Canadians are trying to figure out why their government has snapped diplomatic relations with Iran. Canada and Iran have had a troubled relationship. When the Iranians seized the US embassy in 1979 and took American diplomats hostage, the Canadian embassy sheltered six Americans, including charge d'affaires Bruce Laingan. Ambassador Kenneth Taylor arranged their departure posing as Canadians. Canadian-Iranian photographer Zahra Kazemi was arrested in Iran in 2003 while taking pictures and was beaten to death in custody. An infuriated Canada downgraded relations with Iran in 2007. Currently Canadian Iranians Hamid Ghassemi-Shall and Saeed Malekpour are under a death sentence in Iran for alleged spying. Paul Dewar, the foreign affairs critic of the Opposition New Democratic Party, called the government's action unwise. “For us to make a difference, we have to be there.” Liberal Party's interim leader Bob Rae also said that “we don't cut off diplomatic relations with every country we disagree with.” A Globe and Mail reporter stated that Canada has shot itself in the foot. Two years ago Canada had a tiff with the United Arab Emirates over the landing rights of airlines. As a result UAE ousted Canada from a military base which Canada had used free of charge for years. UAE also imposed stiff visa fees on Canadians. John Mundy, Canada's last ambassador to Iran before relations were downgraded in 2007, wrote: “Our opposition parties should move for an immediate debate in Parliament on our foreign policy towards Iran so that the Canadian people know where the government is leading us. The government should explain how it sees a peaceful resolution of the nuclear issue with Iran given that it believes further diplomacy to be futile. Secondly, Parliament should know how committed Canada is to Israel, particularly in the event of Israeli military actions... our policy towards Iran is the first time in decades that a Canadian prime minister has acted to reduce the diplomatic opportunities for peace during a crisis.” Former Canadian ambassador to Iran Ken Taylor and former Canadian ambassador Daniel Molgat also criticized the move. Canada's Minister of Foreign Affairs John Baird has explained that Canadian diplomats in Iran might have been endangered. He also assailed Iran for its repression, siding with the brutal Syrian regime against its people, pursuing its nuclear program, backing terrorist groups in Lebanon and Afghanistan and its statements calling for Israel's destruction. If Baird felt that Canadian diplomats might be endangered in Iran, he could have recalled them without expelling Iranian diplomats. The Iranian regime is brutally repressive. So was the former Shah's regime and so are the Russian and Chinese regimes. Canada has good relations with them. These governments also support the Syrian regime. The US has a huge stockpile of nuclear, thermonuclear and chemical and biological weapons. Israel has an array of nuclear weapons. Canada hasn't cut ties with them. In 1953 the US and the British helped oust Iran's elected Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh and brought back the Shah, who had fled. The US invaded Iraq on false charges of possessing weapons of mass destruction (which it itself possesses). The US uses torture chambers in other countries for Al-Qaeda suspects. It also detains them at Guantanamo Bay for years. Israel flouts UN resolutions and since 1967 has blocked a just and peaceful solution. Its agents have been killing Iranian scientists for years. The US and Israel have been conducting cyber-warfare against Iran under “Operation Olympic Games” though the Pentagon said last year that a computer attack on the US would be considered war. To some Western governments, such actions are not terrorism. But resistance from the victims is. Muslim terrorists do target innocent people but there is little evidence that Iran is behind them. US intelligence agencies and Israel's military chief, Benny Gantz, have stated that they believe Iran is not pursuing nuclear weapons and that, if it did, it would be a couple of years before they build them. Even then the US and Israel would have overwhelming military superiority. Tony Burman, former head of Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and of Al-Jazeera, wrote in the Toronto Star: “Canada appears to have a new foreign minister. His name is Benjamin Netanyahu. His day job may be prime minister of Israel, but Canada's abrupt actions against Iran seem to confirm that the Harper government's outsourcing of Canada's Middle East policy to Jerusalem is now complete. ... After decades of being one of the world's most respected ‘honest brokers' on Middle East issues, what in God's name has slipped into the water supply in Canada to explain such a change.” When UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon met Iranian leader Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei at the meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement countries in Tehran, Khamenei urged the United Nations to create a nuclear-free Middle East. The US and Canada showed no interest in the idea. Perhaps they do not want a nuclear weapons-free Middle East, but a simple one where Israel is the master of all that it surveys.
– Mohammed Azhar Ali Khan is a retired Canadian journalist, civil servant and refugee judge. He has received the Order of Canada, the Order of Ontario and the Queen's Diamond Jubilee and Golden Jubilee medals.
