What is not generally appreciated is that being an Ayatollah is a very profitable business. This is illustrated in this article from Rooz, but it is obviously only the tip of the iceberg. Drug trade and prostitution could not exist in a police state like Iran without tacit official cooperation - yet both evils are rampant.
Unprecedented Revelations against Senior Iranian Clerics
A Member of the Majlis Investigative Committee - 2008.06.10
Mahbubeh Niknahad
A film and the speech of Abbas Palizar, a member of Iran's Majlis Investigative Committee are now available on the Internet for the public, whose contents expose the country's judiciary and senior clerics. Palizar made his speech at Hamedan University in western Iran and named leading politicians and clerics from the conservative camp and accused them of engaging in corrupt economic practices. He also revealed that the plane crash that carried, and killed, Iran's former minister of transportation during Khatami's presidency was the work of sabotage by insiders, and also that another air crash that killed a former army commander at the Passdaran, Ahmad Kazemi, was at the least "suspicious".
Who is this new exposer?
The person whose revelations at Hamedan University have now attained sensational quality was for some time the "operational secretary" of the research unit of the seventh Majlis where his key responsibility was to head the (Infrastructure Research Bureau) Daftare Motaleat Zirbanai. He was the leading figure to draw up a plan to punish those who committed economic disruption and prior to being the head the Majlis research unit, he was the advisor to the Majlis Economic Committee and the Chairman and spokesperson of the Board of Trustees of the House of Industrialists of Iran (Khane Sanatgaran'e Iran). He had made an unsuccessful bid for Tehran's provincial council while running on the list that supported president Ahmadinejad.
The End of the Conservatists' Grouping and the Repetition of Old Accusations
Palizar called the country's judiciary "the center of economic corruption" and forcefully asserted that neither the judiciary branch nor the State Inspectorate Organization would cooperate with the Majlis in its investigations over corruption. "The State Inspectorate Organization strived to prevent the investigative committee of the Majlis from gaining access to the existing corruption cases and to accomplish this provided forced leave to its members, while with the passage of a year, we eventually gained access to the data on this", he said.
In detailing the corruption, he said, "One day a one of these cleric came to me and said that he had a disabled son and wanted to build a physical therapy center to be run under his management. We registered the center. Then he came and said that he desired to have a financial passport (license) and asked us to give him the license to operate the Dehbid stone mining company in Fars province, a company that has the best stones in the world. After that, he came and asked for the license to operate yet another mine in Zanjan province. Today, he operates four mines and owns the license to a physical therapy center." Students at Hamedan University asked for more details and the name of the cleric and he told them that it was ayatollah Imami Kashani (member of the Guardians Council and one of the 4 temporary Friday prayer leaders of Tehran).
In another part of his speech at Hamedan, Palizar said, "Another ayatollah once went to the leader and said that they wanted to build a law university for women in Qom. He got the license to do that. Immediately after that however he requested a financial passport (license) for Dena Tire Company. The then minister of industries Mr. Nematzadeh told him that he would give him the company at the price of 126 billion Toman (about $126 million). The real market value of the company was 600 billion Toman ($600 million). Soon, these gentlemen were asking for discounts on the price of the tire company and eventually settled for 10 billion Toman (about $10 million). But then they said that they did not have the money and so would pay 80 percent of the price in installments. Nematzadeh accepted that. But they returned and said that they did not even have the 20 percent in cash but would pay it by selling some assets of the company. This is how easily he acquired the company, and then sold it in the market soon after." Students again asked for the name of the cleric and Palizar burst it out: ayatollah Mohammad Yazdi (current member of the Guardians Council and Experts Assembly, former head of the judiciary and the new leader of the Teachers of Qom Theological Center, which is the most important grouping of the conservative clerics in Iran).
Palizar continued with his story: "Ayatollah Yazdi continued his drive and wrote a letter to Mr. Foruzesh, the then minister of industries arguing that his son, Hamid was jobless and requested that arrangements be made so he could export wood from the forests of northern Iran. It is interesting that Hamid Yazdi was a director general at the judiciary. But soon the forests of the north were looted. At the same time, a group of local residents were arrested for cutting down trees (which they did in amounts sufficient for their personal needs) and imprisoned, which led to riots in front of the prison where they were detained."
Palizar mentioned another case of fraud to belong to Iran Khodro car manufacturing plant. "Iran Khodro company was transferred to judges who owned Persia Machine plant at half the market price, while the rest was supposed to have been paid in installments by buyers of the vehicles, most of which were never paid. But this state of affairs did lead to protests. For example, a group calling itself members of the Nahjol-Balaghe foundation came and said that they wanted 500 cars with the same terms. And who do you think are the members of this foundation? None other than Ali Akbar Nategh Nouri (former head of the Special Investigative Unit of the Leaders Office), Mohsen Refighdoost (former head of the Mostazafin Foundation), Asqar Oladi (the former secretary of the conservative 'Jamiate Motalef Islami' i.e. Islamic Coalition Association) Moezi (deputy director of the Leader's office), etc. After this episode came another foundation, Hamgaraie Andishe belonging to cleric Falahian (former minister of intelligence) and ayatollah Elm Alhoda (the radical cleric of Mashhad)."
Adding to the list, Palizar continued his drive by adding that the Tabas Stone Mining Company and twelve other large mines in the country in Khorasan province (the largest province in the country) in eastern Iran were handed over to ayatollah Vaezi Tabasi, the representative of the leader of Iran in that province.
Moving to a different area, Majlis deputy Palizar revealed that the cause for the crash of two aircraft that carried senior officials of the Islamic regime (Rahman Dadman the minister of transportation during Khatami's administration in 2002 who lost his life in the crash and Ahmad Kazemi, the former commander of the Passdaran ground forces who was killed in the helicopter crash of 2006) could be attributed to intentional planning in which one of the then leaders of the Passdaran had a hand in (no details are provided). The Dadman incident was pre-planned. The 1000-page dossier regarding this air crash demonstrates this (again no details are provided)."
As the list got longer, Palizar mentioned the importation of contraband through one of the airports called Payam and said, "The grand smuggler of Payam airport has 1,500 court cases for smuggling, but nobody has arrested him yet because he is under the protection of cleric Nategh Nouri."
The sugar industry in Iran was not left out of these revelations, and Palizar said in this regard, "Mr. Modalal, the son in law of one of the senior clerics in Iran (this is a reference to ayatollah Makarem Shiraz, who is also a source of emulation) was the king of sugar and of the sugar mafia. Modalal worked with a person named Mohammad Reza Yusefi both of whom were willing to pay 700 billion Toman ($700 million) in hush money when the case was exposed."
Palizar ended his expose by naming Hashemi Rafsanjani and his family members to be economically corrupt and said, "Their economic corruption is so wide that it is not possible to list them. But one of them is in their lack of payment of taxes to the government."
Copyright for roozonline.com
Cross posted: Israel News Middle East Analysis
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