmohamed would be representing AI in this gathering.
Thank you.

Contact Information:

Zahir Janmohamed

Advocacy Director, Middle East and North Africa, Amnesty International USA

Amnesty International

600 Pennsylvania Ave. SE , 5th Floor
Washington , D.C. 20003

Tel: (202) 544-0200 Ext: 318
Fax: (202) 546-7142
E-mail: zjanmohamed@aiusa.org

Main Office:

Tel: (212) 807-8400
Fax: (212) 627-1451

Joe Stork

Deputy Director, Middle East and North Africa
Human Rights Watch

350 Fifth Ave. , 34th Floor

New York , NY 10118-3299

Tel: (212) 290-4700
Fax: (212) 736-1300
E-mail: hrwnyc@hrw.org

NIAC's Website
Previously:
Global Politician's Report on NIAC

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Twisted Parsley CAIN hard at work

PLEASE WRITE ABOUT THIS ON YOUR BLOG AND SPREAD THE WORD


Ayatollahs’ Lobby In Washington Offering Human Rights As A Negotiating Item
Hassan Daoleslam - 7/21/2007
The National Iranian American Council (NIAC) and its president Trita Parsi plan to organize a panel in the US House of Representatives on July 26th, 2007, titled “Human Rights in Iran and US Foreign Policy Options” [1]. According to the published agenda, representatives from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch will participate. The sponsors of the program (NIAC and Trita Parsi) are key players in the lobby enterprise of Tehran’s ayatollahs in the United States. The Iranian regime’s violations of human rights have reached unprecedented levels. Its barbaric suppression of women, workers, students and dissidents, and the stoning of a man after 11 years of imprisonment, have been the subject of broad international condemnation. The reason Iran’s lobby is organizing the program is twofold:



1. To present “human rights” as a negotiating item on the “engagement” table with hopes to have human rights entities argue for Tehran-friendly rapprochement, easing of sanctions and tolerance of a nuclear Iran. In a nut shell, the lobby’s message is that the more West pressures the regime, the more violent it becomes, hence, lift the pressure.
2. To uphold the Ayatollahs’ friends and inner circles in control of international reaction to Tehran’s human rights abuses.


The Iranian regime’s lobby has continuously tried to justify the Iran’s clerical behavior and especially its record of human rights violations, by arguing that its cause are external factors and US coercive policies. If the Iranian American scholars are arrested, blame the US administration for allocating funds for Iranian activists. If Ahmadinejad has embarked on a policy of total repression inside the country and antagonism abroad, the blame is on US administration for the famous axis of evil speech and not supporting Khatami.

Ahmadinejad hold the Holocaust conference and declared that “Israel should be wiped off from the map”, Trita Parsi and his cohorts not only did not condemn this anti-Iranian and anti-humanity act, but launched a campaign directed by Siamak Namazi (Parsi’s main partner in Tehran) to blame the fault on “neocon” media which intentionally misinterpreted Ahmadinejad’s declarations [2].

The lobby’s PR tactic on human rights issue in Iran is best presented in Trita Parsi’s own declarations. In 2005, he called for linking improvement of the human rights situation in Iran to guarantee of security of the mullahs and the lifting of sanctions [3].

“While the world has focused on discussions over Tehran's nuclear capability, human rights in Iran have suffered severe setbacks…..With the rest of the world distracted by the nuclear issue, anti-democratic forces in Iran have clamped down on the Iranian democracy movement……. For Tehran, a nuclear arsenal is only really useful as a deterrent against possible US aggression. Iran does not need a nuclear deterrent against any other Middle Eastern country. …. Only security guarantees from the US, as part of a broader political arrangement, can convince Iran to agree to lasting compromises in the nuclear area.”

The mullahs’ message in this article is clear: If the west does not guarantee their uninterrupted rule (“security”) by providing ample financial resources (elimination of sanctions) and allowing an unimpeded path to super power status through development of nuclear capabilities, the regime will continue to suppress, kill and torture the Iranian people.

Binding accountability for Iran’s barbaric suppression of the population to nuclear issues and Iran’s meddling in Iraq per the demands of their US lobby, does the bidding of the ruling ayatollahs. The participation of international human rights organizations in this charade would be a grave mistake.
.

NIAC, Trita Parsi and The Iranian Regime

Officially founded in 2002, NIAC is one of the Iranian regime’s Lobby arms in the US. In a recent article I wrote about NIAC and its effective role as a lobby node for Tehran’s rulers [4,5].

In order to better understand the relation between NIAC and Tehran, we should refer to several figures directly involved in its creation. First and foremost, is Bob Ney, a current federal prisoner and former Ohio Congressman. Ney reportedly received bribes from lobbyists and two international arms dealers in a conspiracy to circumvent sanctions to sell US-made airplane parts to Tehran [6-8]. At the time, Trita Parsi was Ney’s assistant in Iran-related matters [9]. Then, there are two of Neys accomplices in his bribery and conspiracy relations with the arms dealers. These two are well-known Washington lobbyists Roy Coffee and Dave DiStefano. Roy Coffee in a letter to the Dallas Morning News in February 2006 [10] justifying his relationship with Ney and the arms dealers, discussed their collaboration with Trita Parsi to create an Iranian American lobby in 2002. In this letter, Coffee described the events following the meeting of his former classmate Darius Baghai (who had just returned from Iran) with Bob Ney:

“From that meeting, Darius, Dave and I began to work with Trita Parsi, another Iranian-American, to try to form a political action committee of Iranian-Americans to pursue a strategy of normalization of relations between the two countries. The 4 of us worked very hard for about 9 months to form this committee.”

One of the most important figures behind the creation of NIAC is Siamak Namazi who along with his sister and brother, control the Atieh Bahar enterprise, a major umbrella firm for several companies in Iran. Atieh’s customers include the foreign corporations who wish to do business in Iran and find no option but to bribe officials. Recent fiascos involving Atieh’s customers corrupted dealings with the Iranian regime (such as Norway’s Statoil.[12]or the CEO of the French oil company Total SA [13] )has not changed Namazi’s prominent place inside the dominant spheres of power in Tehran. Namazi’s enterprise continues to provide networking and computer services for almost all Iranian banks, parliament, and other important institutions. Namazi’s groups monitor nearly all Iranian economic and political activities and have access to the country’s most sensitive data [14]. One of the Atieh Bahar’s affiliated companies is Azar Energy, which is in partnership with Iranian government in oil projects and is a part of the Mullah’s oil mafia [15].

In 1999, Trita Parsi who was then living in Sweden, and Siamak Namazi, living in Tehran, presented a project in which they explained how to create an Iranian lobby in Washington. This roadmap for creating NIAC and its modus operandi was presented at the invitation and arrangement of Hossein Alikhani at a conference called “Dialogue and Action Amongst the People of Iran and America” (DAPIA) that he hosted in Cypress in 1999. [16]. Hossein Alikhani is a former felon who in 1992, pled guilty to charges of violating anti-terrorist sanctions [17] and spent some time in US federal prisons. Recently Iran’s ayatollahs promised him the deed for the US embassy complex in Tehran [18] for his pain and suffering in American prisons. The true reason for this very generous $1.0 billion dollar reward should be sought elsewhere.


The roadmap for the lobby in US is described in the paper [19] titled “Iranian-Americans: The bridge between two nations” in DAPIA. This report comprises the manifesto and roadmap of the new Iranian lobby in the US. In this paper, the authors suggest that: “an Iranian-American lobby is needed in order to create a balance between the competing Middle Eastern lobbies. Without it, Iran-bashing may become popular in Congress again.” The “competing lobby” was AIPAC (American Israeli Public Affairs Committee). The pillars of the road map are: To give the appearance of a citizen’s lobby; To mimic the Jewish lobby in the US; To impede Iranian opposition activities; To infiltrate the US political system; To break the taboo of working with the Iran’s cleric rulers for the Iranian Diaspora; To improve the image of the Iran’s government abroad.

Once NIAC was created in 2002, on November 25, 2002, Roy Coffee and Distefano organized a lobbying training class for NIAC in a restaurant in Washington DC area.[20,21]. On January 29th 2003, Bob Ney organized a fundraising for NIAC [22]. This was at the same time that the two London based felons related to the Iranian government, had hired the Washington lobbyists and were bribing Bob Ney.

On December 28, 2006 the governmental newspaper Aftab in Iran published an interview with Trita Parsi [23]. In his introduction, the editor underlined the role of Parsi’s lobby on behalf of the Iranian regime. Next to Parsi’s photo, the article’s title seems interesting: “The Iranian Lobby Becomes Active”. The translation of parts of the paper follows:

“The conflict between Iran and the West on Iran’s nuclear file has entered a critical state. The government must now utilize all the possible resources to defend the national interest. In this, we have not paid enough attention to the potentially significant influence of the Iranian American society in moderating the extremist policies of the White House. In comparison of this untouched potential to the influence of the Jewish lobby in directing the policies of Washington in supporting Israel, we see the difference between what is and what could be. The role of unofficial diplomacy (lobbying) has been correctly underlined by experts”

On September 19, 2006, the former head of the Iran Interest in Washington, Ambassador Faramarze Fathnejad thrilled about Trita Parsi and NIAC’s efforts underlined “the importance of relation with Iranian organizations in the U.S. and specially pointed to NIAC and his young leader who is a consultant to CNN and has been very successful in his efforts” [24].

To this date Trita Parsi and NIAC have tenaciously followed their declared roadmap and have worked hard to improve the image of Tehran’s rulers and pale Tehran unfriendly actions by the West.


Trita Parsi and the violations of Human Rights in Iran

In order to understand the Iranian regime’s goal of organizing the “human rights panel” in Washington, we should first examine Trita Parsi’s past activities on the issue of human rights in Iran. In this regards, Parsi has meticulously followed his boss, Bob Ney. In his famous speech in June 2001 before the American Iranian Council (AIC), Ney criticized the US government and stressed that Iran “has a freely elected president and a parliament”. Ney promised the launching of a citizen’s lobby to educate the American lawmakers about Iran. [25]. In 2002 NIAC was founded. In the next several years, Ney relentlessly opposed every single bill criticizing the Iranian regime. He countered such bills by presenting a rival bill. Naturally Trita Parsi’s role was to provide the “citizen’s support” through sending letters and contacting the lawmakers. NIAC continuously assisted Ney’s defense of the Iranian regime [26].

Parsi’s efforts have not been limited to helping Bob Ney. For instance, in 2000, the human rights activists protesting Kamal Kharazi presence in UCLA, disturbed the Iranian foreign minister’s speech. While Trita Parsi had always refrained from condemnation of the torture, mass executions, rapes of women in prison, and stoning consistently carried out by Tehran’s mullahs, he was outraged by this event and Kharazi’s deprivation of his rights. He wrote an article “The need for genuine human rights activists” [27].

By selectively quoting statements of the U.N. Special Representative for Human Rights in Iran, Parsi paints a rosy picture of the human rights situation in Iran.

"…significant progress has become evident in a number of areas and sums up the report with the following words: Overall, progress is certainly being made and, in the Special Representative's view, it is very likely to continue, perhaps even accelerate.”

Parsi then harshly criticizes the human rights groups that protested the speech of the Tehran’s Foreign Minister at UCLA:

“It is quite disturbing to witness groups that title themselves as Human Rights activists, openly and blatantly opposing the freedom of speech of an individual, no matter how despised he or she may be…… Freedom of expression is a fundamental human right that cannot be denied to anyone-including a person accused of violating other people's human rights or guilty of representing a government that continues to show inadequate respect for these rights. It was therefore a sad spectacle to witness the noisy opposition by these so-called Human Rights groups to Kharrazi's right to free expression at UCLA.”

For Mr. Parsi, “noisy opposition” at the speech of the envoy of an oppressive regime is a “quite disturbing” violation of a “fundamental human right” which “undermines the very idea” of human rights. Nonviolent verbal protests are, for Parsi, a “sad spectacle” of “intimidation” that we should deplore and denounce, but violent, misogynous, and well-documented oppression should be addressed with “respect and dialogue”:

“We need to implement and nurture a culture of mutual respect and dialogue, and, once and for all, turn our backs on intimidation, verbal aggression and intolerance.”


NIAC’s sister organization: CASMII: denying the violation of human rights in Iran

In December 2005, Abbas Edalat, a London based computer engineer, along with several pro-regime activists, founded the Campaign Against Sanctions and Military Intervention in Iran (CASMII) [28].

On January 6, 2006, Jon Tirman from MIT, one of Parsi’s guests for the July 26th event, hosted a meeting for Edalat to launch CASMII in the US. This new organization was primarily consisted of Mr. Parsi’s circle. Six members of CASMII’s board and advisory (the majority at the time) belong to NIAC and Mr. Parsi’s former organization, Iranians for International Cooperation (IIC). These were M. Ala, S. Mostarshed, A. Patico, M. Navab, J. Fakharzadeh, and D. Pourkessali [29]. Alex Patico, the US coordinator of CASMII, is also listed as one of the NIAC’s founders and its treasurer [30]. Indeed, CASMII is NIAC’s offspring (2 links) [31,32].

Parallel to Mr. Parsi, his cohorts have engaged in silencing the regime’s critics. Two short examples are adequate evidence. One example is included below. In May 2006, one of the anti-war movement’s groups released a petition called “Iran: Neither U.S. aggression, nor theocratic repression” [33]. In this petition, there was a mild reference to the Iranian regime’s record of human rights violations. CASMII released a statement titled “Opposing Theocratic Repression in Iran or Playing into Hands of US Warmongers?” in which Mr. Parsi’s cohorts strongly condemned the petitioners’ stance against the Iranian regime:

“It is regrettable that your petition caves into US propaganda by devoting more space in its text to condemnation of the Iranian regime, which is to a large extent based on fallacies, inaccuracies and exaggerations, than to opposing the US warmongers. As citizens or residents of western countries, our essential duty is to oppose the aggressive and imperial policies of our own elected governments which we face and can impact rather than present a misleading and condescending picture of the internal situation in Iran and promote our version of "democracy" for a country with a different culture than ours. Rather than joining the bias Western media and condemning Iran for human rights violations… The war crimes and the gross violations of human rights committed by the coalition forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, the human rights issues in Israel, and the Arab client states of the United Sates, as well as the violations of the U.S. Constitution, international renditions, Guantanamo Bay, and torture, will remain our main area of public focus.”

CASMII’s chief in the U.S. is Rostam Pourzal who like Edalat and Parsi is a strong advocate of Tehran’s rulers. For instance, in the June 2006, a women rally in Tehran was brutally crashed by the police. The police brutalities were widely reported by international media and human rights organizations. Pourzal came to the regime’s rescues and in under the title “What Really Happened in Tehran” wrote [35]:

“Contrary to dispatches by news services, I learned from an eyewitness whom I infinitely trust that he saw no beating or gassing of the demonstrators. Now I quote from his email directly: I witnessed a few women protesters being asked by some female police officers to walk away. In response the protestors [sic] started screaming hysterically at the officers and accused them of beating them, an accusation which looked unsound. "Why are you beating us?", shouted a woman protestor at a female police officer, who was visibly shaken and became speechless at such an accusation. Small crowds of bystanders would also converge on these places to see what is going on, as it is typical in the Iranian culture. I did not see any expression of sympathy by these bystanders and onlookers for the cause of the protestors. If, for example, equal rights for women are actually not as popular in Iran as we wish, we would be better off facing the facts and asking what we are doing wrong, instead of inventing excuses or blaming the messenger. I was stunned during a recent visit to Iran to find that President Ahmadinejad is quite popular among women from all walks of life.”

Mr. Parsi’s cohorts in CASMII are so concerned about protecting the image of Tehran’s mullahs on the human rights issues that even Shirin Ebadi the Nobel laureate is not safe from their attacks. After her call to the international community to raise the human rights issue in their negation with the Iranian regime, Rostam Pourzal, smeared her in his article titled: “Dancing to Western Music”.

NIAC and its sister organizations have rarely raised the issue of human rights in Iran. Nonetheless, like clockwork, those rare occasions parrot several predictable claims, namely that the human rights situation in Iran is improving; that the main reason for human rights violations is pressure from the West or resistance from the victims and the oppressed. Invariably, the recommendations are to increase kindness toward the ayatollahs, to offer more carrots, and to develop pundits of a more Tehran-friendly breed.


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REFERENCES

1. http://www.niacouncil.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=830

2. http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/06/11/news/iran.php

3. Parsi, T., “Reconnecting Iran with Democracy” Financial Times, January 2, 2005.

4. Daioleslam, H., Available from: http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=27787

5. Daioleslam, H., Available from: http://www.intellectualconservative.com/2007/04/25/trita-parsi-bob-ney-and-iran%e2%80%99s-oil-mafia-penetrating-the-us-political-system/#respond

6. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10857676/site/newsweek/

7. http://tpmmuckraker.com/ney.php

8. http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Bob_Ney

9. http://www.iranian.com/Opinion/2002/May/Group/

10. http://frontburner.dmagazine.com/archives/013069.html

11. http://www.atiehbahar.com/

12. Intl. Herald Tribune – Europe, “Statoil chairman resigns from anti-corruption group board after Iran bribery case," October 20, 2006.

13. PIERRE-ANTOINE SOUCHARD, A. Total CEO held for questioning over company's Iran activities. (March 21st, 2007) available from: http://www.adpdigital.net/

14. http://www.azar-energy.com/

15. http://www.worlddialogue.org/meet4.htm

16. http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/cases/63-05.html

17. http://www.asianews.ir/main1.asp?a_id=27078

18. available from: http://www.asianews.ir/main1.asp?a_id=27078

19. http://www.niacouncil.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=64&Itemid=2

20. http://web.payk.net/mailingLists/iran-news/html/2002/msg00572.html

21. http://www.niacouncil.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=67&Itemid=29

22. http://www.aftabnews.ir/vdccpoq2biqpp.html

23. http://www.topiranian.com/ngo/archives/009103.html

24. http://www.american-iranian.org/pubs/articles/Bob%20Ney%20speech.pdf

25. http://www.niacouncil.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=49&Itemid=2

26. http://www.iranian.com/News/2000/September/rights.html

27. http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii/

28. http://www.campaigniran.org/casmii/index.php?q=node/70

29. http://www.globalexchange.org/getInvolved/speakers/210.html

30. http://www.niacouncil.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=647&Itemid=2

31. http://www.niacouncil.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=683&Itemid=2

32. Znet, may 18.2006, available from: http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=10289

33. CASMII, June 11, 2006 available from: [http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=10407]

34. MRZine 6.18.06: available from: http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/pourzal180606.html

35. The Iranians, May 4, 2006 by] [http://www.iranian.com/Pourzal/2006/May/Ebadi/index.html

Hassan Daoleslam is an independent Iran Analyst and writer. He is well published in Farsi and has appeared as an expert guest in the Voice of America-TV as well as other Persian media.

h/t to Winston
.

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Conundrum

Economist has an exceptional piece on Iran, weighing all options at our disposal to change the regime's "behavior". The Economist doubts that strong sanctions will have any discernible impact to change the political dynamic within Iran enough to change the Islamic Republic's behavior, in part, due to their high threshold of tolerating austere conditions(8 years of Iran-Iraq war). It also asserts that all options are equally bad, including overt military action, and will have the adverse effect of strengthening the regime rather than weakening it:

Nonetheless, it is not clear that sanctions are even close to imposing the sort of pain needed to alter the government's nuclear behaviour. They have pushed down living standards, but war and revolution have taught Iranians how to muddle through. An economy like Iran's, dominated by the government budget, is better able than most to take the travails of the private sector in its stride. And since energy exports make up almost half the government's revenues, high world prices (kept high in part by the tension over Iran) have compensated nicely for much of the damage sanctions have inflicted. Besides, many powerful Iranians prosper through their control of a relatively closed economy. The openness the world proffers as an “incentive” to give up the bomb strikes at some of this group's vested interests.

The fundamental problem here is that so far all notions of "sanctions" are based on western notions of what will hurt rather than trying to get into the mullah's minds and figure out what will actually move them.

The second problem with Iran is that we have not confronted an unbroken string of Iranian aggressions over 28 years: from killing the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan to Khobar Towers, Buenos Aires, Beirut, Embassy take-over/hostages. What our inactions have resulted in is nothing more than a nightmarish convoluted mix of threats all over the ME. All the current threats facing the Middle East and the West - the Hamas takeover in the Gaza Strip, Hizballah’s bid for power in Lebanon, political turmoil in Iraq, and imminent nuclear weapons in the hands of a radical dictatorship share the Islamic Republic as their main financier and instigator.

The third and the most important and, often entirely overlooked, problem is the fact that we have not been able to identify a cohesive picture of who the enemy is and what it has been up to for the past 28 years? The vast, well-funded highly organized and strategically well-placed *lobby of the Islamic Republic (with the help of our socialist useful idiots)--starting well over 10 years ago--in Washington D.C. is mainly responsible for this confusion among our policy makers.

By nearly 30 years of retreat/surrender we have taught every rabid Islamists in Iran (though a minority but holding all the financial and military power) that we will do nothing in the face of aggression and it might be too complicated now to start. We need tink tanks to stop listening to biased lobbyist and do their own investigation and analysis.

*NIAC, CASMII, etc.

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Hassan Daioleslam's Interview with VOA (voice of America)

An in-depth interview with the author of "Iran's oil Mafia", Hassan Daioleslam. He and the savvy callers from Iran and Europe ripped, Hooshang Amirahmadi, the clown who at one time had the audacity to nominate himself as a presidential candidate of the Islamic Republic while holding a U.S. citizenship, into pieces. At first, he resorted to fallacious arguments to justify his background but he failed miserably. At the end of the program he was disgustingly transparent. These traitrous lobbyists' propaganda and disinformation not only have damaged Iranians interest but it has also endangered our national security by confusing the hell out of our Policy makers in the U.S. And the result has been a game of missing the elephant in the room. Shame on him and his ilk.

Voice of America: Click on the link to hear the audio: "Mize Gerdi ba Shoma" (Roundtable, in persian)

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Hallelujah, Praise the Lord

Trita Parsi

I woke up this morning to this wonderful expose of one of the most deceptive propaganda arm of the Islamic Republic in the West, the largest Iranian-American organization in the US, the National Iranian American Council (NIAC).

The true nature of this group headed by the mullah's voice, Trita Parsi, is finally exposed . The article is so juicy and I've been waiting for this for so long that I'm going to re-print the whole thing. "Iran's Oil Mafia":

Robert William (Bob) Ney is a current federal prisoner and a former Ohio Congressman from 1995 until November 3, 2006. Ney pled guilty to charges of conspiracy and making false statements in relation to the Jack Abramoff lobbying and bribery scandal. Ney reportedly received bribes from Abramoff, other lobbyists, and two foreign businessmen - a felon and an arms dealer - in exchange for using his position to advance their interests.

Conspicuously missing from this dossier of disservice to the country was Ney’s assistance in the creation of a Washington-based lobbying enterprise for the Iranian theocratic regime, The National Iranian-American Council (NIAC). NIAC is part of an extensive US lobbying web that objectively furthers the interests of the Islamic Republic of Iran.


This article will address the creation of NIAC, Tehran’s role, NIAC’s connection to Iran’s oil mafia, and NIAC attempts to penetrate US political system.Creation of NIACThe National Iranian-American Council (NIAC) was founded thanks to the efforts of four non Iranian-Americans: Roy Coffee, Dave DiStefano, Rep. Bob Ney, and *Trita Parsi.


Coffee and DiStefano, both Washington lobbyists, were investigated by the Justice Department for arranging a trip to London for Bob Ney, where he met a Syrian arms dealer and convicted felon involved in a conspiracy to circumvent sanctions to sell US-made aircraft parts to Tehran.


Roy Coffee sent a letter to the Dallas Morning News in February 2006 to justify his relationship with the two London-based felons. Part of the letter discussed the founding of NIAC:“Back in the spring or summer of 2002, a good friend of mine from law school, Darius Baghai, had just returned from visiting relatives in Iran for the first time since his family left before the revolution. He spoke with me about how the economy of Iran was humming …….From this, I took Darius in to visit with Mr. Ney. What was to be a 15 minute meeting became a 1 1/2 hour meeting as they spoke passionately about their hopes for the Iranian people.


They also spoke in Farsi a great deal - I'm sure talking smack about me. From that meeting, Darius, Dave and I began to work with Trita Parsi, another Iranian-American to try to form a political action committee of Iranian-Americans to pursue a strategy of normalization of relations between the two countries…. The 4 of us worked very hard for about 9 months to form this committee.”At the time, Trita Parsi was a Swedish-Iranian graduate student in his early twenties, best known for ties to Iran’s ambassador in Sweden. A successful self-promoter, he soon attached himself as a part-time aide to Congressman Ney before he was appointed president of NIAC.


The New LobbyNIAC’s predecessor, the American-Iranian Council (AIC), was established in the 1990s with backing from multinational oil companies. For many years, it spear-headed pro-Tehran lobbying effort in the US. AIC president Houshang Amirahmadi had been an active pro-Tehran player since early 1980s. While residing in US, he was also a presidential candidate in Iran’s elections, and officially collaborated with different Iranian institutions and notably the foreign ministry. In 1999 and 2000 Trita Parsi was helping Amirahmadi to organize lobbying events in Washington.


In 2001, the pro-Iran lobby in the United States became intensely active to prevent the renewal of the Iran Libya Sanctions Act (ILSA), and to lift U.S. sanctions on Iran. Despite extraordinary pressure from the lobby, ILSA passed overwhelmingly. Prior to his imprisonment in March 2007, Bob Ney led Congressional efforts to defeat ILSA and initiate Tehran-friendly policies in concert with AIC. Disappointed and angered by the ILSA vote, Ney began to plan for the next battle of the war. “The ILSA vote doesn’t look very promising, but that doesn’t mean the struggle should stop on this entire issue.


It is a matter of education and re-education and people getting together and forming a citizen’s lobby to make sure that members of Congress and their offices are educated on this issue,” Ney told AIC in a June 2001 speech. While Ney was hard at work “forming a citizen’s lobby,” Trita Parsi claimed that the majority of lawmakers voted against their true wills. In a tone apologetic to Tehran, he expressed his hope that the Iranian regime understood that he and his colleagues had worked hard to prevent this result:“Hopefully, Tehran will recognize that an honest attempt was made to defeat or at least weaken the sanctions.


The call for a review and Speaker Hastert's pledge to insist on Congressional action based on the review must also be interpreted by Tehran as a step in the right direction” (Iran Analysis July 2001 Peyvand Iran News) This failure to block the renewal of ILSA in 2001 marked the start of a new era for the pro-Iran lobby in the United States. The lobbyists recognized that they must broadly reach out to Iranian-Americans.NIAC was created to put those plans in motion.


Trita Parsi was the regime’s trusted man within the new network. Tehran’s faith in Parsi was so profound that in 2003 when Iran decided to send a highly secret proposal for negotiations to the White House, Parsi was called on to arrange the delivery of the message through Bob Ney to Karl Rove. Parsi, moreover, was among the few chosen men (along with Mahallati, Iran’s former ambassador to UN) to present the results of a shady Tehran-friendly poll of the Iranian population which indicated the popularity of Iran’s nuclear program.


Trita Parsi and the Regime’s Inner CircleDuring the eight years of Rafsanjani’s presidency, which ended in 1997, the Iranian regime had attempted without success to attract the Iranian Diaspora to its cause. Khatami’s presidency recharged Tehran’s efforts. With the Supreme Leader’s direct involvement, the High Council for Iranian Compatriots Overseas was created in 2000. The President heads the Council, and the Foreign Minister serves as its deputy director. The Ministry of Intelligence and the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance collaborate to implement the decisions of the council. The objective was to create a network of organizations to infiltrate and seemingly represent the Iranian community abroad, and promote policies favorable to the Iranian government.


Tehran anticipated that this strategy would neutralize opposition activities abroad and legitimize the new lobby. State-sanctioned Iranian newspapers started a campaign to promote Trita Parsi and NIAC. Pro-government publications outside Iran followed suit. The former head of the Iran interest in Washington, Ambassador Faramarze Fathnejad, was thrilled with the efforts of Trita Parsi and NIAC, and underlined “the importance of relation with Iranian organizations in the U.S. and specially pointed to NIAC and his young leader who is a consultant to CNN and has been very successful in his efforts.” The Iran Ambassador even claimed 20,000 strong membership for NIAC (while only 150 is claimed by NIAC itself)!But token rhetorical support would not alone turn an inexperienced graduate student and a corrupt Washington politician into a lobbying enterprise. Entities with ample financial resources and direct access to Iran’s top leaders had to enter the scene. This is where Siamak Namazi, an important figures of this new lobbying enterprise and a prominent member of the Iranian oil Mafia, enters the scene.Trita Parsi and Namazi worked closely on developing the details of a grand plan to create an Iranian-American “Citizen’s Lobby.”


They traveled to Iran together They organized joint conferences and meetings. In 1999, they co-authored a seminal paper, that provided the roadmap for the organization that later became NIAC. 24Namazi, along with his sister Pari and brother Babak, control the Atieh enterprise in Iran and its three sister companies Atieh Roshan, Atieh Bahar and Atieh Associates, as well as numerous other direct and indirect partnerships, including Azar Energy, Menas companies in England, Atieh Dadeh Pardaz, FTZ Corporate services and MES Middle East Strategies.. Particularly noteworthy is the fact that Baquer Namazi (their father) is the Chairman of Hamyaran, identified by the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars as a “resource center” in Tehran for Iranian non-governmental organizations (NGOs).Atieh claims to be a “fully private strategic consulting firm that assists companies better understand the Iranian market, develop business and stay ahead of [the] competition.” People familiar with the oil industry in Iran understand the coded language, After all, rulers in every country in the Middle East use outside consultants to negotiate the discrete terms of lucrative oil contracts.Atieh’s customers include the foreign corporations who wish to do business in Iran. One Atieh Bahar customer, Norway’s Statoil, has been publicly identified as a participant in a scheme to bribe Iranian government officials by the US Securities and Exchange Commission and the Department of Justice.


A number of high officials in the company were fired and the company had to pay tens of millions of dollars in penalties to the US and Norwegian governments for “payments to an Iranian official in 2002 and 2003 in order to induce him to use his influence to obtain the award to Statoil of a contract to develop phases 6, 7 and 8 of the Iranian South Pars gas field.”The most recent debacle of Atieh enterprise was in March 2007 when the CEO of the French oil company Total SA was charged with having bribed senior Iranian officials to secure contracts. Total is a major customer of the Namazi’s Atieh enterprise.Tehran’s trust in Namazi is further evidenced by the fact that his company provides the network and computer services for almost all Iranian banks, the Majles (parliament), and other important institutions. Namazi’s groups monitor nearly all Iranian economic or political activities and have access to the country’s most sensitive data. This is a clear indication of his prominent place inside the inner circle of power in Tehran.While representing Tehran, Namazi, disguised as a scholar travels to the US to seemingly pursue academic activities . He succeeded so well that the Congressionally-funded National Endowment for Democracy awarded him a Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellowship in 2005.


This link between the Iranian oil Mafia and “scholarly” pursuits in the US is hardly isolated. Three former Iranian deputy foreign ministers currently live in Boston posing as “scholars”: Mohammad Mahallati who was also the Iranian ambassador to the UN in the late 1980s, Farhad Atai and, Abbas Maleki. In addition to his diplomatic past, Maleki has been one of the most important figures within the Iranian oil Mafia.The Roadmap In 1999, Parsi and Namazi presented a joint paper titled “Iranian-Americans: The bridge between two nations” at a conference organized by the Iranian government in Cypress. This report contains the manifesto and the roadmap for the new Iranian lobby in the US. The authors argue that “an Iranian-American lobby is needed in order to create a balance between the competing Middle Eastern lobbies. Without it, Iran-bashing may become popular in Congress again.”The “competing lobby” was AIPAC (American Israeli Public Affairs Committee).


The pillars of the road map were: To have the appearance of a citizen’s lobbyTo mimic the Jewish lobby in the USTo impede Iranian opposition activitiesTo infiltrate the US political systemTo break the taboo of working with the Iran’s cleric rulers for the Iranian DiasporaTo improve the image of the Iran’s government abroad24. In their report, Namazi and Parsi acknowledged that problems of organizing a pro-regime lobby within the Iranian-American community:“This group’s role has not been utilized any where close to its potential, however, for several reasons: A good portion of them were against the IRI [Islamic Republic of Iran], therefore would not do anything to help.”“The point is, [Iranian Americans] were not about to form a lobby group that would benefit the establishment in Tehran, or benefit the Iranian-Americans themselves as a community, nor was it for the most part interested in forming a pressure group against the Islamic Republic.”This was also underlined by Roy Coffee, one of the NIAC’s founders:“We [NIAC’s founders] found that most Iranians do not want to get involved in politics because of their experiences in Iran during and after the revolution. They have come to this country to make a better life for themselves and their children and don't want to get involved.” The lack of participation by the Iranian American community in this lobby has been overcome with a sophisticated machine of professional lobbyists and “friendly” circles who favor a rapprochement with the Iranian regime.Tehran’s Advice: Mimic Jewish Lobby in WashingtonOne of the hallmarks of the new lobby was its desire to rival the “Israeli Lobby” in the United States. This aspiration led to the creation of the Iranian American Political Action Committee (IAPAC), loosely modeled after similar organizations created by AIPAC (American Israeli Public Affairs Committee).


Three of IAPAC’s board members came from the AIC’s leadership.In their 1999 paper, Parsi and Namazi analyzed at length the techniques used by AIPAC, and suggested that the same approach should be taken to create an Iranian lobby in Washington:“Creating similar types of seminars and intern opportunities to Iranian-American youth may not improve Iran-US relations in the short run, but it will help integrate the Iranian-American community into the political life of America. In the long run, a strong and active Iranian- American lobby, partly established through these seminars and by the participants of these programs, may serve to ensure that the US and Iran never find themselves in violent opposition to each other again.”Trita Parsi has been reciting this comparison to the Israeli lobby since the late 1990’s, about the time that the High Council was formed in Tehran. At the beginning his tone was more contentious and resembled the mullah’s usual rhetoric, but more recently he has toned down his anti-Israeli remarks, at least in English.The government-owned newspaper Aftab published an interview with Trita Parsi on December 28, 2006 that underscores Parsi’s efforts on behalf of the Iranian regime.. Translation: “The conflict between Iran and the West on Iran’s nuclear file has entered a critical state. The government must now utilize all the possible resources to defend the national interest. In this, we have not paid enough attention to the potentially significant influence of the Iranian American society in moderating the extremist policies of the White House.


In comparison of this untouched potential to the influence of the Jewish lobby in directing the policies of Washington in supporting Israel, we see the difference between what is and what could be.” Siamak Namazi began sounding similar themes.:“I propose that we should start showing up to the leadership training seminars and other events organized by the American-Israeli Political Action Committee (AIPAC) for their youth. Not only will this create an opportunity to learn the fine skills of community organization and grassroots lobbying, but it also takes away from AIPAC's ability to spread misinformation about Iran through a deliberate campaign to further its own political agenda.” Not Lobbyists?


As Ney’s criminal bribery and lobbying fiasco became more public, NIAC’s president Trita Parsi began to downplay NIAC’s lobbying activities. (NIAC is registered as a 501 c3, to which certain legal restrictions apply.) Furthermore, being lobbied by a former aid would have added to Ney’s already complicated situation. Asked in 2005 whether his group lobbied the US Congress, Trita Parsi told an interviewer:“Our group does not do any lobbying at all. We do not contact the Congressmen to support or oppose a bill.”Since its creation, however, NIAC has strived to penetrate the US political system in accordance with the roadmap Namazi and Parsi established in 1999. As the Washington Post reported on June 25, 2006: “The NIAC helped persuade a dozen conservative House members to sign a letter to President Bush earlier this month calling for unconditional negotiations with Iran's regime.” The external communications of Parsi and other NIAC leaders shed further light on NIAC’s lobbying activities.“The NIAC members have educational and experimental knowledge on the lobbying process and politics in America.”“.. we must establish connections on Capitol Hill to establish early-warning systems about proposed votes or bills that may oppose the best interests of Iranian-Americans.” Bob Ney, Roy Coffee, and Dave DiStefano arranged numerous workshops, training classes, seminars and speeches in which they themselves and others with experience prepared members and affiliates of NIAC to lobby and influence Congress. Parsi, Namazi and Ney organized public gatherings and discrete and exclusive $1,000 per plate fundraiser events.


They even developed a training manual for lobbyists, a copy of which was sent to this writer by a former NIAC member. NIAC itself admits that “In 2002, Congressman Ney benefited from letters sent by Iranian-Americans through NIAC's Legislative Action Center in support of his resolution on US-Iran relations.”Infiltrating CongressTrita Parsi, Namazi and their backers fully intended to infiltrate the US Congress. One of the methods they boast of involves recruiting young Iranian Americans to serve as Congressional interns or pages by offering room, board and financial incentives. NIAC’s website brags of success stories in this venture. NIAC claims to have drafted the young Iranian American Press Secretary for Rep. Marcy Kaptur to help in improving the lobbying skills of NIAC members and affiliates. Similarly, an Iranian American student in the University of Minnesota received a financial scholarship in his senior year and becomes an intern in Senator Norm Coleman’s (R-MN) Washington office. Another intern, a graduate of University of South Florida, was placed in Congressman Jim Davis’ (D-FL) Washington, D.C. office. Expanding the operation to penetrate the US political system, NIAC has now formally implemented a paid trainee program and is actively in search for unwary Iranian American youth.

Conclusion Since the early 1990’s, Tehran has embarked on developing a sophisticated lobbying enterprise in the United States.


Iran’s government has devoted significant manpower and financial resources to this cause. This lobbying enterprise consists of a complex, intermingled web of entities and organizations with significant overlap of leadership, and heavy involvement of the notoriously mafia-like inner circles of the Iranian regime. Disguised as scholars, many of the former Iranian government officials reside in the US and constitute an important piece of the lobby machine. NIAC and its major figures, such as Bob Ney and Trita Parsi are effective nodes of Tehran’s efforts to manipulate US policy toward self-serving ends.

Furthermore, I might add, Trita Parsi plus being paraded around by CNN, PBS and NPR as a "Middle East" expert, he has also become the darling of the rabid left who often cite his propaganda to back up their assertions in anything that supports the murderous mullahs' agenda. Trita Parsi et al are extremly dangerous because they have an uncanny talent to torture logic, facts and reason to mind-bending extremes in order to have clueless politicians (Baker, pelosi et al) to believe monumentally ridiculous “explanations for terrorist acts committed by the IR” … justifications drawn from finanaical need so warped and debased that you are catapulted beyond anger and disbelief directly into rage and the desire to call your doctor before you lose your mind.

Trita Parsi is no small fish. He has been mentored by very influential American policy makers such as Professor Francis Fukuyama, and Dr. Zbigniew Brzezinski. Are US policy-makers going to rely on expert advice of these dubious characters masquarading as Middle East experts while they are unofficial operative of our enemies? If they are then we are doomed to repeat the lessons of Iran in 1979, which spawned satanic militant Islam under the auspieces of Carter's beloved saint, Khomeini.

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