Podcast: Zarif’s Lie

You’re listening to Iran’s Weekly Wire; I’m Roland Elliott Brown.

*

“We do not jail people for their opinions.”

That’s what Iran’s Foreign Minister, Javad Zarif, told the PBS host Charlie Rose last week.

The reaction from Iranians who have been imprisoned for their beliefs has been swift and unforgiving.

Here is Shaya Solhjou. He’s an atheist and a leftist who was arrested in Shiraz in 2009 because of his online activity.

[Shaya Solhjou] We didn't expect that Javad Zarif would say something like this. I just want to name all colleagues. All the journalists who are in jail because of their opinions and because of the essays and articles that they wrote. I just want to ask him who are these people? What are their crimes? What did they do that you put them in jail? You are coming in front of the camera, you just say we don't put anyone in jail because of their opinion, we don’t put any journalists in jail? So who are they?

And here’s Shakib Nasrullah. He belongs to Iran’s Baha’i minority. Iran’s government routinely persecutes Baha’is for their beliefs. Nasrullah was held in the political section of Tehran’s Evin Prison in 2011.

[Shakib Nasrullah] I am myself witness to what was happening inside the prison, so I definitely don't agree with his statement that no one is in prison in Iran because of their beliefs. My interrogator's questions were all centered around why I am a Baha’i, and why I am a member of the Baha’i community, and threatening my job, my life, my family, based on the fact that I am a Baha’i. If it is not about the Baha’i faith, what is it about?

Diane Ala’i, who represents the Baha’i International Community, also has some thoughts on Zarif’s statement.

[Diane Ala’i] I find it regrettable to see that high government officials, who are supposed to be the trustees of the people of Iran, have no qualms in publicly denying the truth.  And that truth is that having a different point of view or holding a different belief than that of those presently in power is viewed as a crime in Iran, and as acting against National Security.

And of course, there are organizations that look at hard data on free expression in Iran.

I spoke to Ben Nelson from Freedom House, a Washington and New York-based group that monitors civil liberties and press freedoms worldwide. I asked him how close Zarif’s statement was to the truth.

[Ben Nelson] Well, it's pretty far from it. Iran has consistently been rated among the worst of the worst for the last five years. A lot of that has to do with the rate at which they jail journalists, bloggers, or other online activists for expressing their opinions, criticising the state, criticising Khamenei or the Revolutionary Guards. You simply can't do that in Iran without facing some sort of prosecution or arrest.

I also spoke to Sherif Mansour of the Committee to Protect Journalists. I asked him if Iran jails people for their opinions.

[Sherif Mansour] Well, absolutely. We've ran our census analysis every year about the number of journalists behind bars because of their work as journalists, and for every case we've documented, all of those charges in all of those cases were related to things that they wrote or published as journalists, because of their reporting. And most of it was charges related specifically to charges like insults for religion, for the supreme leader, for spreading propaganda against the regime, against the establishment the evidence is overwhelming. That's what made Iran on our list this year for most censored countries for the press. It was ranked 7th among the top ten worst in censorship. That is also the reason why Iran was consistently among the top jailers of journalists over the last five years, including the worst jailer of journalists in 2010 and 2011, with highest number of journalists behind bars for their work worldwide.

Zarif’s assertion that no one is imprisoned for their opinions in Iran is wrong.  So, what was he thinking?  What did he hope to achieve?

To understand that, we need some context.  The question Charlie Rose asked Zarif was specifically about the imprisonment of journalists.

Rose was clearly alluding to the case of Jason Rezaian a Washington Post reporter.  

Iran has imprisoned Rezaian since last July. It held him in solitary confinement without charge or access to counsel for eight months before accusing him of spying. So far, authorities have produced no evidence to support the indictment.

Hooman Majd is an Iranian-American journalist on friendly terms with both Zarif and Rezaian. If anyone can interpret Zarif’s claim, he can.  I started by asking if he thought Zarif was just lying.

[Hooman Majd] No, I don't think he was lying. I think what he was trying to say was in direct response to what Charlie asked him about Jason, and what Zarif has said in the past is that Jason was not arrested for the crime of journalism, because that's not a crime in Iran.

Zarif says this isn’t about opinions, because Iran’s judiciary has accused Rezaian of spying. But Iran often makes no distinction between opinion forming and fact-finding, or between fact finding and espionage.

[Hooman Majd] As you know, and as many Iranians and other journalists, non-Iranian journalists know, there are people in Iran for whom the espionage bar is set very very low, and things that you or I or most people would not consider anything like spying, they would consider, at a minimum, giving comfort to the enemy. And that bar is extremely low. We've all seen it, and it doesn't make it right, but that is a fact of Iranian politics, unfortunately.

That “fact” of Iranian politics is what forced Zarif’s hand. The judiciary comes directly under the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.  Even if Zarif doesn’t agree with it, he has his career to think of.

And this has been a problem for the Rouhani administration to which he belongs. Here’s Shaya Solhjou:

[Shaya Sohljou] Rouhani and Zarif always said we are trying to make human rights better in Iran and let everybody all the journalists write whatever they want, but as we see, they didn't do anything, and it's getting worse than the period of Ahmadinejad, that he was president. We can see nothing changed.

And Zarif has paid a heavy price for his remarks. He has lost of credibility at home and abroad.

After the interview, Zarif used Facebook for damage control.  He wrote a long article in which he said “war mongers” in America were using the press attention to derail the nuclear talks.

He said his comments had been taken out of context. He also complained that it had been hard to do two whole press interviews in one day.

Revealingly, he also came down in favour of security over freedom of expression, saying that criticism in a good society should be fair and in keeping with national interests.  

Iranians know that Zarif has to answer to Iran’s deep security state, but they had hoped for something better.  And they had been promised better during the last election, when they voted for a break with the paranoia of the Ahmadinejad era. Here’s Hooman Majd.

[Hooman Majd]  The Iranians, we're an emotional people, but we also are a people who like to have heroes, and Zarif, you know, for better or worse, over the last couple of years, has become the hero for people in iran who want change.

There is  a sense in which people expect more from Zarif than they expect from Rouhani. Zarif presents an urbane face to the West. Iranians voted him “man of the year” in an online poll. He received a hero’s welcome when he returned from nuclear negotiations in April.  

But liberal Iranians expect more from Zarif than they’re going to get.

[Hooman Majd] We can’t forget that someone like Javad Zarif is a product of the system. He was a revolutionary, he believes in the system, is a reformist, so believes that the system needs political reform, believes in freedom of speech as far as I know, but obviously still supports the system. And the system has some elements, or many elements that we would consider not democratic in the West.

Zarif’s Facebook article, which he published in Persian, was aimed at his domestic supporters.  It received twenty-five thousand likes. And that  suggests that he still enjoys considerable support.  And it shows that Iranian society is willing to compromise on liberalism.

Nevertheless, Iran now wants a new relationship with the West. And as that new relationship emerges, human rights organizations are going to more ask questions than ever about how Iran closes off information and debate.

I asked Bret Nelson of Freedom House what he would ask if he was interviewing Zarif.

[Bret Nelson] I would ask him why so many journalists are in prison, why Iran consistently rates among the leading jailers of journalists in the world. I would want to know why they have the harsh laws on the books that they do that prevent critical inquiry into the affairs of the state, opening up social issues or political issues for public debate.

I asked Shakib Nasrullah the same question.

[Shakib Nasrullah] I would definitely ask if he has done any research himself, independent of what others tell him or not, of the many people really are in prison in Iran based on their beliefs. From the things you could hear in the corridors, all of these people were prominent Iranian intellectuals and educated people who were there because of their beliefs.

Zarif may be in a position to offer a nuclear deal. But the freedom to gather accurate information about Iran’s government, or to dissent from that government, is not something Zarif wants to negotiate.

*

That’s all from Iran’s Weekly Wire. If you want to find out more about this story, join us on Twitter or Facebook, or visit IranWire.com