Iranian-American businessman Siamak Namazi promoted closer ties between his two home countries for years, but now he’s the latest source of conflict testing whether President Obama’s nuclear deal would be the opening he and his allies hoped would lead to that goal.
News reports said Namazi, head of strategic planning at Dubai-based Crescent Petroleum, was arrested by agents of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in mid-October while visiting family in Iran. He would be the fourth American held by Iranian authorities. A fifth American, former FBI agent Robert Levinson, went missing in Iran in 2007, and U.S. authorities are seeking information about his fate.
News of Namazi’s arrest spurred calls from lawmakers for tougher sanctions against Iran, with many reminding Obama that he had promised to push back against Tehran’s bad behavior once the nuclear deal was reached. Specific proposals included listing the IRGC as a terrorist group, which the administration has resisted, and targeted sanctions against the individuals responsible for his arrest.
“Iran’s threatening behavior will worsen if the administration does not work with Congress to enact stronger measures to push back, including renewal of the expiring Iran Sanctions Act of 1996 and targeted sanctions against Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and against any Iranian official found to have participated in the unjust detainment of American citizens,” said Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill. Kirk is one of the sponsors of legislation that would impose tougher sanctions on Iran.
But this could be difficult for the administration to accept, especially in light of declarations last month by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, that Tehran would consider “any imposition of sanctions at any level and under any pretext” as a violation of the deal. Administration officials are likely to be swayed by analysis that the arrest is one of many attempts by hardliners in Iran to sabotage the deal, which has just begun the sensitive process of implementation.
News of the arrest also broke as Secretary of State John Kerry was meeting Friday with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. The State Department said Kerry raised the issue of the imprisoned Americans with Zarif.
But administration officials have declined comment on reports of Namazi’s arrest, saying they’re looking into them.
“I’m aware of reports. Privacy considerations will prevent me from discussing more on that,” State Department spokeswoman Elizabeth Trudeau said Monday.
Namazi is from a prominent Iranian family. His father was governor of the oil-rich province of Khuzestan under Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi before the 1979 revolution that brought a Shiite Muslim theocracy to power, but he and other family members maintained close ties with the new regime.
A Daily Beast article published in September claimed Namazi played a key role in the founding of the National Iranian American Council, which lobbied hard in favor of the nuclear deal, and said he and his family were poised to make a fortune off improved ties resulting from it.
NIAC has said those claims are false, and said it is “deeply troubled” by reports Namazi has been detained.
