US embassy cable - 05DUBAI4706

S E C R E T  DUBAI 004706 
 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL:  9/25/2015 
TAGS: IR, PINR, PGOV, PHUM, PREL, KNNP 
SUBJECT: FORMER IRANIAN MP: REFORMERS TRYING TO REGROUP 
 
CLASSIFIED BY: Jason L. Davis, Consul General, Dubai, UAE. 
REASON: 1.4 (d) 
 
1. (S) Summary:  Iranian reform leader and former member of 
parliament Fatemeh Haghighatjoo (please protect) believes that 
international pressure on Iran, but not war, will produce 
positive results on both the nuclear and the human rights 
fronts. She admits the reform movement is in disarray and to 
date has suffered from an inability to unify; she believes the 
solution is more extensive media efforts. She supports former 
presidential candidate Karroubi's efforts to open a private 
television channel, which will reportedly follow a BBC/CNN 
model. On the recent presidential election, she thinks a 
combination of fraud and a genuine response to his 
not-so-genuine promises of economic relief brought Ahmadinejad 
to power. Now in office, the new government is pursuing 
corruption cases against reformers. End summary. 
 
2. (S) Fatemeh Haghighatjoo (please protect), an Iranian reform 
leader and former member of parliament from Tehran, came to 
ConGen Dubai September 21 to pick up an exchange visitor visa 
(J) for herself and her family. She is going to MIT for a 
fellowship in its Center for International Studies, where she 
will focus on human rights issues. She gave PolEconChief the 
following overview of her perspective on current Iranian affairs. 
 
Recommendation for Foreign Governments:  Pressure 
--------------------------------------------- ---- 
 
3. (S) Haghighatjoo called the Iranian Government's recent 
threats on the nuclear issue, such as pulling out of the NPT, 
"lies". Saying "I know this government," she predicted that 
serious international pressure, including from the United 
Nations Security Council, would make it cave. However, she 
repeatedly underscored that she did not believe war against Iran 
was the solution. 
 
4. (S) On the human rights front she also said she believed 
outside pressure on Iran was effective. She thought foreign 
statements spotlighting specific cases, such as Iranian 
political prisoner Akbar Ganji, on the balance offer more help 
than harm to the affected individuals. It should not be 
forgotten, however, that there are lots of other political 
prisoners in Iran, she noted. 
 
Recommendation for Iranian Reformers:  Organize 
--------------------------------------------- -- 
 
5. (S) Haghighatjoo repeated what we hear from all sources: that 
the reform movement in Iran is in disarray, and that reformers 
have not been able to form an alliance amongst themselves. She 
cited a "lack of internal media support" as one of the main 
reasons for this, indicating that without media coverage of 
their point-of-view and issues, reformers could not succeed. 
Unsurprisingly, she said the state media organs, as well as the 
legal framework of Iran, work against reformers. She added that 
the government knows that the Iranian people are generally 
pro-American, so it deliberately slants press coverage against 
the U.S. in an attempt to discredit it in the eyes of the 
people.  She believes such efforts are successful only with the 
"uneducated class" in Iran. 
 
6. (S) In the absence of a free domestic press, she said 
reformers should work on media projects from outside Iran. She 
praised Radio Farda and the BBC's Persian service, and mentioned 
that a Dutch government project to open a Farsi language TV 
channel was attracting quality Iranian journalists. On the other 
hand, she criticized the Los Angeles-based Farsi language 
commercial television channels as "lacking" in terms of 
intelligent content. 
 
Karroubi Hits the Airwaves 
-------------------------- 
 
7. (S) Haghighatjoo confirmed reports in the press and from 
other contacts that former presidential candidate and former 
Majlis Speaker Mehdi Karroubi is planning to launch an private 
Iranian television channel. She said she had recently seen 
Karroubi and encouraged him to pursue this project. (Note: press 
reports refer to Karroubi's station as Iran's first 
privately-owned station, but indicate that the station will be 
based outside the country, in Dubai -- which we have not been 
able to confirm. Called 'Saba' Television, it will launch at the 
end of Ramadan and be modeled after the BCC, CNN, al-Jazeera, 
and al-Arabiya. Contacts say it is supposed to be more 
"objective" in its news coverage than Iranian state TV. Karroubi 
is also reportedly opening a newspaper.) 
 
Election Assessment 
------------------- 
 
8. (S) Haghighatjoo said Ahmadinejad won the presidency with a 
combination of organized fraud and real votes by people 
responding to his populist economic message. She claimed all 
candidates, even conservatives Qalibaf and Larijani, complained 
of cheating, but most then agreed to stay quiet. She is 
personally convinced that Karroubi, not Ahmadinejad, got more 
legitimate votes in the first round and should thus have made 
the second round. (According to published results of the first 
round of voting, Ahmadinejad came in second place with 19.48 
percent of the vote, and Karroubi in third with 17.28 percent). 
 
9. (S) Those who actually voted for Ahmadinejad were responding 
to his campaign promises to improve their economic situation, 
Haghighatjoo said. She added that Karroubi was the only other 
candidate to speak directly on economic issues. Reformer 
candidate Moin only spoke indirectly about the economic 
hardships facing the people, claiming that with democracy, the 
economy would improve. Despite Ahmadinejad's campaign rhetoric, 
Haghighatjoo was dismissive of the chance of structural economic 
change coming soon to Iran. 
 
10. (S) Haghighatjoo also said that after eight years of 
President Khatami, many wanted a president who came across as 
strong. However, Haghighatjoo echoed a common view that 
Ahmadinejad has no power himself, that the Supreme Leader 
retains control. As to why Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard 
Corps (IRGC) would want to move into the realm of political 
power, she thought perhaps they were inspired by the political 
role the military has played in Pakistan and Turkey. 
Furthermore, the military was likely worried that if reformers 
managed to retain the presidency, they could eventually succeed 
at reducing the military's power. 
 
11. (S) In her view, Supreme Leader Khamene'i decided 
post-election that he no longer needs defeated presidential 
candidate Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, although she doubts he will 
actually run Rafsanjani out on corruption charges. She confirmed 
that the government is, however, pursuing corruption cases 
against some former officials, mostly reformers. Regarding her 
own situation, the Iranian judiciary was threatening to bring 
her up on charges related to speeches she had given calling for 
the release of student activists. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
12. (S) Comment:  We note that Haghighatjoo is unlikely to have 
any first-hand knowledge of the Iranian government's negotiating 
positions on the nuclear issue or actual evidence of fraud in 
the elections. Nonetheless, she is an astute observer of the new 
government and an experienced reform leader. Now 37, she told us 
she started her own political activities while still at 
university. She impressed PolEconChief as a very capable and 
charismatic activist who feels driven to work for real change in 
Iran. 
 
13. (S) Haghighatjoo is one of three noteworthy Iranian 
reformers we know of issued J or H-1B visas within the past 
month for academic work in the U.S., including noted blogger 
Omid Memarian (going to UC Berkeley's School of Journalism) and 
Akbar Atri (going to the Human Rights Center at Yale). She 
mentioned that her husband is a journalist and plans to pursue a 
master's degree in journalism while they are in the U.S. 
 
 
DAVIS