Iran’s independence is not for sale

Flag of Iran

By Kian Mokhtari

It is particularly hilarious to be asked by the English-speaking world about Iran’s insistence on its nuclear energy program. And their astonishment at the reply that it is to do with energy security issues is particularly laughable given their exploitation of Iran’s precious fossil fuel reserves over many decades.

The razzmatazz surrounding the unilateral sanctions against Iran’s oil industry with promises that Washington’s Arab allies in the region would make up for any shortfall, soon died out with the terrible realization that for instance Saudi Arabia’s oil field could no longer yield enough to replace Iranian oil. And that China and India alongside many other Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) countries would not be heeding Washington’s call for illegal sanctions against a peaceful nation’s efforts to sustain itself.

The West’s position on Iran is unacceptable for many NAM countries with aspirations to develop peaceful nuclear programs, thereby alleviating part of their energy security concerns. Looking ahead they also realize that in order to maintain their societies an infinite source of energy has to be found and incorporated into their national perspective in short to medium term.

Other sources of energy are also being pursued with the utmost urgency as most of the world’s sweet crude wells are running dry forcing oil producers to spend more and more on extracting reconstituted sweet crude by way of pumping water or gas into the wells so oil levels rise enough for extraction to take place. This is all a far cry from sweet crude bubbling to the surface only a few years ago.

Independence has remained one of the most powerful ideals of Iran’s Islamic Revolution. Close to one million Iranian young men and women died in the hail of bullets, bombs and chemical and biological weapons supplied to Saddam Hussein’s Iraq by the West in an attempt to annihilate the Islamic Republic.

The shortsighted policies of the West have again backfired on the usual suspects however, with the immediate families and blood relatives of the Sacred Defense of Iran’s martyrs, tens of millions strong, becoming the backbone of the Revolution and a political force to be reckoned with in Iran. Tehran cannot implement policies that go against the established grain because after all “blood is thicker than mud”. Becoming dependent on foreigners for nuclear fuel is considered by the majority of Iranians to be no more than surrendering Iran’s sovereignty and independence.

Iran currently manufactures its own nuclear fuel for its medical test reactors and the Bushehr nuclear power reactor. The said fuels are enriched up to 20 percent and 3.5 percent respectively. This means that even should Iran disagree with the policies of the world powers there will be no shortage of electricity or medicine for the Iranian rank and file.

The US has refused on political grounds to supply fuel plates for the medical reactor it provided to Iran in the late 1960s, forcing a scramble by Iranian scientists to develop an indigenous production facility to provide cancer patients with lifesaving medicines. The US reply: several scientists involved in the peaceful and compassionate drive to save lives were assassinated in Tehran, in broad daylight, by the Zionist regime’s agents on Washington’s orders.

So faced with dwindling oil and gas reserves and its obligations to its own population’s sacrifices and demands, Tehran will have to endure the pain caused by the US and its allies’ illegal sanctions and proceed regardless to provide a future for its children.

Furthermore, Washington has gotten into the habit of screaming about Iran’s human rights record. Of course the American statesmen negate mentioning the fact that they provided $450-million to cause unrest that put Iranian children in the way of harm only three years or so ago. They equally forget to mention the Occupy protests that have been raging in the US cities against its corporate-controlled government for 13 months and the almost 9,000 arrests in addition to detentions, beatings, interrogations and intimidation of tens of thousands of other US citizens associated with the peaceful uprising.

The US government also regularly forgets to mention that waging unjust wars abroad has defrauded the US public out of $6 trillion ever since the beginning of the 21st century, which otherwise could have been used for education, health, welfare and infrastructural projects to improve people’s lives.

Washington’s tacit approval and use of medieval torture techniques called “enhanced interrogation” is also being swept under the carpet along with the news of its torture houses set up worldwide to stifle billions of people’s cries against massive financial disparity, imposed on the human family courtesy of freewheeling Western capitalism and fraudulent practices.

There’s not a sound out of the US about its use of chemical weapons in Vietnam, or the use of Depleted Uranium (DU) weapons against Iraq that have led to tens of thousands of cancers, child birth defects and other serious medical conditions among the native populations.

And above all Washington would very much like to forget its incineration of hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians in its nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, when it was fully aware that the government of Japan was about to surrender within days any way.

From under 33 years of sanctions Iranians have managed to put satellites into space, mastered the genetic sciences to assist the wellbeing of humanity and are immensely popular throughout the world for their civil projects that have provided electricity, clean drinking water and food to hundreds of millions of people. Iran’s selfless efforts on behalf of all of humanity will outlive the empty and racially motivated slogans of a band of criminals who are hated by all… including their own.