Editorial:
Iranian Morality Tale
The Washington Post
Thursday, March 4, 1999
THE CANDIDATES identified with reform in Iran seem to have prevailed
in the first local elections since the Islamic revolution in 1979. A 90
percent turnout gave candidates supporting President Mohammed Khatemi a
formidable 70 percent of the vote for seats that were chartered in the
Iranian constitution but previously had not been filled. In a view that
has gained broad support in the West, the vote bespeaks popular confidence
in a by-now proven moderate who has put a popular foundation under his
brave challenge of the hard-line fundamentalists in Tehran. To some, this
is the time to end diplomatic hesitation and, by lifting the American embargo,
to back Iran's reformers in their effort to join the West.
But is it so simple as that? There appears to be a certain aspect of
a good guy, bad guy morality tale to the conventional view of Iranian politics.
There is no denying the bravery of the "reformers," especially
of the street demonstrators, including many women, an abused class in Iran.
President Khatemi has his own place among the reformers. However, only
the lower ramparts of government appear to be open to democratic procedure.
The upper ramparts -- including parliament, the intelligence and judicial
systems, the foreign policy apparatus and the security and defense establishments
-- apparently stay under the traditional-clerical control of the man called
supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Just weeks ago an ugly sequence of killings, stabbings and mysterious
deaths unfolded among well-known dissidents and writers in Iran. A near-public
tug of war then took place between elements in the Islamic hierarchy trying
to cover up these crimes and elements trying to bring the offenders to
justice. What was at stake here was something essential to a modern society,
the application of the rule of law. On that issue, President Khatemi was
plainly on the right side.
The rule of law would no doubt be greeted with deep satisfaction by
many Iranian citizens. Some, however, might be even more pleased to be
living under a system whose law they had had a hand in approving. As for
Mr. Khatemi, it seems he favors not simply the rule of law but the rule
of Islamic law. Whether that is the Iranian people's emerging preference
remains to be tested.
Nor are the foreign, defense and security policies of Iran currently
under democratic governance: not its support of terrorism in the terrorism-soaked
Middle East, nor its hostility to the flawed but still live peace negotiations
between Israelis and Palestinians, nor its pursuit of weapons of mass destruction.
Europe is impatient to get back to business as usual with Iran. Many
Europeans dismiss American reluctance to jump into the fast lane of normalization
as an emotional overreaction to Iran's kidnapping of American diplomats
in 1979. Perhaps there is a bit of a kidnapping factor in the American
attitude. But there is also concern for the harsh Iranian policies that
remain in place two decades later.
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