Three decades of revolution- a former revolutionary advocates reforms in Iran

Mohsen Sazegara is an Iranian exile now living in Virginia. Thirty years ago he had the distinction of accompanying Ayatollah Khomeini on his journey from Paris (where he had been in exile) back to Tehran. Mr Sazegara’s role at the time was to liaise with the many foreign journalists on the Air France flight. Sadly, he now says, he was “too busy on that night with 150 journalists” to absorb the atmosphere but confides that he “was happy like the others on the plane”. His hopes on that plane trip were for the establishment of a “free and powerful Iran.”

In January 1979, the Shah of Iran, facing riots on the streets, realized his reign was over had fled the country. A month later Ayatollah Khomeini, the leader of the opposition, returned to a hero’s welcome. Within days, Tehran was facing a revolution. The government collapsed and was replaced by an Islamic regime.

Iran has been near the center of the US’s international agenda ever since: the Iran-Contra affair of the 1980s, when the Reagan administration tried to swap arms for American hostages held in Lebanon; the Iran-Iraq war, in which at least a million died; and, now, the confrontation over what Iran says is a peaceful nuclear energy program but Washington fears could be all about nuclear weapons.

Sazegara would later help to establish the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (an elite armed force responsible for the security of the regime, as well as law enforcement and the country’s missile forces). He then moved on to become a deputy prime minister and lastly a senior manager in Iran’s biggest industrial projects.

As a one-time student leader organizing demonstrations against the Shah of Iran in the late 1970s, how did he, a one-time revolutionary, change so radically into the person he is today? “I revised my ideas and I [now] believe in a minimal theory of religion instead of a maximal theory of religion, and a secular regime. [The] Islamic republic of Iran failed in many aspects, especially human rights and economy.”

Mr Sazegara now runs a think-tank on contemporary Iran as well as hosting a weekly television show in Persian transmitted by satellite to Iran itself via Voice of America. From being one of the original revolutionaries, it is quite a change. Of all the places to choose to live and work from, why choose the United States, dubbed by Iran as the “Great Satan”?

“I came here as a visiting fellow to the Washington Institute [for Near East Policy] for three months and had medical treatment for my heart problem during those months. I intended to return to my country after this period [but] the judiciary [in] Iran sentenced me to six years’ jail in absentia, [so I stayed here – and went on to fellowships at both Yale and Harvard.] [The] regime of Iran is an enemy of the US, but I am not.”

Mr Sazegara has not changed his views on the Shah’s regime, condemned for being dictatorial and for being a police state, against which he protested more than 30 years ago but uses it as a reference point for judging the current regime: “We [now] have a religious despotism in Iran which [is] worse than the Shah’s dictatorship.”

The Obama Administration’s new policy of engagement with Iran could be a challenge to Mr Sazegara’s point of view, particularly if it comes at the cost of Washington pressing for domestic political changes. Mr Sazegara is careful not to condemn hopes for the prospects of change, cautiously commenting: “I hope to encourage the international community, including the US, to help us change the behavior of [the] regime of Iran towards its people in democratic and human rights affairs.”

He feels there is a danger that the wishes of the population of Iran could be ignored because, according to opinion polls, although the government of Iran dislikes the United States, the people don't. He agrees, adding “especially the young generation of Iran.”

Much has happened in the last 30 years. What about the next 30 years? How will Iran look in 30 years’ time, in 2039? And what are the prospects for the rest of the Middle East? “It is really hard to say. I hope a peaceful Middle East for the future.”

And what about Mr Sazegara personally? Does he think he will ever go back to live in Iran? “Yes, I do.” But what about the prison sentence that awaits you? “[Firstly] I have to change the present situation in Iran.” However at the moment it is just too dangerous for him to return.