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Jamshid Chalangi:
In tonight’s program of Behind the Headlines we look at the consequences of another sharp decline in the value of Iranian rial against the US dollar, and the blustering of the Revolutionary Guard against the Trump administration, and ask our guests Maysam Mehrani and Maziar Shakori if the Guards are the real powerhouse in Iran?
Maysam Mehrani:
The Islamic republic regime’s record of the last 40 years tells us that staying in power at any cost is its priority.
There is no such a thing as “Islamic justice” in Iran today and people like Ghassem Soleimani need to answer to the Iranians what benefit this regime has brought for them in their warmongering policy in the region.
Decades after the end of Iran-Iraq war all of the war affected areas of Iran still suffer from lack of many basic services and yet the Guards are talking of another war, this time with the US.
They do not have any means or power of waging this war. The Israelis have destroyed their bases in Syria and killed tens of them but they have not been able toreact. How could they ever withstand the US army now? Soleimani’s bluster is just a show to say that the Guards and the Rouhani government are united.
Maziar Shakori:
The Islamic republic regime is not interested in solving the many economic and social problems of the Iranians at all.
This regime looks upon the majority of the Iranians as “not one of us” and only looks after the interest of the ruling clique and its obedient followers.
The country’s economy is bankrupted and today the Companies House has revealed that more than 4000 front companies have been set up recently to receive US dollars at lower government-set rates and no one knows who runs these companies. But the regime uses all its might and repressive tools to crack down on hungry workers who are demanding their overdue salaries.
Soleimani is also after a deal with the US and is telling Trump that if you want to make a deal with us I am the one to talk to and Rouhani is nobody.
Maysam Mehrani:
The regime’s strategy is to fend off the crisis by portraying that the Guards and the Rouhani government are united. But at the same time Mike Pompeo has told the regime that the US distinguishes between the Iranian people and their rulers whom he described as a mafia gang.
Trump is a populist president and will act upon all his campaign promises as he did with the nuclear deal and he has committed himself to not to take the US into any new war.
Today the US interests are in line with those of the Iranian people and I personally believe more in Trump than Khamenei and Rouhani. At the end of the day the Iranian people and their demands for freedom and prosperity should decide the future of Iran.
Maziar Shakori:
I do not trust the US or any other power at all. What should we do in case the US interests become different from those of our people?
