Activists demand Iranian prof. Seyed Hossein Mousavian faraway from Center East discuss

Activists and a Nobel Laureate are demanding an Ivy League college cancel a panel that includes a controversial Iranian professor who they accuse of selling terrorism and supporting the fatwa in opposition to creator Salman Rushdie, The Submit has realized.

Seyed Hossein Mousavian, a Center East safety professional at Princeton, is scheduled to headline the panel “Israel and Iran: The Way forward for the Center East” at Dartmouth’s Haldeman Corridor Monday night.

Opponents of the Iranian regime within the US and Europe need the occasion cancelled, noting Mousavian’s previous engaged on behalf of the Iranian regime and alleged ties to terror acts and the deaths of 4 college students in Berlin in 1992 by the hands of Hezbollah.

Detractors additionally accuse Mousavian of being a lobbyist for the present Iranian authorities, which he denies.

“The ‘discursive instruments’ of the Islamic Republic will be as harmful as lethal weapons,” wrote Shirin Ebadi, a former Iranian decide who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003, in a put up on Telegram Friday.

“The discourse of whitewashing and normalization paves the best way for the regime’s crimes contained in the nation and its different actions within the area.”

Ebadi goes on to level out Mousavian was the top of the “First Western Europe Workplace” of Iran’s overseas ministry “in the course of the darkest interval of the Islamic Republic’s rule.” He additionally claims he supported the fatwa in opposition to creator Rushdie, issued in 1989 over his novel “The Satanic Verses.”

Mousavian was Iran’s ambassador to Germany from 1990 to 1997 when 4 dissidents had been murdered behind a Greek restaurant in Berlin in 1992. 5 years later, a German court docket concluded Iran’s Particular Affairs Committee had ordered the murders, however didn’t identify Mousavian.

“Throughout his tenure, at the least 24 Iranian dissidents had been assassinated on European soil by Iranian brokers, together with the infamous 1992 Mykonos restaurant bloodbath in Berlin,” claimed the activist group Alliance Towards Islamic Regime of Iran Apologists in a press assertion Sunday.

“Mousavian defended these actions and likewise endorsed the fatwa in opposition to Salman Rushdie, reflecting the regime’s blatant opposition to free expression and dissent.”

Mousavian blamed all of the murders on Israeli and US operatives, in keeping with a 2022 interview with Iran’s Arman Melli newspaper.

Greater than 2,000 individuals from Boston to Iran have signed a Change.org petition in opposition to Mousavian’s discuss at Dartmouth.

“Rather than offering a platform for somebody linked to the repressive Iranian regime, we encourage Dartmouth Faculty to have interaction with native activists and people from the New England space who’ve personally endured the regime’s brutality,” they wrote.

Activists have additionally referred to as on Princeton to fireplace Mousavian, which is dealing with a congressional probe into why the college employed the previous high Iranian diplomat.

New York-based Iranian scholar Majid Mohammadi posted a photograph of Mohammadi on X Monday, noting: “This picture alone is a shame to Princeton U. Mousavian sells political propaganda, his protection of the assassination of writers, terrorism & cover-up for the 1988 bloodbath with the banner of Princeton.”

The dialogue on “The Way forward for the Center East” will even embody a speaker from the Brookings Establishment, a Washington DC-based suppose tank, offering their perspective on the matter.

Mousavian is a specialist in nuclear coverage at Princeton’s Program on Science and World Safety. He presently proposes “coverage initiatives” over Iran’s controversial nuclear undertaking, in keeping with his bio on the Princeton web site.

Earlier than coming to the US, Mousavian was an necessary determine within the Iranian authorities, each as a diplomat and editor of the Tehran Instances, the English-language newspaper which is a mouthpiece for the regime.

Mousavian was arrested by Iran in 2007, accused of “espionage” and described as a hazard to its nationwide safety, for allegedly leaking info to European members of an Iranian nuclear negotiation crew, which he was additionally was a part of.

He was later cleared of the spying expenses, however discovered responsible of working in opposition to the regime, according to CNN.

Nonetheless, he was allowed to go away the nation to take up the position at Princeton in 2009. Mousavian and Princeton College didn’t return requests for remark Monday.

In an electronic mail to the Daily Princetonian in 2023, Mousavian claimed: “I’ve not been in a position to go to Iran since June 2021 and I’ve not been engaged with any authorities together with the federal government of Iran for the reason that Iranian court docket convicted me in 2008.”