https://kayhanlife.com/news/iran/letter-of-canadian-for-democracy-in-iran-to-ottawas-house-of-commons/

September 9, 2022
The House of Commons
Ottawa, Ontario, K1A 0A6

Dear Parliamentarian,

We the members of Canadians for Democracy in Iran (CDI), an Ontario registered nonprofit organization, write to you today with grave concerns regarding the uninvestigated criminal acts and the growing influence of the Islamic Republic Guards Corps (IRGC) in Canada.

As you know, since its inception in 1979, the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) through the IRGC has used terrorism as an integral part of its foreign and military policies to: 1) squash democracy movements at home 2) to spread the Iranian regime’s revolutionary ideology abroad 3) and to spark turmoil throughout the Middle East. The IRGC’s lethal activities that have taken the lives of several hundred individuals have been carried out either directly through the Quds Force, the IRGC’s elite unit, or through its proxies. However, it is of paramount importance to recognize that the IRI’s foreign policy is also pursued through other destructive means, such as non-kinetic activities, front companies, religious foundations, cultural centres, etc.

Furthermore, it is important to note that IRI’s support for terrorism is not just limited to the Middle East. Since the mid 1990s, there have been dozens of terrorist plots attributed to the IRGC outside the region. These include the bombing of the AMIA Jewish Center in Buenos Aires that took the life of 85 people; the attempt to murder the Saudi Ambassador in the U.S.; the foiled bomb plot in Kenya; etc. More recently, the IRGCI agents have perpetuated their acts of terror in the United States. Masih Alinejad, a vocal Iranian-American political activist, was threatened outside her residence in Washington DC by an IRGC agent. According to the U.S. Justice Department, an Iranian national and member of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps targeted John Bolton, the former U.S. President’s National Security Advisor. Moreover, the evidence of serious and credible threats on the lives of former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and former Trump-administration-Iran-envoy, Brian Hook, were disclosed by the State Department. Most recently, Salman Rushdie, an author of international renown, was nearly fatally attacked on a religious decree issued by the leader of IRI.

As you know, one of the IRGC’s most heinous acts of terror occurred in 2020, when the terrorist group took the lives of 176 people by shooting down Ukrainian flight 752 over Tehran. Of the total number of innocent victims who died that day, 138 passengers onboard had ties to Canada.

In light of the above, our humble opinion is that Canada’s response to these threats has been inadequate. While we applaud the step taken in June 2018 by the House of Commons to overwhelmingly designate the IRGC a terrorist organization, we are deeply concerned that four years later this motion is still waiting to become passed into law. We recognize this failing, despite several efforts by Canada parliamentarians to move this initiative forward. In serving as a beacon of hope and freedom to so many worldwide, Canada cannot allow the IRGC to be portrayed as anything other than what they are: an organized instrument of chaos, terror, and violence both inside and outside of Iran. This reality runs contrary to the IRGC’s false claim to be a “people’s army”.

Moreover, designating the Quds Force– the offshore branch of the IRGC- and not the full IRGC under the Canadian Criminal Code has created a plethora of legal anomalies. For one, the IRI would not care if Canada kept the Quds Force on the terrorist list, given that the Quds Force does not have significant economic assets. But the regime does care about foreign investment and international business, particularly in the energy sector. On the other hand, the designation of the full IRGC under the Canadian criminal code would not just be symbolic. In fact, it would have real-world consequences by making it hazardous for many banks and companies to do business with Iran, given the number of industries that are owned or controlled by the IRGC.

It is of importance to note that the Canadian public opinion appears to be in favour of more punitive measures. According to recent public opinion polls, there is clear Canadian consensus that foreign nationals who have not been held accountable in their home countries for gross human rights violations should not be allowed to travel or hold assets in Canada with impunity. We therefore strongly urge the government to consider subjecting the IRGC to the 2017 “Justice for Victims of Corrupt Foreign Officials Act”- Canada’s version of the Magnitsky Act- which has been designed to do just that.

Therefore, we call upon the government of Canada to extend the JVCFOA act to the entire IRGC for the following reasons:

The designation of the IRGC as a terrorist organization will help the families of the victims of the Ukrainian airliner by allowing them to sue the Iranian government for damages suffered as a result of the plane’s destruction.

(b) According to Canada’s Criminal Code, an entity can be added to the terrorist list if there are reasonable grounds to believe that it has knowingly carried out, participated in, or facilitated a terrorist activity. Therefore, the recent Ontario Superior Court of Justice ruling that the shooting down of Flight PS752 by Iran was an “intentional” act of terrorism paves the way for the government to designate the IRGC as a terrorist organization.

(c) IRGC agents are currently operating and fundraising on Canadian soil. Hence, failing to designate the IRGC in its entirety as a terrorist organization endangers not only Canada’s Iranian but also Jewish communities.

(d) Subjecting the IRGC to JVCFOA will automatically enforce travel bans against high-placed officials of the IRI, including: Razm Hosseini, the former Iranian Vice President; Mahmoud Reza Khavari, the former chairman of the board and managing director of Bank Melli Iran (the Islamic republic’s largest bank and fugitive embezzler wanted by Interpol); and more recently, Tehran’s Police Chief, Morteza Talaie and Hamid-Reza Reza Zadeh, the son of Iran’s Vice President Ensieh Khazali.

(e) Enacting JVCFOA will counter the IRGC’s money-laundering efforts and its other illicit activities through its proxies in Canada. The IRGC is responsible for commanding and coordinating Hezbollah’s global activities, including drug smuggling and money laundering, and thus it makes sense for the investigation to target both organizations.

(f) Not listing the IRGC as a terrorist organization also legitimizes the very organization that funds Hamas and Hezbollah, two organizations that Canada has already placed on this list.

(g) In a nutshell, listing the IRGC in its entirety as a terrorist organization will help decrease the risk that this organization poses to Canada and Canadians.

We thank you for taking the time to allow us to express our concerns, and we look forward to discussing this with you further. We would be most appreciative of receiving a response from you on this matter.

Sincerely,

CDI Board of Directors

Mr. Afshin Afshin Jam, Dr. Siavash Assadpour, Ms. Khatereh Azarfar, Dr. Ata Hoodashtian, , Ms. Venus Torabi, Dr. Farrokh Zandi

Toronto, Canada

While relatives of Iranians killed on Flight PS752 were unable to get visas to fly to Canada for memorial services, an Iranian VP's son is living and working in B.C.

Petition initiated by: Saeed Zavareh

July 14th, 2022
RE: The SIU 2022 Distinguished Award to Dr. Nasser Simforoosh

Dear SIU committee,

We are writing this letter to express our outrage about the news that Dr. Nasser Simforoosh will be one of the recipients of the 2022 SIU Distinguished Career Award. He has already shared this news with the Iranian mainstream and social media in advance of receiving the award stating that he was selected as the most accomplished urologist in the world by the SIU committee. As scientists and concerned Iranian citizens, we would like to urge the SIU committee to refrain from granting this award and reconsider this decision based on the reasons outlined below.

On January 12th, 2021, the contents of a letter1 signed by a group of Iranian physicians, professors and academics regarding the COVID-19 vaccines were widely publicized in the Iranian national media. This open letter was directed to the President of Iran and was timed carefully to be published a few days after an important speech2 made by the Supreme Leader of Iran in which he announced an all-out ban on the import of all types of COVID-19 vaccines especially those from the USA, UK and France. The letter was co-signed by over 2,500 scholars including Dr. Nasser Simforoosh (the 8th signatory on the list).

There are numerous statements in the letter that are very disturbing with a strong indication that the statements were politically motivated and devoid of scientific facts and evidence. Among the claims was a suggestion that the aforementioned vaccines may be used as biological weapons, claiming that such incidents have actually occurred in the past. It is important to note that this letter was written at the time when three major regulators in the world (the FDA, EMA, and WHO) had listed the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for emergency use. All the statements made by Dr. Simforoosh and his colleagues in the letter are scientifically unfounded. Such statements, particularly at the peak of the pandemic in early 2021, created a great deal of public mistrust toward vaccination campaigns intended to save lives both in Iran and abroad.

Dr. Simforoosh has also shown utter disregard for the principles of equity, diversity and inclusion during the time when some of us were trainees under his supervision. For example, we witnessed how he disallowed female urology residents to examine or operate on male patients. He was adamant about the segregation of male and female medical students preventing female trainees from learning the anatomy of the opposite sex. He often chose residents based on their affinity to religious beliefs rather than academic prowess. Some of us were present when he prevented female trainees from examining male patients with common urologic conditions preventing them from learning the fundamentals of a profession that they had worked so hard to qualify for.

Although Dr. Simfroosh has earned a few scientific accolades during his career, the damage that he has inflicted on our profession far outweighs these achievements. His behavior has led to a mass exodus of the best and brightest young physicians from Iran, many of which practice in prestigious institutions in North America today.

As such, our question to the SIU members is this.” Should a reputable international organization such as the SIU offer a prestigious award to a person who has not only been an exemplary leader of our profession but who has potentially led to the loss of thousands of lives by advocating false and disturbing statements on the safety of the COVID-19 vaccine?”.

We understand that the SIU presents this award to those who have made a significant and impactful contribution in the field of Urology and have potentially improved both patients’ lives and quality of life. However, Dr. Simfroosh’s actions and behavior have done the opposite. For one, they have disregarded the hypocritic oath, an oath taken by all physicians around the world, that states first do no harm. Dr. Simfroosh has indeed caused a lot of harm by advocating falsehoods about a scientific breakthrough that could have saved thousands of lives in Iran during the pandemic purely for political gains.

We sincerely hope that the SIU reconsiders this decision in memory of the thousands of innocent Iranian lives that were lost during the pandemic, thousands of patients whose lives were affected by his decisions and hundreds of physicians who ultimately left their homeland solely because of his behavior.

https://www.change.org/p/stop-awarding-dr-nasser-simforoosh-the-2022-siu-distinguished-career-award

Rt. Honourable Justin Trudeau, PC, MP

Office of the Prime Minister

80 Wellington Street

Ottawa, Ontario

K1A 0A2

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Fax: (613) 941-6900

July 5, 2022

Dear Prime Minister Trudeau,

We write you in regard to a disturbing extradition treaty currently pending ratification before the Belgian Parliament. Recently Belgium and the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) negotiated a treaty that facilitates the swap of individuals convicted of gross violations of human rights and terrorism charges by Belgian courts in return for the release of individuals arbitrarily arrested and detained by IRI. Should this treaty be adopted by the Belgian Parliament, it would permit Iranians convicted in Belgium to serve the remainder of their sentence in their home country, and vice versa.

As with most other members of the Iranian diaspora dispersed around the world, we are gravely concerned that the Belgian Government would see fit to agree to such a nefarious arrangement, and are certain that the treaty will accentuate IRI’s inclination to arrest dual nationals as bargaining chips with foreign countries, and embolden it to undertake further terrorist activities by targeting Iranian dissidents throughout Europe and North America.

The immediate backdrop against which this extradition treaty has been negotiated was a decision rendered by a Belgian court in 2020 that found Assadollah Asadi, an Iranian diplomat accredited to Austria, for having “attempted murder and involvement in terrorism” by attempting to target a gathering of Iranian dissidents in France. Consequently, Asadi was sentenced to 20 years of imprisonment in Belgium. The gathering of criminal evidence that uncovered this plot was made possible by an elaborate intelligence operation coordinated between the security services of France, Germany, Austria, Luxemburg, and Belgium. In an obvious tit-for-tat, unconfirmed media reports suggest that IRI has recently arrested two Belgian nationals in Iran to use as leverage with Belgium for the release of Asadi from prison.

As such, we should all be concerned that rather than standing steadfast against IRI’s latest attempts at hostage diplomacy, the Belgian government is eschewing international law by attempting to rush a newly finalized extradition through its legislature for approval. As you are aware, for decades IRI has systematically resorted to the arbitrary detention of foreign and dual nationals so as to leverage innocent individuals as bargaining chips in its hostage diplomacy. The prohibition against the arbitrary detention and imprisonment of individuals is long-established, being expressly banned and outlawed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of 1968, the International Convention against the Taking of Hostages of 1979, and the recent legal instrument referred to as the Declaration Against the Arbitrary Detention in State-to-State Relations of 2020, an initiative drafted and championed by Canada.

The international community should therefore stand united in condemning Belgium’s latest effort to award the Islamic Republic of Iran for its morally reprehensible behaviour. Apart from condoning IRI’s practice of hostage diplomacy, Belgium is turning a blind eye to IRI’s nefarious practice of undertaking intelligence operations to eliminate Iranian dissidents on foreign soil. Schemes orchestrated by the Government of IRI and its proxies to target its perceived enemies for assassination, surveillance and abduction in numerous countries are well documented.^[1] Apart from incontrovertible evidence unearthed in the trial of Assadollah Asadi referenced above, the international community is fully aware of recent attempts by agents of IRI to target dissidents, including among others attempts uncovered in Holland in 2015 and 2017, and in Denmark in 2018.^[2] Furthermore, as evidenced by accounts publicized by Canadian and American news media outlets, North America has certainly not proven immune from the menace of Iranian intelligence operatives orchestrating elaborate schemes either.³

In light of the disturbing evidence provided above, we would respectfully request that you, Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly, and Canada’s diplomatic mission in Brussels exert every effort to apprise the Belgian Government of the error of its ways in attempting to enter into an extradition treaty with IRI. Efforts to remain vigilant against the scourge of terrorism must remain a collective priority, and vigilance to maintain international security should remain indivisible and not be permitted to fall prey to the short-sighted initiative of one country alone. Indeed, the failure to discourage Belgium from proceeding with its extradition treaty will encourage IRI to continue its systematic practice of detaining innocent individuals within its borders, embolden it to continue its clandestine terrorist operations beyond its borders on foreign soil, and stand as a testament to other rogue countries that resorting to the opprobrium of similarly sinister practices will be rewarded.

It remains to add that Canada is uniquely positioned to lead the effort to ensure that the Islamic Republic is thwarted in its efforts to reap any rewards from its menacing machinations abroad. Apart from having a moral responsibility to lead the effort to ensure that the Islamic Republic is held to account for the tragedy of Flight PS752, you have been outspoken in condemning the practice of paying ransom or of rewarding countries or entities that have abducted or detained Canadians abroad and have belatedly championed international acceptance of the Declaration Against Arbitrary Detention in State-to-State Relations.

We thank you for considering this request and certainly hope that your government will make every effort to make the strongest diplomatic representations to Belgium.

On behalf of Canadians for Democracy in Iran

Sincerely yours

Afshin Afshin Jam, Spokesperson

CC:      Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Foreign Affairs, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

            Michael Chong, MP, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Heather McPherson, MP, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Ali Ehsassi, MP, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

^[1] https://ctc.usma.edu/trends-in-iranian-external-assassination-surveillance-and-abduction-plots/

^[2] https://www.iranintl.com/en/202203126641

³ https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-condemns-iran-kidnapping-plot-1.6103032

Canada has warned its citizens against all travel to Iran “due to the volatile security situation, the regional threat of terrorism and the possibility of arbitrary detention.

On Sunday, June 15, 2022, hundreds of Iranian citizens living in Canada supported the anti-government protests of Iranian citizens by holding rallies in solidarity with the grieving people of Abadan in the Metropol disaster.

The organizers of the gatherings in various Canadian cities announced that these gatherings were held with the aim of "interaction, respect and solidarity" with the people "to help the process of transition from the Islamic Republic".

These gatherings were held in the three cities of Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal, with the presence of Iranian groups with different political tendencies.

The growing role and power of the IRGC is a critical factor shaping the power structure of Iran and the level of stability and security in the Gulf. It is a critical factor affecting the future of Iraq as well. This commentary by Munqith Dagher presents an Iraqi view of just how serious a challenge the IRGC has become.