Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  It's my pleasure. Thank you very much. Honourable members of this subcommittee, I am privileged to appear before you today to discuss the role of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the IRGC, in a vast system of domestic repression, and to encourage the government of Iran

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Let me answer your question. One thing we underestimate about the Iranian regime is this. Unlike Saddam's Iraq or North Korea, which are Stalinist dictatorships, the Iranian regime actually cares to some extent about its international reputation. These Iranian regime officials i

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  As someone who has worked on non-proliferation and sanctions issues for many years, let me underscore that he's exactly right and I think this is exactly where we're heading. If Ali Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guards were smart, they would strike the so-called grand bargain wi

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  In terms of specific cases leading up to the election in two weeks, yes. We've seen, as I mentioned, IRGC officials publicly talk about the repression, talk about how these elections should be engineered. We've seen the IRGC's cyber-defence command and its specific special depart

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  I think what's happening is that the supreme leader looked at the election of 2009 and realized that he had lost control. He had lost control of somebody that he had considered to be a loyalist. But what he had was a populist. He had a former mayor of Tehran who understood grass

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Mr. Cotler, it's actually a very timely question. The House Foreign Affairs Committee of the U.S. Congress just unanimously adopted legislation last week called the Nuclear Iran Prevention Act of 2013. In the legislation there is a specific human rights provision that would requ

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  I'll just add that one great example was the global dialogue conference in Toronto two weeks ago, which I believe was sponsored by the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade and the Munk School of Global Affairs. Iranian-Canadian civil society activists were brough

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  You know, sir, it's even worse than that. That just sounds like a bad sitcom, but it actually is worse. The United Nations has been so penetrated by Iranian largesse, and the strange voting patterns and voting blocks of the UN, that the Iranians have not only chaired the disarmam

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Thank you for that question. You're absolutely right. There has actually been some excellent reporting done by The Wall Street Journal, Reuters, and Bloomberg, in open sources over the past couple of years detailing international companies that are selling tools of electronic re

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Thank you very much. Honourable members of this subcommittee, I am privileged to appear again before you today to discuss the issue of Iran's nuclear negotiations, Iran's human rights abuses, and the intersection between the two. It's a great honour to appear beside my colleague

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Thank you very much for your question. I believe that a nuclear deal is possible, even with this regime. I'm skeptical that a deal could be reached by July 30 unless it's a bad deal. If there's a bad deal it could be reached very quickly. The fundamental condition—there are man

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Yes. You're exactly right.

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  Sorry, sir. I have to say that the acoustics are not great in here. Is the question about Iranian front groups?

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  First of all, if you want an exposition on Iranian front groups, I'm happy to provide that. I don't think I actually have provided that in my testimony, but—

Subcommittee on International Human Rights committee  I hear your point. The organization that I head as executive director is a non-profit organization based in Washington. It's a non-profit and it's funded by private North American donors. We don't get any money from foreign governments. We don't get any money from corporations.