Two weeks ago, Iranian authorities arrested Soleimani Nia. According to a petition advocating for his release , he was questioned by intelligence officials in late November. Then in January he was called to the Revolutionary Court. That’s when security guards searched his home, seizing electronic devices and documents. His whereabouts since then are unknown.

Iranian American writer Firoozeh Dumas worked closed with Soleimani Nia on the translation of her book Funny in Farsi.

“The irony is Mohammed is the least political person I know,” she tells host Lisa Mullins. “… this is why I find it so painful for him to be in prison, because I know that man is completely innocent.”

Dumas says Soleimani Nia had been working on developing a website similar to “LinkedIn,” designed to help Iranians find jobs.

‘I’m guessing that that must have been something that was suspicious for the government,” Dumas said.

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Lisa Mullins: I am Lisa Mullins and this is The World, the co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH in Boston. Writer Firoozeh Dumas is well known for the biting humor in her book “Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing up Iranian in America” but there is no humor in what’s happened to the man who translated her book into Persian for readers in Iran. Iranian intelligence officials questioned translator Mohammed Soleimani Nia in late November and he hasn’t been seen since January; that’s when he was called before the Revolutionary Court. Security guards searched his home. They seized electronic devices and documents. Author Firoozeh Dumas wonders what authorities were expecting to find in her translator’s home.

Firoozeh Dumas: I don’t know what they were looking for but what I do know is that Mohammed also had a site which he had started which was very similar to “LinkedIn.” It basically connected people in Iran who are looking for jobs and I’m guessing that that must have been something that was suspicious for the government. The irony is that Mohammed is the least political person I know and during the time when he was translating “Funny in Farsi” for me he made it very clear he had no interest in politics whatsoever. Oftentimes in our emails I would just throw in a political question because, of course, I just wanted to hear something because I would hear something on the news in America and wonder what his take on it was. Even though he would answer all my questions, he never once answered any political question.

Mullins: How do you know him at all, by the way?

Dumas: Well, he contacted me when “Funny in Farsi” came out because he wanted permission to translate my book which, in a nut of itself, says a lot about him because Iran does not adhere to international copyright laws. So, nobody has to ask the author’s permission to translate and publish a book. So, he asked my permission and then he sent me a chapter that he had translated and I thought that it was quite good. He also told me…

Mullins: Not easy to do, by the way; to translate it because it’s humor. It’s humor about your life here as an Iranian-American living in California.

Dumas: Translating humor is one of the hardest things because you have to find the equivalent in the other language. I do want to share a story about that, but one thing that also really impressed me about Mohammed was, he said to me that I would have the final edit on all the stories and he incorporated all my edits. The man had no ego. He just really wanted to translate this book well and I was so impressed during the year that I worked with him and I felt like his personality was just so pure. One thing I do want to say about the difficulty of translating humor: Mohammed had learned English in Iran and he really spoke it very well, but there were culture references in “Funny in Farsi” that he didn’t understand. One time he emailed me and he said, “What is shake and bake?” I said, “Well, it’s a product that comes in a box and there’s spices and there’s a plastic bag, and you cut up a chicken and you put it in the bag and then you shake the spices in the bag.” I said, “But, the important part is that, in the commercials, when the lady is doing this she’s always really joyful.”

Mullins: [laughs] She’s dancing.

Dumas: He emailed me and he said, “I don’t think I can translate that.”

Mullins: [laughs] There is no translation. But you think he did a really good job otherwise at bringing humor to this bit of Iranian-American literature. You heard from a lot of Iranians, so it was successful, it was selling a lot of copies.

Dumas: Well, the Persian version of “Funny in Farsi” sold about 100,000 copies and it has since been… It’s no longer allowed to be published because the censors decided it needed to be further censored. But, the 100,000 copies that it sold is an unbelievable number for a country like Iran which is about the size of Texas.

Mullins: When you say that the government banned it for further censorship, how was it censored, to begin with?

Dumas: Well, there was one entire chapter that was called “A ham amendment” that was removed.

Mullins: What was the ham amendment?

Dumas: The ham amendment is a story about my father who in 1953 won a Fulbright Scholarship to study in America. During the year that he was in America, he fell in love with democracy, jello and ham. Obviously, he’s still working on the democracy, but that entire chapter was removed.

Mullins: Do you think, Firoozeh, that it was Mohammed’s translation, the fact that he translated your book that landed him in trouble? Or, do you think it was something entirely separate?

Dumas: I don’t know. What I do know is that he did become known because of the translation and I know that others associated with the book have been visited by the government. I don’t know what the reason is for his arrest but, given that lately bloggers, journalists have all been imprisoned, I don’t understand what’s going on. I don’t think anybody really does, but I think he’s been swept up in something that is much bigger than we understand.

Mullins: You’re drawing attention to it now, for what reason?

Dumas: Well, I feel that when someone is taken away to a prison without any reason whatsoever, without the ability to have a lawyer, without the ability to have what we in America call due process, it is up to the rest of us to keep this person’s name alive. Now, I have to say I do hope people understand there are so many others like him that I’m also thinking of, but I’m hoping that by drawing attention to Mohammed’s case that others will also get attention.

Mullins: Firoozeh Dumas is an Iranian-American writer and author of the book “Funny in Farsi” as well as other books. She spoke with us about the arrest in Iran of her translator Mohammed Soleimani Nia. Thank you very much.

Dumas: Thank you so much Lisa. It’s always a pleasure.

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The sanctions involve an immediate ban on all new oil contracts with Iran, while existing contracts will be honored until July 1.

Tehran denies that it is trying to develop nuclear weapons and says talks and not sanctions are the only way to resolve the dispute.

The EU currently buys about 20 percent of Iran’s oil exports.

(Graphic: BBC)

Meanwhile, the Pentagon said the US aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, as well as a British Royal Navy frigate and a French warship, have passed through the Straits of Hormuz at the entrance to the Gulf without incident in the wake of Iranian threats to block the trade route.

Under the new deal, EU governments are expected to stop signing new contracts with Iran when the ban comes into place – which could be as soon as this week, Reuters news agency reports.

All existing contracts will have to be phased out by July 1.

More from the BBC

(Map: BBC)

The Iranian film, A Separation, has been racking up awards at film festivals around the world since its release last year, most recently garnering a Golden Globe. Anchor Marco Werman speaks with Khatereh Sheibani, Professor of Persian Literature and culture at York University in Toronto, about the film success and how that success is viewed in the director’s home country, Iran.

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Marco Werman: An Iranian film called “A Separation” is on the short list for a Best Foreign Language Oscar nomination, we’ll find out next Tuesday if it actually gets nominated, but the Iranian movie is already a winner. It bagged the Golden Globe for Best Foreign Film last Sunday. The film is about a couple in Tehran who are about to separate because they can’t agree on where to live: the wife wants to leave Iran with the couple’s daughter, the husband wants to stay, to take care of his ailing father.

[Speaking Farsi]

Werman: Khatereh Sheibani is a professor of Persian Literature and Culture at York University in Toronto. She says the film was very successful in Iran as well.

Khatereh Sheibani: In fact, “The Separation” was the best-selling movie in the history of Iranian Cinema. So, at the box office it was a huge success before even winning any international awards.

Werman: Now, the film, “A Separation”, it’s about a couple that’s on the verge of separating, as we said earlier. And it’s a peek into Iranian society and tensions between a modern secular family and a more conservative and religious one. And the director Asghar Farhadi has been asked if his film should be viewed as a political statement, on Iranian society, and he had this to say:

[Speaking Farsi]

Interpreter: If what you mean by political film is a film that follows a certain ideology or works as a political manifesto or defends a certain group, then, no. But if what you mean by a political film is a film that has social roots and includes society and its issues, then yes, this could be a political film.

Werman: That’s Iranian director Asghar Farhadi speaking there, through an interpreter. Miss Sheibani, how do you react to his statement? Do you think he’s trying to be careful?

Sheibani: You know they have every right to be careful, if they are making this inside Iran. But this is not a film that promotes any particular ideology, any particular world view. In fact this film is about the relativity of truth. You can’t say which person is right, which world view is right.

Werman: The main characters in the movie are conflicted about where they should live: in Iran, or should they leave the country? How many Iranians have on their minds this question of “Do I stay or do I go?”

Sheibani: Unfortunately there are many, many people who have this question now, in their mind. As you know, right after the revolution, there was a huge immigration towards Western countries. Especially for the secular middle-class people this is a seminal question, whether to leave, or to stay in the country.

Werman: So, obviously a lot of people in Iran relate to Mr. Farhadi’s film. But how do you explain its popularity in the United States?

Sheibani: You know, there has been a lot of talking about Iran in [the] media for the past few years. So, in the absence of foreign journalists in Iran and in the absence of having a real image of Iran, they’re turning to movies to see how this country looks like. I even heard from some Westerner friends who told me, “We wanted to see how a middle-class household looks like in Iran”. So it could be one aspect of the film that Americans could relate to.

Werman: Khatereh Sheibani in Toronto, the author of The Poetics of Iranian Cinema. Thank you very much!

Sheibani: Thank you!

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This week, though, those chants sound more chilling.

That’s because tensions between Tehran and Washington are rising rapidly.

Iranian leaders blame the US and Israel for the assassination Wednesday of an Iranian nuclear scientist.

American officials, on the other hand, are publicly warning Iran not to cross a couple of “red lines.”

One is the development of nuclear weapons.

The other is blocking the oil shipping lanes at the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

Marco Werman talks with Borzou Daragahi, middle east correspondent for the Financial Times, about increasing tensions between the US and Iraq.

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Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman, this is The World. It’s not unusual to hear chants of death to America and death to Israel in Tehran. Today though, those chants sound more ominous. That’s because tensions between Tehran and Washington rose rapidly this week. Iranian leaders blame the US and Israel for the assassination Wednesday of an Iranian nuclear scientist. American officials on the other hand are publicly warning Iran not to cross a couple of red lines; one is the development of nuclear weapons, the other is blocking the oil shipping lanes at the strategic Strait of Hormuz. Borzou Daragahi is a Middle East correspondent for the Financial Times. Borzou, there is so much happening now in Iran, help us sift through it. What are the most important developments in relation to Iran this week?

Borzou Daragahi: I think you went through the very important ones. I think one thing that’s really significant that you didn’t mention is the fact that Iran says that it is now open to restarting talks over its nuclear program. It could show that Iran on the one hand it’s sort of increasing its bluster, and on the other hand it’s genuinely concerned and wants to keep diplomatic options open. We who have been examining Iran closely have always thought that the you know, nuclear program that Iran embarked on was a means for the regime to ensure its own survival. And if at some point the regime decides that the nuclear program is hampering its own survival, then it might change course in some way, but we’ll see over the next few days whether this talk of negotiation is actually genuine.

Werman: I want to get back to the assassination of Iranian nuclear scientist, Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan. It really couldn’t have come at a worse time in terms of ratcheting up tensions between the US and Iran. Borzou, now that you’ve had a couple of days to think about it, is the assassination significant in itself or does its significance really lie in its timing?

Daragahi: I think the timing is very curious and there are some who have speculated that it could have been the result of someone within the regime or from abroad who wanted to scuttle any chance of reproach, and who wanted to increase tensions between Iran and the west. Maybe they got wind that there was an attempt at a diplomatic settlement and wanted to stop that from happening, perhaps someone in the regime, perhaps someone in another country. I don’t think we’ll ever know, but absolutely, the timing is extremely significant.

Werman: There’s been so much posturing from both sides, the US and Iran, I mean various statements have been made by the US this week about how Iran would cross a major red line if it tried to close the Strait of Hormuz. On the other hand, for example, Iran just sentenced to death an Iranian American whom they accused of spying. Now that you’ve done some sifting for us, Borzou, is it clear to you who the aggressor is?

Daragahi: You know, I think there’s a case of mixed signals here. The Obama administration is working according to one diplomatic playbook and they’re sort of slowly, incrementally ratcheting diplomatic pressure, economic pressure on the Islamic republic in order to obtain the desired result, which is to get them to compromise on their nuclear program. Iran doesn’t see it that way. Iran sees every step in this steady escalation as an affront to a great nation, an insult to its dignity, and sees every single step as a crossing of a red line. And so they see what the Obama administration sees as sort of incremental pressure as an existential threat. And I think these two parties need to get on the phone with each other and sort of explain that to each other.

Werman: The Financial Times’ Borzou Daragahi, thank you very much.

Daragahi: It’s been a pleasure.

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Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan, an academic who also worked at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility, and another unidentified person were killed in the attack.

The blast happened after a motorcyclist stuck an apparent bomb to the car.

Several Iranian nuclear scientists have been assassinated in recent years, with Iran blaming Israel and the US.

Both countries deny the accusations.

The BBC’s Security Correspondent Gordon Corera is following the story.

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Marco Werman: I am Marco Werman. This is The World. Iran says the assassination of a scientist in Tehran today will not stop progress on the country’s nuclear program. The scientist was identified as 32 year old Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan, a supervisor at Iran’s Natanz uranium enrichment facility. He was reportedly killed after someone on a passing motorcycle attached a bomb to his car with a magnet. The blast is also said to have killed the scientist’s driver. The BBC’s Security Correspondent Gordon Corera is following the story. He says the man who was killed may have had a unique role at the Natanz nuclear plant.

Gordon Corera: He appears to have been a specialist in a particular type of technique that’s used involving gas permeation which is part of the enrichment process and that seems to signify that he had some kind of specialist expertise in enrichment even though he was fairly young, in his early 30s. That would most likely be why he was targeted.

Werman: Who were the suspects in this killing?

Corera: Well, I think the assumption in a lot of quarters will be that this is the work of the Israeli spy agency, the Mossad. Now, of course they won’t confirm that. No one knows for sure. The Iranians have pointed the finger at the Israelis, also saying that the Americans and perhaps even the British, they’ve said in the past, might have been involved as well. But I think the assumption is always that the Israelis are behind this kind of activity. We can’t be sure about that. They do have a track record, it’s thought. If you go back even to the Iraqi nuclear program, late ’70s, they were doing these kind of covert actions to try and disrupt it. So, it’s something they have a tradition of doing, if you like. People in Israel won’t openly acknowledge it but they do talk about how they’re not displeased to see this kind of act take place.

Werman: Gordon, you’ve spoken with nuclear experts about the assassination. What do they make of it? I mean, is there a belief that you can actually stop a nuclear program by taking out scientists one by one?

Corera: No, I don’t think there is a belief in many quarters that you can stop it entirely. I think a lot of the covert campaign that’s been going on appears to be about delay. I think the hope is that whether it’s the killing of scientists, whether it’s the Stuxnet virus which sabotaged the centrifuges at Natanz, whether it’s some of the explosions that have taken place which are slightly mysterious, that these will introduce delay. Basically, all you can do is really buy time and, in that time, the hope is that perhaps sanctions, internal social, economic, political dynamics together those force a change of heart, a change of decision in Iran’s leadership in terms of where they want to go with the nuclear program. So, it’s essentially about buying time. I think it’s difficult to see that covert action can actually do any more than that; and there are risks too. I think it’s fair to say that, so far, Iran has been relatively restrained in its response, but at some point it may seek to strike back in some way and that could escalate the crisis in turn.

Werman: The BBC’s Security Correspondent Gordon Corera speaking with us from London. By the way, you can find a map of Iran’s key nuclear sites; it’s at theworld.org.

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Iran’s Nuclear Facilities

Israel hasn’t commented on the incident but just yesterday, Israel’s military chief made a comment that’s interpreted by some now as a hint of involvement.

The Israeli official said Iran will be facing “un-natural setbacks” in the year ahead.

Gad Shimron is a former member of Israel’s intelligence agency, the Mossad.

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Marco Werman: The U.S. has denied any involvement in today’s assassination in Tehran. Israel hasn’t commented on the incident but just yesterday, Israel’s military chief made a comment that’s interpreted by some now as a hint of involvement. The Israeli official said Iran will be facing “un-natural setbacks” in the year ahead. Gad Shimron is a former member of Israel’s intelligence agency, the Mossad. He says Iran is highly invulnerable to infiltration.

Gad Shimron: It is relatively an open society. Relatively, I mean, if you compare it to North Korea for sure, but even to other countries in the world. You have tourists coming in. You have a very large Diaspora of Iranians who live outside Iran and have very good relations with families, with their relatives in Iran. What is most important, don’t forget, Iran is riddled with inner conflicts. You have the Baluchis in the east who want some more autonomy; you have the Kurds in the north-west; you have the Arabs in Kazakhstan, in the western provinces of Iran who really don’t think Iranians; and there are some very strong dissident organizations like the Mujahideen-e Khalq are fiercely anti-Ayatollahs, and therefore it is not that difficult to operate in Iran. There’s a lot of opposition, inner opposition in Iran. I believe there are locals…I believe there are Iranians who are guided, financed probably as well, by foreign intelligence organizations, and I think to their list of the usual suspects one should add not only Israel and the United States but also actually a wide coalition of international forces such as the British MI6, the Saudi Intelligence, even the Egyptian Intelligence before last year’s revolution was very much involved in the struggle to hold and delay the Iranian nuclear program.

Werman: And a magnetic bomb? I mean, we’ve seen these things in the movies but how widely are they used and is it an indicator of any particular strategy of any particular spy agency?

Shimron: No, you know. Nobody invents new things, they only just reuse them. The system is that two guys come on a motorcycle – there are a lot of motorcycles in Tehran, and in the traffic they just attach the magnetic bomb on the door…on one of the doors of the car and speed away. A few seconds later there is an explosion and the victim is gone.

Werman: What purpose do these sorts of assassinations really serve? I mean, could killing one person really affect Iran’s nuclear ambitions?

Shimron: Things like this cannot be quantified. It’s a matter of sending a message with the hope that, together with the economical sanctions which seem to work very well, will delay and eventually stop the Iranian nuclear program.

Werman: Why not just wait for sanctions to work?

Shimron: Because all the studies…If you go back in history and just study, let’s say, 200 sanctions imposed since 1920, sanctions alone don’t do the job. You always need something else and it seems that the recipe here is working. The combination of sanctions, the fact that the Iranian Rial is dropping very rapidly in the market – it’s losing a lot of value, unemployment is going up, the regime is facing very, very steep economical problems; this together with this problem of intimidating top scientists may even work. I mean, one cannot know. The results will speak for themselves later.

Werman: Journalist and former member of Mossad – the Israeli Intelligence Service, Gad Shimron thank you very much for your thoughts sir.

Shimron: Thank you.

Werman: I also spoke today with David Ignatius of the Washington Post about the moral issues involved in covert operations. Ignatius writes thrillers based on his in-depth knowledge of the intelligence community. He says he has no idea who is responsible for today’s assassination in Iran but…

David Ignatius: What I do know is the question of whether are…If covert activities in Iran should include activities that could have the effect of killing Iranians deliberately or by accident has been a very contentious one. This is the dirty side of state craft or undeclared warfare. It’s gone on since the times of the ancients. The Venetians had a masterful assassination service that was part of how they ran their commercial empire. It is a fact of life over many, many centuries but it’s an unattractive one. It’s for a good reason that governments refuse to acknowledge these activities because, if they did, I think the publics at home and abroad would be irate. These are things that look to people like murder.

Werman: David Ignatius of the Washington Post commenting on, as he put it, “the dirty side of state craft.”

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Read two chapters of Zahra’s Paradise

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Marco Werman: Even if you set aside the lethal intrigue that surrounds its nuclear program, Iran remains a mystery to most Westerners. A new book titled “Zahra’s Paradise” offers readers a glimpse of life in the country. It’s a graphic novel by an Iranian-American author. For security reasons, he goes only by his first name, Amir. The book is set in Tehran during the disputed 2009 elections and the protests that followed. It centers around a mother’s quest to find her missing son. The author says the graphic novel’s title is a reference to a specific place in Iran.

Amir: “Zahra’s Paradise” is the name of the main cemetery. It’s a vast, vast space outside Tehran, and since the revolution of 1979, it has really been the place where Iranians have been burying their loved ones. This was, you know, both people who were killed during the revolution, after the revolution, all the victims of the Iran-Iraq war ended there. So in a sense, it’s the place where all Iranians come together and grieve together, and then you realize that in the religious context, you know, the cemetery is actually not just the place where you take the dead. It’s actually the entrance into the heavens. Zahra is the name of the prophet’s daughter. So there’s this tremendous irony that this paradise has come to represent, really, the grief of an entire nation.

Werman: Your book began as a web comic and has been serialized online in black and white strips three times a week, beginning in early 2010. Why did you use that format?

Amir: What the internet allowed us to do was to communicate in real time which meant that as my partner, Khalil, was doing the drawing, we were putting them up, and what that meant was that all the traditional barriers to publishing, which were sort of barriers of space and time and language, were gone. We were actually interacting with our audience live and that was a whole other way of really publishing and presenting the ideas.

Werman: The fact that it’s a comic and it’s literally in black and white, were you worried that it would turn the story into almost a polemic, you know, with good guys and bad guys and maybe less nuance you’d find in a novel?

Amir: Not really. I think one of the things that we’ve done in Zahra’s Paradise is to show the contradictions in people, to show the way in which people are forced, by circumstance and situation, into various political positions and then change those positions. So the black-and-whiteness of it actually allowed us to show it as a collage.

Werman: Who has seen this web comic around the globe, and do you have any sense of how many Iranians inside Iran have had access to it?

Amir: We could see through Google that we had readership in at least twenty different cities in Iran and we started getting feedback from people there. Around the world, Zahra’s Paradise has I think been read in about something like eighty to ninety countries. So the web made it really much more of a global phenomenon than anything else.

Werman: Is it risky for Iranians to look at Zahra’s Paradise in Iran on the internet?

Amir: You know, I don’t think they’re monitored at that level, but we started gettting notes from people inside Iran telling us to be careful. So I know that people were reading it there. I think, you know, they need to take precautions and things, but they were reading it.

Werman: Amir, let me ask you about two things in the book that I’m curious about. Some of the most riveting images are these public hangings that happen in Tehran using construction cranes. Now we see these images of bustling traffic in downtown Tehran and two men dangling from crane hooks. Why does the regime use cranes to hang people?

Amir: It’s a great question. How is it that the crane, which is something that’s supposedly for construction, become this instrument for hanging people? How did the crane become a symbol in a way like the hand of God that sort of yanks Iranians off the ground and hangs them? How did it become a symbol, really, or Iran and Islam. The crane, of course, is very, you know, it’s kind of like having mobile executioners and the idea is to strike fear in the populous. It’s to show how much more powerful the state is,a relative to the people.

Werman: Tell us what’s on the last thirteen pages of the book. It’s in the tiniest type imaginable. I had to put on my reading glasses and then use a magnifying glass. Visually, it packs quite a wallop.

Amir: That’s the list of sixteen thousand, nine hundred and one Iranians who have been killed since the revolution of 1979. Either assassinated or executed or vanished and it just tells you of how deep the damage that the Islamic Republic is inflicting on the Iranian people, but it’s also a way of telling people, “No. The struggle for Iran’s future is a struggle for memory, it’s a struggle for history, it’s a struggle for truth, it’s a struggle against lies.”

Werman: Amir is the Iranian-American author of the graphic novel “Zahra’s Paradise”. He and illustrator, Khalil, use only their first name for security reasons. Amir, very good to speak with you and meet you. Thank you.

Amir: Thank you very much, Marco.

Werman: Check out a few chapters from the graphic novel at theworld.org.

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A nuclear scientist is killed after a suspected bomb exploded in a car in northern Tehran, the latest in a string of such nuclear-linked attacks.

Ahmadinejad is seeking to reinforce ties with the few allies Iran has left – and also possibly to annoy the United States.

Marco Werman speaks with Michael Shifter, president of the Inter-American Dialogue.

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Marco Werman: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is in Latin America today. He’s on a four-nation tour with visits to Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba and Ecuador. Ahmadinejad is seeking to reinforce ties with his allies in the region. He may also be looking to annoy the United States. Michael Shifter is President of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington. Michael, you just wrote a piece in Foreign Policy Magazine with the subtitle “Is Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s latest tour of Latin America a waste of time?” Is it?

Michael Shifter: Well, I don’t think he’s going to get very much out of it. He is going to needle and irk the United States and annoy the United States; he’s already accomplished that. There’s been some reaction in Washington. But he’s not getting much play in the major countries of the region that are not very interested in joining alliance with Ahmadinejad; they reject him. He’s really going to four countries that are on the margins politically, so he’s not going to get very much out of it either in economic terms or in diplomatic terms.

Werman: This is his sixth tour, though, of Latin America since he came to power in 2005. What’s his real interest there? Does he want to expand Iranian influence in this hemisphere and what do the Latin Americans make of that influence anyway?

Shifter: I think he wants to expand and there have been some Embassies that have opened up in the region. Trade has increased with a number of countries. There have been some modest investments, but it really hasn’t amounted to very much. The country itself, Iran, is in dire straits and it’s very little what he can do in Latin America. The countries are open to the economic and diplomatic side but certainly are very wary and cautious and understand that he is under enormous international pressure because of the nuclear program.

Werman: If you look across Latin America though, aren’t there economic relations with Iran in place that are pretty significant; trade deals, oil deals, etcetera that many countries would probably prefer not to put at risk, and I’m wondering, will they abide by U.S. sanctions on Iran or not when push comes to shove?

Shifter: They have a number of trading relationships. Brazil is the most significant trading relationship which has more than doubled since 2005, but there have been a lot of projects that have been promised that haven’t delivered. That oil refinery in Ecuador, constructing a port in Nicaragua; Iran really hasn’t come through. So, Latin Americans are waiting to see whether Iran will come through this time, but there’s a lot of skepticism. As far as the sanctions are concerned, there’s not going to be any appetite to really confront Iran. Also, most Latin American countries, the major countries have said they’ve got to go along with sanctions that are supported by the United Nations and by the international community.

Werman: So, you don’t really see this as an Iranian threat in the U.S. backyard?

Shifter: I think it’s something to keep a close watch on, but I don’t think it’s a threat. Given that he’s going to these four countries really doesn’t amount to very much and it really is to provoke and needle the United States which I think he is accomplishing.

Werman: Michael Shifter, President of the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, thanks very much.

Shifter: Thank you.

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Former Marine Amir Mirzai Hekmati was “sentenced to death for cooperating with a hostile nation, membership of the CIA and trying to implicate Iran in terrorism,” semi-official Fars news agency said.

The 28-year-old’s US-based family say he was in Iran visiting grandparents.

The sentence comes at a time of fresh tensions between Iran and the West over Tehran’s nuclear program.

Lisa Mullins speaks with the BBC’s Mohsen Asgari about the case.

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Lisa Mullins: I’m Lisa Mullins and this is The World. Today, the United States urged Iran to release Amir Hekmati. He’s a 28-year-old American of Iranian descent and he’s been sentenced to death in Iran on charges of being a CIA agent. US officials have denied the charges and State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland did so again today.

Victoria Nuland: If it is true that he has been so sentenced we would condemn this verdict in the strongest terms, and we are working with all of our partners to convey that condemnation to the Iranian government. We’ve maintained from the beginning that the charges against him were a fabrication and we call on the Iranian government to release him immediately.

Mullins: That’s Victoria Nuland. Amir Hekmati is a former marine and a dual US and Iranian citizen. He claims he was in Iran to visit his grandmother’s, but that did not stop his trial from going forward.

Amir Hekmati: [speaking Arabic]

Mullins: Hekmati’s supposed confession was aired last month on Iranian state TV. In it he describes being part of a plot to infiltrate Iran’s Intelligence Ministry. Hekmati is the latest in a long list of US-Iranian dual citizens to face such a charge in Iran. The BBC’s Mohsen Asgari is following this case and the reaction to it in Tehran.

Mohsen Asgari: Actually, Iran has frequently accused America of sabotaging this system in the country or seeking for undermining its regime by doing some covert operational activities. So this is something very normal and usually the people in Iran don’t pay attention to these things a lot because they are obsessed with their economy problems. And they have heard a lot about the fact that some American citizens have been arrested by the Iranian system, but at the end they all have been released. In July 2009 remember that three Americans had been arrested and they had been kept in Iran for 2-1/2 years with the same accusations, but finally they were released on bail.

Mullins: So what does that say about the chances of this particular American, Amir Hekmati, being released as well?

Asgari: It’s a political thing I think because in recent weeks we have been receiving a lot of threatening messages from American officials against Iran. And they are talking about widening the sanctions on Iran’s economy. On the other side Iran has launched a military exercise and have test fired a lot of missiles at the Persian Gulf, threatening America. So this is a war of words between the two sides and this is a very risky threat I think if they want to execute this person. It is a [declaration] of war against America I think and the stake is so high potentially that no one wants it to happen.

Mullins: One other thing about that, if you’re saying you can’t separate the global politics from the individual court cases like the case against this American accused of spying, what is Iran saying is its strongest evidence that Mr. Hekmati is indeed a spy?

Asgari: Iranian system has not posted any documents yet accept the confession of Mr. Hekmati that was shown on Iran’s state TV saying that he has been deceived by the CIA to infiltrate into Iran’s security system and implicate Iran in terror reason. This is the whole document that we have heard so far. But their point is that Iran is trying to increase its bargaining power in the run up to the supposedly nuclear talks because Iran has at the same time sent a letter to 5-plus-1 countries to pave the ground for a fresh round of nuclear talks. By means of these things Iran is trying to increase its bargaining power.

Mullins: All right, Mohsen Asgari, thank you.

Asgari: You’re welcome.

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The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Lisa Mullins: Amir Hekmati was tried and sentenced in Tehran as an Iranian citizen, but he’s also an American citizen, born to Iranian parents in Arizona and raised here in the US. Hadi Ghaemi has been in touch with Hekmati’s family. Ghaemi runs the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. He is based in New York.

Hadi Ghaemi: The family are in total shock at the news and they don’t know anymore than what the media has reported so far, and particularly given that Iranian judiciary has not allowed them to have legal representation inside Iran. They have no contact and no more information at the moment.

Mullins: And who is he being represented by if…

Ghaemi: In the lower court there was a court-appointed lawyer, who from what we understand, practically did nothing to present the facts and launch a credible defense for Amir.

Mullins: Well, what would have been appropriate in terms of his defense?

Ghaemi: Well, any good lawyer would have asked for any incriminating evidence that based on what evidence is being charged with his membership in the CIA and doing spy work in Iran.

Mullins: Excuse me for one second, do you know if that was ever presented by the government?

Ghaemi: Yes, the government is saying because of his record in the military he has been recruited by the CIA to go there and infiltrate the Iranian Intelligence Services, which is highly unlikely scenario given Amir had never been to Iran and had no understanding or record of working on Iran issues.

Mullins: He was in the Marine Corps where he served as a translator, and what was he doing for work at the time he was in Iran?

Ghaemi: At the time we understand that he was a freelance contractor. He actually did not have any permanent job and just wanted to go visit his grandmother on the even of a major holiday.

Mullins: And did the government know this, know about his background?

Ghaemi: Yes, yes exactly, the point is that when Amir applied for his passport processing at the intersection of the Iranian government in Washington, DC, he provided all details of his military service, which goes back to 2001 up to 2005. And sought assurances from them that this is not going to cause him any trouble. And they told him it should be all fine. And actually when he arrived in the airport there was no questioning and no issues. Only two weeks after he was in Iran he was detained.

Mullins: I wonder given the language skills of Amir Hekmati and the fact that he has local connections, family there, and given his military background, does it seem to you plausible that he could be a spy?

Ghaemi: Not at all. Again, why should he go there telling the Iranian government his entire background? Why should he carry IDs showing he has had been enrolled in the US military? And knowing the Iranian Intelligence Services and government it would be extremely difficult to penetrate and make connections to provide any kind of information out of that system. It’s extremely opaque and hard to have any access to the inner workings of the Iranian government.

Mullins: What else do you know about him?

Ghaemi: From what I understand he had never been to Iran, but had a great love for the culture and the country, and his family there. And that this summer since he was in the region he decided to go and pay a visit to his grandmother. He felt like he just was making a short vacation there, but they trapped him basically.

Mullins: Do you know anything about how he is coping since he’s been imprisoned for what is it, four months now?

Ghaemi: Yeah, more than four months, August 29 is when he was detained. And no, there’s been no access to him really. The Swiss embassy that represents the American government interest in Tehran has not been allowed any access to him. The family-appointed lawyer has not been given any information or access to him. So he’s been kept in pretty much isolation and this again, is just a classic pattern of holding people in solitary confinement for months and then urging them to cooperate with interrogators to get a lenient outcome. And it always turns the other way. People who do cooperate and keep silence, the families keep silent, are always shocked to find out that all of the promises made were false. And in this case a death sentence is very shocking.

Mullins: Hadi Ghaemi of the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, speaking to us from New York, thanks.

Ghaemi: Thank you, it is my pleasure.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

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The text below is a phonetic transcript of a radio story broadcast by PRI’s THE WORLD. It has been created on deadline by a contractor for PRI. The transcript is included here to facilitate internet searches for audio content. Please report any transcribing errors to theworld@pri.org. This transcript may not be in its final form, and it may be updated. Please be aware that the authoritative record of material distributed by PRI’s THE WORLD is the program audio.

Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman, this is The World. Tensions between Tehran and the west continue to rise. Iran concluded 10 days of war games in the Persian Gulf today, but not before firing off two long ranges missiles. Iran’s pushing back against US sanctions on its central bank. Those sanctions were prompted by Iran’s refusal to halt its uranium enrichment program. Iran is widely being seen as flexing its military muscle right now as a potential precursor to shutting down the Strait of Hormuz. Twenty percent of the world’s oil passes through the strait. The BBC’s Mohsen Asgari joins us from Tehran. Mohsen, why is Iran holding these missile tests now?

Mohsen Asgari: The timing is quite interesting because these military exercises are taking place exactly at the time that the west and particularly America is increasing the pressures over Iran and particularly Iran’s economy. Iran is trying to send various messages to the outside world to say that on the one hand it is ready to defend itself in one way or another, and on the other side of the story we can hear that Iranian top nuclear negotiators have sent letters or are going to send letters to the 5-plus-1 countries to set the stage for the fresh round of nuclear talks in order to decrease tensions.

Werman: I also want to ask you Mohsen about another troubling bit of news out of Iran, at least as far as the west is concerned.

Iranian TV Announcer: [speaking Arabic]

Werman: Now, this announcement on Iranian state-controlled TV is saying that researchers have produced Iran’s first nuclear fuel rods. The announcer is saying here that the rods have been inserted into the core of Tehran’s research nuclear reactor. Mohsen, is this a big step in Iranian nuclear technology?

Asgari: Potentially it’s a bigger step for Iran and also it can raise a lot of concerns on the western side, but it is exactly an incarnation of the same policy to increase Iran’s bargaining power in the run up to the new round of nuclear negotiations. And on the other side of this story Iran wants to say that it has progressed enough in nuclear activities so it cannot hold uranium enrichment or it cannot change its policy.

Werman: I mean for the west this news about the nuclear fuel rods will be provocative. How are Iranians reacting to all of this? I mean it can all be kind of contained under the heading Save a Rattling, I mean they know how these national actions and the back and forth can escalate.

Asgari: That’s right, Iran has adopted a strategy of carrot on a stick; on the one side they sent letter to the west announcing that they are read to sit on the negotiating table, to talk about nuclear tensions, and on the other side Iran is trying to show its power on testing missiles and also on nuclear activities and the progress that it has achieved through nuclear activities.

Werman: Is all this making common Iranians nervous?

Asgari: Common Iranians they are upset with their economic problems at the moment. They know that the sanctions have caused a lot of problems for them. They have heard about nuclear activities and they understood this story from this angle of vision that the west is against Iran’s progress. This is what is advertised on and off on Iran’s state TV. So they are obsessed with their economic problems because inflation rate is going up, unemployment is torturing. They are obsessed with these problems and they don’t pay attention to military exercise or these uranium enrichment at first in the same way that the western people may look at it.

Werman: So the economy is what’s dominating the lives of most Iranians right now is what you’re saying. How bad is it?

Asgari: It is bad because Mr. Ahmadinejad, Iran’s president, has cut all the subsidies that used to be allocated for electricity, petrol and bread, so when they cut these subsidies they put huge pressure on the people and especially on the working class of the society because the salary of these people has not increased, but the price of goods and cost of life has drastically increased. So the people if you come to Tehran’s streets, you’ll see that people are working three shifts in a day and they are looking for ways to earn more money you know, for their families. And it is interesting that the fluctuation of foreign exchange rate in Iran has become a huge story these days. People are rushing to banks and foreign exchange centers in order to buy US dollar, keep those US dollars in order to sell it at a higher rate later. So these are not the signs that shows that Iran’s economy is suffering from bad diseases these days.

Werman: The BBC’s Mohsen Asgari speaking with us from Tehran, thank you very much indeed.

Asgari: My pleasure.

Copyright ©2009 PRI’s THE WORLD. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to PRI’s THE WORLD. This transcript may not be reproduced, in whole or in part, without prior written permission. For further information, please email The World’s Permissions Coordinator at theworld@pri.org.

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