Bulletin de liaison et d'information - Institut kurde de Paris

Revue de Presse-Press Review-Berhevoka Çapê-Rivista Stampa-Dentro de la Prensa-Baszn Özeti
Toward Normal Links Between Iran and
By Stanley A. Weiss America
T EHRAN - What do the president
and foreign minister of Iran have in
common withthe president' and secretary
of state of the United States?
They all want ildialogue.
Mohammed Khatami wants to establish
a ."thoughtful" dialogue;
Kamal Kharrazi, one that at is "constructive.
"Bill Clinton wants it to be
"honest"; Madeleine Albright, to be
"direct.'~ And the European Union has
now agreed toa dialogue that is
"open" rather than "critical." ..
But A. N. S.. Khamooshi, head of
Iran's state-supported Chamber of
Commerce, told me when I began my
visit: "Forget dialogue. Let's do business."
To an American businessman,
that sounded very promising.
The problem has.been that when I try
to discuss .specifics, I hear the same
mantra from almost every Iranian I meet
~ top government officials, opposition
leaders, professionals,' economists,
journalists, conservatives and moderates,
including those who spent time in
the.shah's and the ayatollahs' prisons.
It goes like this: Just as President
Khatamiexpressed regret over the
seizure of American hostages in 1979,
President Clinton must apologize' for
the part the United Sta~s played in
overthrowing the Mossadegh regime in
1953 and bringing back the shah.
Surprising as it may seem in a country
where half the male population is
too young to shave, the coup that took.
place almost half a century ago is a fresh
memory, and ~..national obsession.
Iranians feel like a woman deceived.
The United States had been a hero since
the beginnmg of the century for its anticoloniàliststance,
and a savior immediately
after World War II for hel~
ing get the Russians out of Iran. But m
1951 Mohammed Mossadegh, an anti-
Communist nationalist, became prime
minister and nationalized
Iranian Oil Company.
the Anglo-
. .
At the urging of political mullahs
and British intelligence, the CIA
served as paymaster to help overthrow
Mossadegh and reinstall the shah. The
line from that event in 1953 to the'
taking of thé U.S. hostages in 1979 runs
straight and true in the minds of practically
every Iranian I speak to ..
Americ/UlS seem equally stuck in
time. The fact is that the Islamic "revolution
for export" died on June 3,
1989, and is buried along with Ayatollah
Ruhollah Khomeini. Today Iran
hasa president who speaks openly for
the rule of law, a civil society based on
the constitution, and individual rights
for allIranians.
. He was elected by 70 percent of the
electorate, 90 percent of whom voted
last May. He IS resisted by Ayatollah
Sayed Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme
leader. Buttheir "good mullah, bad
mullah" partnership seems to be workiilg..
It is time that the United States
began to readjust it policies based on
this new reality.
Unfortunately, the Iranian economy is
"sick," as President Khatami said recently.
The state controls 85 percent of
an economic system that is rirismanaged,
bloated, over-regulated and corrupt. The'.
budget policies of the Parliament are
.subject to the final say-so of a mullahdominated
Council ofGuardians. .
It is as if the U.S. Supreme Court,
made up mernbersof the Moral Majori~.'
had to .approve congressional
declSlons. One doesn't have to be an
ayatollah to kri.owthat thisdoesn 't have
a prayer of working~
Worse, 80 percent of the government's
hard currency earnings and 70
percent of its revenues com~ from oil
exports, and world oil prices have
dropped to the lowest levels in a decade.
The rial has'gone from 70 to the dollar at
the time of the 1978 revolution to a
. market rate today of more than5,OOO.
Half the population lives below the
poverty line. At least half of young
Iranians are unemployed or underemployed.
Annual inflation is 50 percent,
.more than twice the official rate.
And then there are the semi-gov- .
ernmental ' 'foundations. " These financial
organizations,purportedly
charitable and run mostly by merchanttraders,
operate at le~t. 750 companies
and command assets second only to
those of the state. Much of their profits
go to high-rankipg government officials
and clerics.
Yet of the 120,000 mullahs, 95 percent
confine themselves to religious,
not political, pursuits.You can tell who
they are; they' ride. on buses, not in
chauffeur-driven limousines.
In 10 days in Tehran, Isfahan and
Shiraz, I have not seen a mugger or a
beggar, or anyone looking remotely like
the homeless people I see when I walk
down Connecticut Avenue in Washington.
The wide streets are ciëan anà
free of potholes. Iranian family values'
. would make the most devout Christian
or Jewish fundamentalist proud.
The literacy rate among Iranians under
.30 is an astounding 93 percent.
Unlike Islamic countries like Saudi
Arabia, where women cannot drive or :
vote, Iran does not write off half of its
population: Iranian women are doctors,
lawyers, teachers, psychologists - and
vice President. Daughters of Ayatollah .
Khainenei and former President'
Hashemi Rafsanjani are feminists. .
Iran is of enormous strategic im- .
portance to the United States. Sixtyfour
percent of the world's known oil
reserves lie below and around the Gulf. .
This most populous nation in the'
Middle East has the second largest nat~
ural gas reserves in the world.
. And there is the Caspiari Sea, .with
potential oil and gas reserves worth as
much as $4 trillion. The shortest and
cheapest pipeline route to the Gulf and
to Western markets runs through Iran.
Containment is no longer U.S. policy
toward China, whose record on human
rightsand the proliferation of weapons
of mass destruction has been criminal.
So why does the United States continue
to try to "contain"Iran?
Whatever the rationale for a hard-line
policy ~uring the 1980s, today it only
ISOlates the United States and Israel.
America should lift its trade embargo
and repeal its secondary sanctions on
non-U.S. companies that invest in Iran.
This would be a blow to the reactionary
forces which at present control almost
all of Iran' s domestic income.
They would like nothing better than
for the United States to continue ils
current p