wow, I've never seen Zakaria give both barrels to an interviewee like this before.
Interesting introduction for the first couple of minutes. Thereafter things ratchet up until the last few minutes, when things get really heated. Tolkien fans will particularly like the last line...
Transcript from:
http://orientemiedo.wordpress.com/2009/07/27/fareed-zakaria-vs-mohammad-marandi/ZAKARIA: Joining me now from Tehran is Seyed Mohammad Marandi. He is a professor of North American Studies at Tehran University.
Professor Marandi, welcome.
PROF. SEYED MOHAMMAD MARANDI, UNIVERSITY OF TEHRAN: Thank you.
ZAKARIA: Let me ask you, professor, how do we make sense of what is going on in Iran right now? The only way in which the regime has been able to maintain its control is to use fairly tough methods — brutal methods — of repression.
It has used the Basij. It is using the Revolutionary Guard. It is arresting people. It is arresting journalists.
This is not what the Islamic Republic of Iran presents to the world as the basis of its regime. It is turning into a military dictatorship, is it not?
MARANDI: Since Mr. Mousavi’s people went to the streets day after day, it was causing trouble in the city of Tehran. So, the police really felt that they had to bring thing back to normal.
Mr. Mousavi took people to the streets in the heart of Tehran, where businesses were severely disrupted and damaged, ordinary people were hurt. And he did it on a daily basis.
And on the other hand, I think that Mr. Ahmadinejad was provocative in his victory speech after the election.
But I think that, as things settle down and the two sides become more level-headed and less emotional, the supporters of both gentlemen, I think things will return back to normal.
ZAKARIA: But they are not normal. Mr. Mousavi’s brother-in-law is in jail. Many of his supporters are in jail. He is under effective house arrest.
You’re making this out like a normal dispute at election, where people are now happily reconciled. But you still have, on one side, the use of the Basij, the Revolutionary Guard, house arrests, real arrests.
This is, as I say, this has become a military clampdown and a military dictatorship, has it not?
MARANDI: No, again, I don’t agree, because if you go on the streets of Tehran, things are very normal. I mean, you can walk around town… ZAKARIA: You can walk around…
MARANDI: … and you will not see anything extraordinary.
ZAKARIA: You can walk around North Korea, as well, Professor Marandi.
MARANDI: I think you also have to keep in mind the fact that some of the measures taken by the security forces have to do with the fact that there has been a lot of interference from outside the country.
Right now you have almost 40 television channels in Persian being broadcast into Iran from the United States and Europe — basically funded by the American government and European governments, or in some cases owned — which have played a very negative role over the past few weeks, turning people against one another.
This sort of behavior and this sort of funding coming from the United States and its European allies really does not serve their interests.
ZAKARIA: Professor Marandi, you can’t possibly expect us to believe that. Here you have a two-term president of Iran, Rafsanjani, calling for opposition to the regime; a two-term prime minister of Iran, Mr. Mousavi, calling for the creation of an opposition movement; a two-term president, Khatami, calling for a referendum.
You have people under house arrest. You have major clerics in Qom asking that Ahmadinejad’s election be boycotted.
Are you telling me all these people are doing this at the bidding of the United States? Surely you must realize that that’s kind of a ludicrous claim.
MARANDI: Well, that’s not exactly what I said.
What I was saying was that the path that the United States…
ZAKARIA: Those are the people who are asking people to go out on the streets — not President Obama. It is a president alright. It just happens to be President Khatami and Rafsanjani, not President Obama.
MARANDI: What I’ve been saying was that, when external forces and governments outside of Iran interfere in a country’s internal affairs, it only makes matters worse, and it only creates further tensions.
I think it’s extraordinary that the United States allows itself to beam in tens of television channels, or fund television channels that beam into the country. And in many cases, they call for riots, and they call for violence.
ZAKARIA: Do you worry that you will be seen in history as a mouthpiece for a dying, repressive regime in its death throes? That 20 years from now you’ll look back, and the world will look back at you, the way it did some of those smooth-talking, English-speaking, Soviet spokesmen who were telling us right in the middle 1980s, that the Soviet Union was all just fine and democratic and wonderful?
MARANDI: Well, Fareed, I am an academic at the University of Tehran. And I would be very surprised to know that Mr. Ahmadinejad would be supportive of me, because I have always been a critic of his administration. But I think it is my duty to be honest.
And if he has won the election, I will have to accept the results. Just like when Mr. Hugo Chavez wins elections in Venezuela, I think the people who oppose him have to accept the results.
And also, I think that, if we look back in my own personal history, I was a volunteer in the Iraq-Iran War when Iraq invaded Iran. And I survived two chemical attacks by the Iraqi regime.
And those chemical weapons were provided to Iraq’s — to Saddam Hussein — by the European Union countries and the United States. They provided…
ZAKARIA: You know that that’s not true.
MARANDI: … (UNINTELLIGIBLE) technology.
ZAKARIA: And you..
MARANDI: And I think that if…
ZAKARIA: You hesitated there, Professor Marandi, because you know it is not true that the United States provided any…
MARANDI: But the technology and the support…
ZAKARIA: You’re trying to come up with some way to formulate it that you…
MARANDI: No, the United States did provide Saddam Hussein with support.
ZAKARIA: With agricultural credits. They did not provide them with chemical weapons.
MARANDI: Come on, Fareed. You know that the United States did back Saddam — you know that the United States did back Saddam Hussein, that they supported him both directly…
ZAKARIA: I may — I said very clearly it provided agricultural credits. Though that’s not chemical weapons. These are two separate things.
MARANDI: Well, I think history has shown that the United States did back Saddam Hussein at a time when he was carrying out brutal measures against the people — his own people — and the people of Iran. And I am a survivor of those two attacks. But at the end of the day, what I am looking for is a more realistic understanding of Iran in the United States, in order for rapprochement to begin.
And if people in the United States, if politicians in the United States do not wish to understand the reality on the ground in Iran, then there will not be an opportunity for the two sides to sit together and to resolve their issues.
ZAKARIA: All right. Thank you very much, Professor Marandi. I will only point out to you and to our viewers, that one sign that the regime looks favorably upon you is it is almost impossible to get anybody from Tehran — you know, and to be allowed to do so on an open satellite link.
MARANDI: Fareed, you invited me.
ZAKARIA: We have tried very hard — that’s my point. But it is very hard to get these satellite links through in Iran. And the fact that you are allowed to do this…
MARANDI: Well, a lot of people, Fareed, don’t trust the Western media.
ZAKARIA: Well, my point stands.
MARANDI: No, Fareed. A lot of people here don’t trust the Western media.
ZAKARIA: I would love to…
MARANDI: They think it’s biased…
ZAKARIA: I would love to talk to…
MARANDI: … rightly or wrongly.
ZAKARIA: I would love to talk to Prime Minister Mousavi, President Khatami or President Rafsanjani. But alas, we are not allowed to speak to them.
MARANDI: Well, that’s not…
ZAKARIA: The only person we are allowed to speak to is you.
MARANDI: Well again — but you can speak to my colleagues at the University of Tehran. And you can speak to my students. Hopefully, if you get a visa one of these days, you can come to speak to them…
ZAKARIA: Which I applied for several times and have never gotten. So…
MARANDI: … and meet them. And you’ll see that it’s a very different world from the one that you believe it to be.
ZAKARIA: Well, I anxiously await the day I will be granted a visa to Tehran. It has not happened yet.
Thank you very much, Professor Marandi.
MARANDI: But if you think that I am somehow the Mouth of Sauron, I think you’re mistaken.
ZAKARIA: Thank you.
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