Iran Tests the New Administration
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By Seth Cropsey
January 28, 2021
Iran Tests the New Administration
On 18 January, Iran detained businessman Emad Sharghi, preventing his alleged attempt to “flee†the country. Sharghi, a dual Iranian-American citizen who works for a UAE-based aviation brokerage firm, has been harassed by Iranian authorities in the past, and was imprisoned previously in 2018. In November 2020, Sharghi was convicted without a trial of espionage by Abdolqasem Salavati, a controversial Iranian judge who has convicted numerous dissidents. Salavati is part of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Courts system, a parallel judiciary that handles cases relating to regime security. Established in 1979, the Revolutionary Courts have overseen numerous domestic purges, acting akin to the Soviet Union’s NKVD-operated secret court system during the 1930s. Although Sharghi was convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison in November and arrested in December, he was soon released on bail.
Considering the direct control the regime holds over the Revolutionary Courts system and the mullahs’ record of involvement in U.S. presidential elections, it is likely that high-level decision-makers in the Islamic Republic ordered Sharghi’s arrest. Moreover, his conviction occurred within a week of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh’s assassination. Fakhrizadeh was an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps brigadier general and physicist who oversaw Iran’s nuclear program. Coupled with the assassination of IRGC General Qassem Soleimani in January 2020, Fakhrizadeh’s death demonstrates a significant degree of penetration into Iran’s security system. Sharghi’s U.S. citizenship and arrest, therefore, is a direct message to the United States, much like Iran's missile strike against a U.S.-used Iraqi airbase was after the Soleimani killing.
https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2021/01/28/iran_tests_the_new_administration_658182.html
