“The resolution and the resolutions could have been prevented from being forced on our country,” wrote Mousavi, if only the government had acted with “wisdom and rationality.”
Iran’s opposition leaders tend to disagree with the Ahmadinejad administration over social, economic and domestic issues, although rarely, if ever criticizing the government on questions of foreign affairs. But writing on the opposition platform kaleme.com, Mousavi criticized Ahmadinejad’s inner circle as inexperienced, incapable and arrogant in its handling of global concern over Iran’s nuclear intentions.
“Fewer and less experienced people are in charge of dealing with this sensitive dossier,” he said. “One of the reasons for entering this unpleasant and critical phase is a lack of able advisors… Weren’t the people supposed to govern their own destiny?”
“An illegitimate and oppressive government at war with its people, cannot stand against foreign threats,” he said. “Under such conditions, it must either concede to the outsiders or place the country on the verge of a devastating threat.”
Dr. Mehrdad Khonsari, a former Iranian diplomat and Senior Research Consultant at the Centre for Arab and Iranian Studies, said Mousavi’s statement marked a significant change in approach.
“There is an obvious shift here,” he told The Media Line. “It is a departure in the sense that many of Mousavi’s advisors outside Iran have always advised him that he should try to offer a different position regarding the nuclear issue and the consequent sanctions. He has resisted and it seems that he might have listened more carefully to those positions [this time].”
Mousavi laid into the disputed Iranian president for failing to inform the country’s citizens of the impact the sanctions would have.
“It is as clear as day that this resolution will affect our nation’s security and economy,” he wrote. “[Citizens] should know what effects these sanctions have on their livelihood, the rate of unemployment, inflation, production and the country’s progress and security… Who in their right minds is not aware that after the resolution, our country is more vulnerable and isolated than before?”
“To say that this resolution is like a used handkerchief does not reduce the tragedy brought about as a result of explosive and deceitful policies,” he concluded. “Foul language and insults towards other countries are only for internal usage and for an uninformed few.”
Ahmadinejad had previously referred to the UN sanctions, adopted June 9, as having the impact of a “used hankie and must be thrown in the dust bin.”
Mousavi opposes UN sanctions on Iran.
“We are denied our right to use peaceful nuclear technology,” he said. “This oppressive resolution … will decrease GDP, increase unemployment, create more hardships for people and widen the gap between us and other developing nations, especially our neighbors.”
He insinuated, however, that elements in the Ahmadinejad regime were inviting a war so as to stay in power.
“The Green Movement will not allow the oppressors to escape accountability and responsibility and to increase the oppression and terrorizing of [political] opponents by placing the country in a state of alert and welcoming military conflict or by giving in to disgraceful agreements over the most important national interests simply for the sake of ensuring their own short-term interests.”
Dr. Seyed Mohammad Marandi, a lecturer at the University of Tehran, argued Mousavi was seeking cover for embarrassing criticisms of his own role in bringing about the crises in Iranian-American relations.
“First of all, people don’t read his declarations very much anymore,” Dr. Marandi told The Media Line. “People have lost interest in him for the most part.”
“He is probably responding to a lot of anger directed at him, because many people believe that his actions over the past year are responsible for the current situation,” Dr. Marandi said. “Many believe that if he had acted responsibly after the elections, and not created riots on the streets of Tehran, the US would not have felt that it would be in a position to confront Iran in this way.”
“In other words, there is a widespread belief that before the elections the US had started to accept that pressure on Iran was futile,” he continued. “As such, many see Mousavi as largely responsible for this American miscalculation that sanctions and pressure will work.”
Dr. Khonsari agreed, in part, that Mousavi’s shift was not entirely sincere.
“What he has done with this statement, although I agree with it, is disingenuous because essentially he is criticizing Ahmadinejad for the consequences of a policy which he would have pursued,” Dr. Khonsari said. “Since there is so much talk about the sanctions, Mousavi has tried to jump on the bandwagon, but it seems politically expedient for him to criticize Ahmadinejad in this way just because Ahmadinejad is in the dumps and he can get political points from it.”
Many global powers accuse Iran of secretly developing a nuclear weapons program.
In March inspectors with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog, told The New York Times they were searching for evidence that Iran is developing two secret nuclear sites inside the mountains.
Last year the US revealed the existence of a secret nuclear enrichment site inside a mountain just outside Qom, a city that is home to the majority of Iran’s clerical establishment. Immediately after the Qom site was revealed, it was leaked that IAEA staff had privately concluded that Iran had acquired “sufficient information to be able to design and produce a workable implosion nuclear device” based on highly enriched uranium.
Iran is known to have mastered at least two of the three steps needed to effectively launch a nuclear weapon: developing a medium-range rocket capable of striking Israel and Arab nations allied with the West, and acquiring highly enriched, weapons grade uranium. There has been little consensus among Western intelligence agencies regarding Iran’s progress on the final step, that of developing a warhead capable of being attached to a missile.
On Wednesday the director of Iran’s nuclear program Ali Akbar Salehi acknowledged to the official ISNA news agency that the UN sanctions might slow the country’s nuclear progress.
“One can’t say sanctions are ineffective,” he said. “If sanctions are aimed at preventing Iran’s nuclear activities… we say they may slow down the work, but will not stop the activities. This is a certainty.”
Written by Benjamin Joffe-Walt
Source: The Media Line
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