Struggle for Human Rights in Iran

Laura Rozen reports the October 19th meeting of IAEA, the October 25th IAEA inspection of Qum, and a follow up meeting with the P5+1 and Iran all loom large in the coming weeks. Moving forward, Patrick Clawson identifies three key issues for negotiations: “Iran’s nuclear clock, creating transparency through verification, and resolving the fundamental issues between Iran and the international community.” He warns that negotiations should not last indefinitely and the Iranian regime may view negotiations as an opportunity to crack down on the opposition movement.

Meanwhile, the House passed the Iran Divestment bill 414-6 yesterday. If passed into law, the bill will allow state and local governments to divest funds from companies who conduct more than $20 million of business a year with Iran’s energy sector. Despite broad congressional support, many people, including Iranian opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, worry the sanctions will only harm the Iranian people.

But that does not stop Abe Greenwald from supporting the bill’s sister legislation in the Senate, cosponsored by Senator Casey (D-Penn.) and Senator Brownback (R-Kan.). Pat Toomey, a Republican candidate for the Senate in Pennsylvania, agrees with Greenwald, suggesting the current administration has used “too much carrot and too little stick.” John Hannah argues that the Iranian people will blame sanctions on the regime’s intransigence, but the U.S. must impose tough sanctions suddenly for them to work. M.J. Rosenberg reports how  some neoconservatives find sanctions inadequate and are now pushing for an Israeli military strike.

Nobel Peace laureate, Shirin Ebadi, disagrees and warns that ”paying so much attention to Iran’s nuclear ambitions than to its trampling of democracy and freedom is a mistake both tactical and moral.” She argues that if the U.S. pushes human rights, then President Ahmadinejad‘s support will become “weaker and weaker by the day.” Hadi Ghaemi echoes Ebadi’s concerns, accusing the Obama administration for “all but ignoring the human rights crisis, the post-election violence, and now the rising number of political death sentences.” The Iranian regime has delivered four confirmed death sentences to opposition members, and niacINsight questions whether a fifth opposition member may have received the death penalty as well.

Earlier this month, Rahim Mohammadi was executed after a dubious conviction of committing a homosexual act (h/t Michael Ledeen). Furthermore, Grand Ayatollah Lotfollah Safi Golpayghani announced “God’s fury” will rain down on Iran if the government allows women to govern some provinces, after Interior Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar suggested the possibility. Such human rights abuses contrast sharply with Kevin Sullivan‘s self-admitted far fetched vision of an Iranian “Peace Corps for Quds” that would “aid in the politicization and, when necessary, the pacification of dissidents and insurgents throughout the region.”

Finally, Tehran Bureau reports that Tabnak  has taken down a story that said Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani had affirmed the legitimacy of Ahmadinejad’s presidency.