UK WINDOW ON IRAN: NGO ARGUES MORE SABERI-LIKE

S E C R E T SECTION 01 OF 03 LONDON 001203

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/20/2019
TAGS: IR JA PGOV PHUM PREL PTER ECON UK
SUBJECT: UK WINDOW ON IRAN: NGO ARGUES MORE SABERI-LIKE
ARRESTS LIKELY; JAPAN EMBASSY COMMENTS ON SPEED OF
ENGAGEMENT; ANALYST ON IRANIAN NEGOTIATING STYLES; A
PESSIMIST'S VIEW ON BOB LEVINSON; ELECTIONS

Classified By: Classified By: Political Counselor Rick Mills for reason
s 1.4 (b) and (d)


1. (SBU) This cable responds to Department (NEA/IR) request
that Iran Watcher posts, echoing IRPO Dubai's widely read
"Window on Iran" round-ups, provide as feasible occasional
front channel summaries of day-to-day Iran-related
interactions appropriate for reporting in summary form to a
wide Washington readership.


2. (S/NF) Summary highlights:
-- Spoilers' arrests of vulnerable AmCits may be repeated
(para. 3);
-- Japan Embassy claims Tokyo wants faster pace on U.S.-Iran
engagement (para. 4);
-- Elections: Ahmedinejad seen as front-runner among expat
Karrubi supporters (para. 5);
-- Iranian private sector negotiator urges engagement
include tough U.S. approach in private (para. 6);
-- Broadcaster believes Mr. Levinson may be dead (para. 7).
(end summary)


3. (S) TEHRAN NGO HEAD SAYS SABERI CASE REFLECTS HARD-LINE
TACTICS LIKELY TO BE REPEATED. A Tehran-based NGO head,
closely linked to UNHCR offices in Iran, and well-known to
Department, correctly predicted to Poloff prior to the event
that Ms Saberi would be released shortly before Iran's June
election, but gloomily argued the recurrence of such an event
-- the grabbing by hard-liners of a U.S.-related civil
society figure so as to complicate engagement efforts -- is
extremely high. Following Ms. Saberi's May 12 release, the
NGO head reiterated this view to Poloff and argued that,
unless the USG is able to absorb such provocations to an
extraordinary extent, hard-line "spoilers" are likely to
succeed in precluding or derailing U.S.-Iran engagement.

-- Interestingly, this NGO head argues many spoilers are
financially rather than politically motivated, describing the
key players as being "the financial mafias" or groupings
which, using generally conservative or hard-line political
cover, reap huge mercantile benefits, in the form of sector
and import and smuggling monopolies enabled by Iran's
sanctions-based isolation. The normalization of relations
would fundamentally undermine these groups' business
interests. This NGO head, who has frequently argued to
Poloff that the IRI regime in its present form will be
unable, due to lack of domestic legitimacy, to survive in its
present form in the event of a significant opening to the
West, maintained that a concrete, dramatic but circumscribed
USG gesture, such as a reopening of air routes and provision
of aircraft spare parts, would fundamentally undermine and
discredit the isolationist narrative propagated by this
"mafia." Such a gesture, he argued would, because of the
energizing effect on the general population, commit the
regime to a course of greater openness to the United States.



4. (S/NF) CANDOR ON IRAN FROM JAPANESE EMBASSY LONDON: TOKYO
MFA REPORTEDLY ANXIOUS FOR USG TO PUSH ENGAGEMENT FORWARD
MORE QUICKLY; AIRCRAFT PARTS A KEY DELIVERABLE. Takahiro
Tamura, First Secretary at the Japanese Embassy in London
told London Iran Watcher May 18 that GOJ, and Deputy Foreign
Minister for Political Affairs Sasae in particular, believe
the USG may be allowing too much time to go by while awaiting
dramatic or meaningful Iranian responses to President Obama's
Nowruz message and the P5 1's April statement. Tamura
referred to Foreign Minister Nakasone's May 2 visit to
Tehran, which Tamura noted had been done over U.S. protests,
but which Sasae had felt, according to Tamura, was important
to signal to all parties the urgency of moving forward.
Tamura further noted what he called Israel's likely
impatience with an extended timeline for U.S.-Iran
negotiations on the nuclear issue, as well as what Tamura
said would be Japan's inability, in the event of a failure of
engagement, to join with the United States in any pressure on
Iran's hydrocarbon sector, due to Japan's high dependency on
Iranian crude.

-- Tamura noted the extensive discussion of engagement he
said Tokyo MFA officials regularly conduct with Iranian
Ambassador to Japan Araghchi and his staff. Tamura said the
Japanese MFA after the Nakasone visit to Tehran had asked the
Iranian Embassy in Tokyo for a list of possible USG actions
that Iran believes would be likely to quicken the pace of
direct U.S.-Iran engagement. Tamura was uncertain whether
the Iranian Embassy's written reply, contained in a letter
signed by the Embassy's Deputy Chief of Mission, had been
vetted by Tehran authorities, but flagged to London Iran
Watcher that the item heading the Iranian list was a request

LONDON 00001203 002 OF 003


for the USG to permit the immediate export to Iran of civil
airliner spare parts, specifically Boeing spare parts.
Tamura said his MFA had asked for such a list in the context
of widely repeated Iranian statements that Tehran wants
concrete actions by the USG going beyond what Tamura called
"the recent change in tone" of U.S. policy on Iran.


5. (C/NF) ELECTIONS: UK-BASED IRANIANS LIKE KARRUBI BUT SEE
AHMEDINEJAD AS FRONT-RUNNER. The general view of London Iran
Watcher (poloff)'s principal analytical contacts is hopeful
but realistic as to the prospects of former Majles Speaker
Karrubi's electoral prospects. Citing the traditionally
unpredictable nature of Iranian elections, analysts such as
St. Andrew's University historian Ali Ansari, Durham
University Political scientist Anoush Ehtashami, civil
society exchange coordinator Ali Pedram, pseudonymic blogger
Nasrin Alavi, and the University of London's Nima Mina
indicate personal preference for Karrubi but avoid
predictions as to turnout, the order in which candidates will
finish, margins of victory, and the likelihood of a runoff.
Those recent UK returnees from Iran who speak to Poloff or to
analysts excitedly of growing support for Moussavi or
Karroubi do admit, when pressed, that their visits to Iran
did not extend far beyond north Tehran, where reformist
support is traditionally concentrated.

-- VOA contract broadcaster Ali Reza Nourizadeh told Poloff
he still believes Ahmedinejad is the front runner but that he
himself is now an enthusiastic supporter of Karrubi's
candidacy, and dismisses Moussavi as ideologically very close
to Ahmedinejad. He argues Moussavi is still the object of
Khamenei's personal enmity based on their past mutual
history, despite press suggestions of a reconciliation
between the two. Nourizadeh emphasizes Karrubi's ability, if
elected, as a cleric to openly disagree with Khamenei, as
well as Karrubi's public statements of openness to
negotiation with the U.S. Nourizadeh claimed that
negotiations had occurred, but had gained no traction,
between Karrubi's and Moussavi's camps over giving Karrubi
control of several major cabinet appointments in exchange for
his own last-minute withdrawal from the race and endorsement
of Moussavi. Nourizadeh said that Karrubi is thought by many
to have engaged in corruption at the Shahid Foundation in the
1980's but that his campaign offers of transparency on that
issue have mollified the press. Nourizadeh said "bazaaris"
are a large part of Karrubi's natural constituency, and that
the student reform organization Takhim e Vahdat, of which
Nourizadeh has sentimental views, is a likely supporter.
Nourizadeh noted that many older expats and many U.S.-based
anti-regime groups had denounced Nourizadeh's refusal to join
their calls for an election boycott.

-- All Poloff interlocutors agree that a low turnout, and a
run-off scenario, would favor Ahmedinejad, due to his control
of Interior Ministry mechanisms, rural patronage, and Basij
personnel. A high turnout, contacts generally agree, will
bring a visibly high level of anti-Ahmedinejad voters to the
polls, thus making it harder for Interior Ministry attempts
at manipulation to appear plausible.


6. (S/NF) NEGOTIATING WITH IRAN: IRANIAN OIL CONSULTANT SAYS
USG MUST COMPLEMENT ITS CONCILIATORY PUBLIC TONE WITH TOUGH
PRIVATE APPROACH. A thirty-year-old Iranian financial
analyst, now UK-based but prior to 2006 a consultant for Pars
Phenol Iran with Iran's Oil Ministry, on May 19 privately
shared with London Iran Watcher (Poloff) his views on Iranian
negotiating norms; he drew on his experience of trying to
secure from European banks Iranian oil sector financing on
behalf the Oil Ministry. The analyst describes himself
politically as a supporter of the Islamic Republic, albeit an
Iran with reduced clerical control, greater social and
political tolerance, and more openness to the West. To
Poloff, the analyst urged that USG officials who engage in
private discussions with Iranian officials on nuclear or
regional security issues adopt in private an approach much
tougher, albeit respectful, than what he described as the
USG's current "conciliatory" public tone. He agreed fully
that the current, conciliatory public tone is needed to
enable Iran's deeply defensive officialdom to engage with the
USG, but argued passionately that, inside any non-public
negotiating venue, USG negotiators will have "no chance" of
achieving their goals if they do not set a firm, highly
specific agenda and negotiating timeline, complete with a
frank explanation of negative consequences in the event of
negotiating failure.

-- The analyst argued there is a danger that the USG's
current public line of openness to direct engagement appears
liable to produce engagement that is in substance open-ended
as to time frame, subject matter, and objective, lacking

LONDON 00001203 003 OF 003


clear statements of mutual equities and a firm timeline. He
argued such a negotiating approach would be warmly welcomed
by Iranian officials, who would, in the absence of pressure
to reach any specific objectives, deftly spin such talks out
for as long as the USG remained at the table.

-- The analyst stressed that Iranian negotiators will, unless
driven by their interlocutors to focus on clear goals,
parameters and consequences, indulge what he called the IRI's
systemic proclivity for meandering procrastination, even at
the expense of Iran's own interests. As an example he cited
his own experience of Iranian oil officials repeatedly
allowing negotiations for achievable Western financing to
fail because of the officials' generalized reluctance, in the
presence of Western negotiators who were not pressing them
hard, to make specific commitments and close a deal, despite
Iran's crippling need for oil sector investment.

-- The analyst attributed this dynamic to the belief within
IRI institutions that failure carries a greater penalty than
inaction, and to individuals' belief in hidden traps and the
related assumption that an opponent will show all his cards,
and reveal the true nature of his negotiating objectives,
only as a last, desperate resort.


7. (S/NF) BROADCASTER NOURIZADEH BELIEVES BOB LEVINSON MAY
BE DEAD. VOA contract broadcaster Ali Reza Nourizadeh on May
19, referring to earlier accounts he had claimed to receive
(08 London 766 and previous) containing alleged details on
Bob Levinson's condition and whereabouts, opined that Mr.
Levinson has most likely been dead for the past year or more.
Nourizadeh argued that a prisoner such as Mr. Levinson
represented a lucrative opportunity to any prison,
logistical, medical, or security sector employee having even
indirect knowledge of a living American prisoner, making it
very unlikely, were Mr. Levinson still alive, for any Iranian
government authorities to hold Mr. Levinson in complete
secrecy. Nourizadeh said the multiple reports he claimed to
have been receiving until early 2008, with sketchy details of
Mr. Levinson's condition and shifting location, all from
persons with private agendas and no direct ties to the IRGC,
had since early 2008 been replaced by "complete silence," a
silence Nourizadeh said was significant.

-- Nourizadeh flagged that a common theory in Iran about the
disappearance was that the kidnapping had been done for
ransom, vice political reasons, by a business "mafia"
independent of regime authorities. Nourizadeh dismissed this
theory, however, as inconsistent with what he called the
"absolute control" the IRGC holds over Kish Island, down to
and including airport baggage handlers and hotel staff: he
claimed as his source for this view of Kish Island security
the leader of a powerful Baluchi-Iranian resistance group
which reportedly had tried but had been unable to gain access
to Kish Island.

-- Comment: As with previously reported Nourizadeh
allegations about Mr. Levinson's kidnapping, Embassy is
unable to assess with any confidence whether Nourizadeh's
views are plausible and supported by credible information,
uninformed conjecture, or fabrications.

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