THE LIFESTYLE OF IRANIAN SPIES
Russia Today
March 26 2012
Recent arrests of Iranian clerics and journalists in Azerbaijan have
heightened tensions between the two neighbors. But with allegations
of espionage downgraded to drugs and arms charges, what could the
real motives for the detentions be?
Azerbaijan is a tiny republic sandwiched between Iran and Russia and
washed by the world’s largest saltwater lake. Azerbaijan and Iran have
been closely linked, both in terms of religion and ethnicity. Both
countries have a Shiite Muslim majority. About a third of Iran’s
population is made of the ethnic Azeri.
While the US and Israel do not have any diplomatic relations with
Iran, they do their utmost to court its neighbor. For example, the US
has constantly fed Azerbaijan’s hopes for the return of the breakaway
region of Nagorno-Karabakh, occupied some 20 years ago by neighboring
Armenia, Iran’s most loyal ally.
Azerbaijan has signed a contract with Israel on arms supplies worth
US$1.6 billion and on the construction of a plant producing drones.
Baku has assured Tehran that Azerbaijan will not agree to serve as
a springboard for a possible US attack. But actions speak louder
than words.
Azerbaijan has seen a genuine spy drama unfolding this year, with over
40 people arrested within the past 12 months, including 23 arrested
in the last two months. Authorities say they have detained Iranian
spies, but people believe that religious leaders are being targeted.
The single official comment was published by the Novosti-Azerbaijan
news agency a month ago, and was voiced by an anonymous source within
the security service. He told the news agency that these arrests were
“aimed at destroying Iran’s tools of influence over the government
and the people of Azerbaijan, which could be exploited by Tehran
during a potential war against the neighboring state.”
The news came after the arrests of the following people: ~U Anar
Bayramli, 31, a Baku reporter working for the Iranian Sahar TV
channel; ~U Ramil Dadashov, Bayramli’s driver; ~U Abulfa Eibatov,
a correspondent for the Islam Khyagigyatlyari newspaper, living in
the village of Nardaran; ~U Ilham Alikperov, head of the office of
the Islamic Party of Azerbaijan in the country’s second-largest city
of Gyandzhe; ~U Niyazi Kerimov, brother of Natig Kerimov, a member
of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Party; ~U Ilham Aliyev, an
employee of the mosque in the village of Binagadzhi.
Journalist Bayramli, who was dubbed as a “dangerous spy”, was only
charged with alleged heroin possession.
Deputy Head of the Islamic Party of Azerbaijan Akif Geidarli has
called the arrests “repressions against worshippers.”
‘Politically-motivated’The Azerbaijani Intelligentsia Union has
described the journalists’ arrests as a “premeditated, biased, and
politically-motivated” move.
Lawyer Elchin Namazov points to the mismatch between the official
accusations and the evidence. He believes that this hunt is after
the dissidents. They are accused of hostile actions, but jailed for
drugs and arms possession, he says.
DEVAMM, the Centre for the Protection of Freedom of Conscience and
Religion, considers all those arrested to be prisoners of conscience.
DEVAMM’s leading coordinator, Ilgar Ibrahimoglu, said that his group
has been receiving inquiries over the arrests by the Council of Europe
and the UN every day.
Meanwhile, at a meeting with journalists, US Charge d’Affaires in
Azerbaijan Adam Sterling welcomed the efforts of the security services
– even though the investigation has yet to be carried out.
“We understand from public information that the people were arrested,
who were involved in cooperating with dangerous plan, and we are
very happy that the security forces have stopped these actions,”
Sterling said.
Ariel Cohen, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation,
seems to have more information about the spies’ crimes than the
investigators do. In his article for The National Interest, he writes
that there were three groups of Iranian agents “planning terrorist
attacks against American businesses, Western oil companies, Israeli
diplomats and prominent members of the Jewish community.” He is also
aware that this was a “network of 22 Iranian agents trained by the
Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps.”
The arrests began a year ago after the leader of the Islamic Party of
Azerbaijan, Movsum Samedov, condemned the government ban on hijabs in
schools and spoke out against corruption and human rights violations
in the country.
As a result, in the autumn of 2011, Samedov, along with six
other devout Muslims, was convicted of attempting to overthrow the
government, plotting terrorist acts and illegal arms possession. They
were given lengthy prison sentences.
Seaside spy breeding groundI set out for the nest of spies, the
settlement of Nardaran. Fourteen of the 23 men arrested come from
this seaside village, half an hour’s drive from capital Baku.
Nardaran has a controversial reputation. For some, it is the spiritual
center of Azerbaijan, home to ancient shrines. For others, it is
a rebellious settlement living in defiance of Baku. It is also an
upscale seaside resort, with villas of the Azeri establishment strewn
around the place.
Surprisingly enough, none of the people residing in what has been
dubbed as a “nest of spies” and the “antigovernment center” have ever
called for violent action against the residents of the government
villas. The country’s elite does not want to give up enjoyable
vacations here, either, and continue to come over and visit its
shrines in secret.
I meet Natig Kerimov, head of Nardaran, an elder and a member of the
Supreme Council of the Islamic Party of Azerbaijan.
He walks with a stick and has still retained his sense of humor. The
only portrait in his house with a veneer ceiling belongs to Imam
Khomeini. The Khomeinists movement emerged some 30 years ago around
these places, when it was still part of the Soviet Union. It sprang
up after the Iranian Islamic Revolution in 1979, and since then the
name Khomeinists has been given to any devout Muslim. And while over
the time their numbers have multiplied, revolutions have spread across
the Islamic world, persecution has grown too.
Natig Kerimov has frequently visited Iran, met both with Ayatolla
Khomeini and Ayatolla Khamenei.
The fences in the settlement carry the “Allahu Akbar” slogan in Arabic.
“They paint over these words elsewhere in Azerbaijan, but here you
can see them on every fence. Politicians in Baku say Nardaran is
ruled by Iran.” Natig straightened out his back, stirred his tea in
a nice-looking mug and looked at his grandson, who kept quiet during
several hours of our conversation.
Ancient Muslim communityNardaran people like do not like to be called
a town or a settlement, instead they say they are a community. “We
have 9,000 people in our community. Azerbaijan’s population is 9
million. Allah works to keep this proportion.”
If you drive through the community in a car, you are bound to see
signs leading you to a mosque. Pilgrims from all over the country
flock to this revered place of worship for Muslims.
The old tiny building has been preserved, with a new larger mosque,
boasting two inner courtyards and arcades rising above it.
Nearby stands the centuries-old cemetery. Once, during construction
works, the diggers stumbled on a terrible Middle-Ages grave – 10 rows
of dead bodies, all with their skulls pierced by a metal rod.
“The elders wrote a letter to the Iranian city of Qom asking whether
they were allowed to open the grave. Once they had permission, they
re-buried all of them,” explain the elders, solemnly sitting at the
table and joining the discussion in turns.
In February, Natig’s brother was arrested. “The arrests started
since February 10. Just two days ago they locked up a student who
had studied in Syria. They nicked him right with his turban on.”
He then goes on to name those arrested: ~U Haji Nusret, 36, studied in
Syria; ~U Ali Khuseinov, 55, taught 300 people to read the Koran; ~U
Elchin Kuliev, 44, businessman, did a lot of charitable work, visited
Mecca. He had 53 grams of heroin planted on him; ~U Niyazi Kerimov,
born in 1951. He was a volunteer during the 1990s Nagorno-Karabakh war
between Armenia and Azerbaijan, in his childhood he was friends with
the current Azeri president; ~U Halidogha Alikperov, 37, joined the
Nagorno-Karabakh war at the age of 14, was invalided at 18, and now
he is accused of treason. He is married with three children; ~U Imran
Alikperov, 42, married with three children. He had drugs planted during
the arrest; ~U Dilaver Yakhibekov, 48, married with five children,
grew flowers and tomatoes for sale, had drugs planted on him.
There were arrests in other settlements, too. “In the village of
Bina, Mullah Ilham Aliyev was invited to lead a wedding ceremony. He
is married with two children. He studied in Qom for 18 years. He
was handcuffed in the middle of the wedding. They said they found a
revolver on him – can you imagine a mullah bringing a revolver over
to the wedding?”
Natig Kerimov names those who went to study in Qom and are now
reluctant to return for fear of arrest.
Almost a quarter of a century ago Nardaran became the birthplace of
the Islamic Party. But it has never been registered. Its leader,
Movsum Samedov, a qualified doctor from the village of Kuba, was
jailed for 12 years last year. He has been in prison for a year now.
“His deputy was arrested, too. He got away with a 10-year sentence.
They seize educated people, those who can preach, mullahs who have
been teaching the Koran for 30 years. How would they manage to convict
them with evidence like this? One imam, for example, was arrested
for allegedly selling drugs during Friday prayers.”
The elder explains that the all the guns found by the police as
evidence have their serial numbers removed. People in the community
believe it is simply one and the same firearm.
“First an elderly woman found a sack in the manure, in the cowshed. We
pulled it out to find a gun inside. That was when it all started. They
showed a report on TV, a young man in handcuffs, and the narrator
saying that he is accused of arms possession. And they show exactly
the same gun that we found in the cowshed.
“Once they came to detain a man named Rokhulla. He has some 12
children, all minors. The police officers were not embarrassed to
talk about their mission in front of other community members. They
discussed between each other that it would be too difficult to order
all the children to lie down, because children would hardly obey it,
so they said it would be better to go to a different house.
“So they went to Rokhulla’s neighbor, and there they found a sack
with a gun. However, later it turned out that the home owner had long
moved to Russia,” Natig relates.
Targeted for 12 yearsArrests began in 2000. Natig says he recalls
an army of 5,000 solders moving in to occupy Nardaran. “Eight of our
elders were put in prison for nine months. 17 people were wounded. We
had protests 160 times. 60 countries rose up in our support. We do
not have weapons, so we cannot fight them. That’s why they say that
Nardaran is not controlled by Baku but is run from Qom.”
Natig was arrested himself. In 2003, he spent three months in detention
and was eventually handed down a five-year suspended sentence. “They
told the court I threw a stone at the police, but said I was lucky
to have missed.”
He has been arrested several times since then, but police officers
are too ashamed to keep the sick man behind bars and they let him
out at night.
I ask him whether they have detained any women. His brows rise
halfway up his forehead. “Women? No, they have not lapsed to that
kind of humiliation.”
Asked about a possible war against Iran by the West, he said, “Iran
has disclosed all of its secrets, but it’s not good enough for them.
Well, Iran has a master. If you want to go against him, you’ll have
to deal with Allah. In 1980, the Americans wanted to destroy Iran, too.
They attacked, but the sand rose up and made them leave.”
Kerimov refers to the botched US operation to release American
hostages, ordered by President Carter. The mission failed when the
helicopters were caught a sandstorm.
Then I ask him to confirm or deny the recent media reports that
the Azeri minority in Iran is planning to overthrow the regime of
the ayatollahs, that an uprising is brewing in the military. He,
too, read the news that there have been clashes between army units
comprised of different ethnicities in the city of Tebriz.
“I called up my friends working at the Tebriz bazaar. The bazaar is
the heart of the city, the people who work there know everything. So
they asked me if I was crazy because in Iran there is no division of
army units by ethnic groups.”
Natig reminds me that Iran’s spiritual leader Khamenei is an ethnic
Azeri. “The Azeri have traditionally been distinguished by their
courage and piety in the Iranian army. I am a Muslim, and I don’t
think in terms of nationalities.”
The community has been able to keep some of its traditional ways but
lost the battle in others. For instance, they had to put up with the
ban on the hijab and sex segregation in schools. At the same time,
they have their own ban on alcohol and they do not have to lock their
doors – there are no thieves in the community.
Nardaran’s flag has been cast in iron. “It will now be impossible to
tear, burn or trample it.”
Nadezhda Kevorkova, RT Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed
in the story are solely those of the author and do not necessarily
represent those of RT.
http://rt.com/news/lifestyle-of-iranian-spies-479/