Sohrab Razzaghi

BRUSSELS—In the presidential election of 2005, following eight years of political liberalization by the government of President Mohammad Khatami, a new political class in Iran came to power that enjoyed the full backing of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. In 2009, this new political class managed to consolidate its power through widespread electoral fraud and the reelection of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

This new political class aims to be the country’s only political agents through a campaign of eliminating rivals and dissidents. Their desire for such monopoly is not limited to politics. Their aim is to become Iran’s economic, cultural, and social leaders, and rule Iran according to their own ideology.

This new political class has taken up a massive effort to disrupt the free flow of information and deny access to those who seek the news. In order to do this, they have created an atmosphere of mistrust in social settings and social relationships and are pursuing the atomization of the Iranian society.

Some of the actions taken by this political elite (with the help of their military supporters) are as follows:

• Political and civil obstruction. This means preventing the free operation of political and civic organizations.
• Preventing the free flow of information. Denying freedom of speech and freedom of the press through arresting more than 170 journalists.
• Suppressing civil liberties, such as the right to run for public office.
• Large-scale suppression of student activists and student organizations.
• Torture and execution of political and civil rights activists. More than 800 individuals currently are in prison on political charges. More than eight individuals, most of whom ethnic minorities, have been executed
• Lack of academic freedom and increasing pressure on professors and students.

I would like to propose a number of strategies for a sustainable transition to democracy in Iran:

• Creating social networks in order to support the political and civil liberties movement in Iran and starting talks with Iran’s civil rights and political activists to enhance human rights and democracy in Iran. European countries and the EU must take clearer positions about the Iranian government and its violation of human rights. The EU must place human rights as its top priority on its agenda.
• The only way to stop this ruling political elite is to build a dynamic, democratic, and developing nation. One of the most important priorities is to build civil societies, and therefore, the international community must help civil society activists in capacity-building and related efforts.
• The lack of recognition of human rights is a group problem that plagues Iranian society. In order to instill such values, we need a program of promoting human rights in Iran in various levels and for various segments of society. This is most needed on the local level. Human rights are violated in Iran on three grounds: theoretical, governmental, and lack of respect for human rights among individual citizens.
• Currently, a large number of political activists and human rights defenders are incarcerated. We need to educate a new generation of such activists and a new wave of such organizations, which is why capacity building in Iran is our top priority.
• In order to break the information blockade created by the government, we must enhance the free flow of information among Iranian citizens. We must avoid spending all our efforts on the Internet only, because more than 35 percent of the Iranian population is in rural areas, and many cities, towns, and villages do not have access to the Internet. Therefore, I suggest we think about expanding efforts concerning the Internet to include television.

Sohrab Razzaghi is a civil society activist and researcher who recently left Iran.