6 - The truth about Iran

The Truth About Iran

An interview by Citizens' Party Chairman Robert Barwick with former Australian ambassador

to Iran-John Lander on the 26th of March Citizens Report warns that the illegal US war against Iran

has raised greater dangers for the world and for Australia. The video, available at the ACP

YouTube channel, provides critical background for Australians to understand the war and its

mammoth implications. Lander was Australia's first ambassador to the Islamic Republic of Iran in

1985 to 88, and personally met the recently assassinated Supreme Leader of Iran 1989 to 2026 Ali

Khamenei when he was president in 1981 to 89. Lander puts the US war against Iran into the context

of historical and geopolitical trajectories. Ultimately, as the result of the latest escalation

with no end in sight, Lander warns that Iran may be forced to take the North Korean option,

that is, develop long-range nuclear missiles. Khamenei had issued a fatwa, a legal ruling

under Islamic law against the development of nuclear weapons as unthinkable and forbidden,

said Lander. US intelligence agencies had concluded that Iran was not building a nuclear weapon,

said Lander, but the principal impediment to that Khamenei's fatwa has now been removed. Given

the current level of aggression from the USA and Israel, the argument will now be made that,

stated Lander, quote, the time has come for Iran to develop a nuclear weapon, and they no longer

have a religious and political impediment to doing so, end quote. Barwick and Lander refute

the claims of Iran as a uniquely evil regime, the world's biggest sponsor of terrorism,

providing a first-hand account of the Khamenei government, Iran's first government elected

under universal suffrage, its ethical positions, and the ban on nuclear weapon development.

As John noted, he has not found a single example of an actual act of terrorism that was clearly

and unambiguously carried out by Iran. Support for Palestine against the genocide is not terrorism,

the real issue. Lander elaborated on the backdrop for the present war, quote,

it's important to understand that the war hasn't started since last June.

The war against Iran has really been going on since the end of the Second World War,

in the sense that the United States has always perceived Iran as a potential

bulwark against the expansion westward and southward of communism, firstly against the Soviet

Union and latterly against China. So the United States ambition has always been the same,

either to control Iran or to break it up, and breaking it up enables them also to maintain

control over the area, end quote. This ambition led to the Anglo-American coup d'etat against

Iranian Prime Minister Mohammed Mosadeg in 1953 after Iran had shifted to a more secular system

of governance and established a parliamentary system. Mosadeg believed Iran should control its

resource riches, not British petroleum or Exxon mobile. This was anathema to the Anglo-American

financial empire and the CIA, said Lander. Mosadeg was overthrown and autocratic monarchy reinstated.

Danger Australia. Our support for US transgressions of international law in the war on Iran,

including assassinations of leaders it does not like, leaves a Pipsqueak country like Australia

extremely vulnerable, Lander observed. We need international law for our security,

and therefore we should be the first to uphold it. At the moment, Australia is extraordinarily

vulnerable, concluded Lander, adding that things will get worse before they get better.

Lander's final piece of advice was that Australia urgently needs a public bank to break the

financial chains of the Anglo-American system. Quote, we don't get an independent foreign policy

unless we have a public bank, end quote.