Thursday
Feb182010
Iran: Getting to the Point on Detentions & Human Rights (Sadr)
Thursday, February 18, 2010 at 10:13 
Yesterday we posted a concise, moving blog of Shadi Sadr, lawyer and human rights activist, in our updates, but I want to re-post it as a featured entry. Let me explain why.Yesterday morning I watched a video discussion between leading US analysts Flynt Leverett and Barbara Slavin, filmed the day after the 22 Bahman rallies. Around the four-minute mark, this exchange occurred:
SLAVIN: An Iran that had a more representative Government was less paranoid and fearful, that didn't have to throw hundreds, thousands of people in jail would be a better Government, not just for us to deal with but for the Iranian people. It sometimes seems to me that you just don't care what happens to these people....
LEVERETT: What I care about, Barbara, are American interests, and I think that American interests at this point require us to pursue serious strategic engagement with the Islamic Republic of Iran as it is, not as some might wish it to be.
SLAVIN: Is there a part in there for human rights?
LEVERETT: You know, human rights is always going to be an element in American foreign policy. My own view is, in dealing with important countries....I don't think human rights should be this positive.
I was going to note this but then refrained. The time has long past for strategic engagement with Leverett, given his unsupported assertions, wilful distortions, and reliance on thin reeds of "evidence",such as the questionable polling of Iranian views before and after the Presidential election, to justify his position. And, after walking away for a cup of tea, I saw no value in posting from anger.
Yet the sheer callousness of Leverett, who will be hailed by pro-Government supporters when he visits the University of Tehran this week, stayed with me. It was at that point that, from Pedestrian, I read Shadi Sadr's personal reflection. I don't expect that Mr Leverett, as he maintains a stand against "positive" human rights, will take any notice, but I hope it might be of value for others:
An hour ago, I walked out of the post office and was hurriedly walking towards the metro when I saw a man on the sidewalk with two bags of fruit in his hand. I first saw the tangerines in one of the bags, and then I saw his face, as he was passing by me. He looked so much like Ahmad Zeydabadi [the journalist who were recently given a six-year prison sentence]! My heart sank. I thought: there were certainly days when Ahmad Zeydabadi too would buy fruit on his way home … those simple days of the past seem like so long ago!
I did not know Ahmad Zeydabadi personally. But I have a distinct memory of him in mind. A few years ago when the Committee of Human Rights Reporters had a press meeting to speak against the controversial family laws, Zeydabadi went to the podium, and instead of talking in difficult, muddled terms, like the politicians who spoke before him, he only spoke of his personal experience, growing up in a family of two wives. And through that, he spoke about how in a family where there are multiple wives, not only do the wives endure pain, but so do the children. His were some of the most honest words I’d ever heard, and I will never forget them. The day after, when I went through the news, no matter how much I looked, I did not see any of Zeydabadi’s words anywhere. Even those friends of mine who were filming the meeting, had not thought anything of Zeydabadi’s speech and had not filmed it! That’s when I realized how much our own culture is still resistant to men who want to break stereotypes.
I can write about Zeydabadi, because I did not know him personally. But I can’t write of my own friends who are in prison, because I’m afraid of what their interrogators will do. I’m afraid that they might put my friends under even more pressure. I can only say this: it has been a good while now that I know that every morning when I wake up and turn on the computer and read the news, a long list of my friends, acquaintances, colleagues, someone I used to know, will be in the list of new prisoners. Every day, familiar names are added behind the walls of Evin Prison, and everyday I ask myself: where did they go, those simple days? …