[R-G] Canada's Opportunity to Confront Iran Is at Hand

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

Here's what the most important right-wing Canadian newspaper is
saying.  Canadian rightists see their golden opportunities in the
United against Iran protests. -- Yoshie

<http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2009/07/26/national-post-editorial-board-canada-s-opportunity-to-confront-iran-is-at-hand.aspx>
National Post editorial board: Canada's opportunity to confront Iran is at hand
Posted: July 26, 2009, 12:00 PM by NP Editor
Editorial, Full Comment, Canadian politics

Even as Iran supports terrorist groups in Lebanon and Gaza, and races
toward construction of a nuclear bomb, the world has done little to
confront it. Many world leaders seem fatalistically resigned toward
accepting the Islamist theocracy as a major nuclear-armed regional
power.

But the tide may be turning — courtesy of none other than Iran’s
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and his handpicked President,
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Mr. Ahmadinejad’s fraudulent re-election last
month, and the brutal crackdown against protesters that followed it,
have stirred up long simmering resentment at home. At the same time,
these events have shone a light on an appalling human-rights record
that includes secret prisons, torture, child executions,
state-sanctioned rape and the murder of regime opponents.

After three decades of an Islamic revolution that has squandered the
material and spiritual wealth of a once-great civilization, the
Iranian regime is vulnerable — facing a severe political and economic
crisis at home and diminished influence abroad.
In the U.S. Congress, Democrats and Republicans are ready to exploit
that vulnerability to peacefully persuade the regime to abandon its
nuclear program or face, in the words of U.S. Secretary of State
Hillary Clinton, “crippling economic sanctions.”

Over two-thirds of the U.S Senate and more than half of the House of
Representatives have co-sponsored the Iran Refined Petroleum Sanctions
Act. The bill, based on research by the Washington-based Foundation
for Defense of Democracies (FDD), targets Iran’s most serious economic
Achilles heel — it’s heavy dependence on imports of refined petroleum.
This trade is facilitated by a handful of mostly European foreign
energy suppliers — Vitol, Trafigura, Total, Glencore and Shell, as
well as the Indian company Reliance Industries. Insurance and
reinsurance companies from Britain, Germany, Norway and Japan also
make this trade possible by underwriting these shipments.

Many of these companies have significant business interests in Canada.
As U.S. Congressman Brad Sherman wrote yesterday  — in the concluding
piece of a four-part series run by this paper in association with FDD
— Canada therefore has a critical role to play in the implementation
of a refined-petroleum embargo. Building on the momentum in the United
States on this issue, he sensibly argued that Canada should put Iran’s
gasoline providers to a choice between the unstable Iranian
dictatorship and Canada’s energy riches.

This campaign isn’t just about pressuring Iran to stop its dangerous
nuclear program — a program whose success would give Iran’s ruling
mullahs the opportunity to realize their cherished goal of
annihilating Israel. It is also about the human rights of Iran’s own
women and children.

In her contribution to the series on Wednesday, Canadian human rights
activist Nazanin Afshin-Jam provided a horrific glimpse into the
brutalities of the regime, noting that at least 160 alleged child
offenders await execution. In a companion piece, Tarek Fatah described
a consistent pattern of rape by Basiji militia members as an
instrument of subjugation by the regime, including a report of a
practice of raping young Iranian girls prior to their execution to
ensure that, in accordance with a highly dubious interpretation of
Islam, they are not murdered as virgins.

In his contribution on Thursday, internationally recognized
human-rights expert Irwin Cotler underscored the importance of
focusing on the Iranian regime’s human-rights record. He has
introduced the Iran Accountability Act in Parliament to focus
attention not only on Iran’s nuclear program, but also on its domestic
repression and genocidal incitement. He, too, calls for Canada to
leverage its energy riches by putting Iran’s refined petroleum
suppliers to a choice between the Canadian and Iranian markets.

Will such a campaign work? It might — especially given Iran’s current
vulnerability. But even if it fails, there is moral value in trying
peaceful methods before military options present themselves. As Mark
Dubowitz of the FDD argued in these pages on Tuesday, “No one could
argue that countries threatened by Iran had ignored peaceful
alternatives.”

Canadian politicians should consider joining their American
counterparts on this issue. With a new session of Parliament starting,
and Barack Obama hosting the G20, at which the Iran file will surely
be prominent, September might be a good month to turn the Iran
gasoline sanctions idea into meaningful government action. After so
many years of dithering, the opportunity to decisively confront Iran’s
rulers may now be at hand.

National Post