Originally published on the CGS blog on May 17, 2007.
While perusing the Partnership for a Secure America’s Across the Aisle blog, I came across guest blogger Michael Kraig’s attention-grabbing post “Respecting Global Citizens: the Case of Haleh Esfandiari.” I applaud Mr. Kraig’s willingness to discuss the plight of Ms. Esfandiari, the Iranian-American director of the Wilson Center’s Middle East Program, and I genuinely share his and many others’ sincere hope for her safe return to family, friends and colleagues. However, I am unsure of Mr. Kraig’s central premise: Is it the expression of concern for the well-being of Ms. Esfandiari and a criticism of the Iranian regime’s interrogation practices? Or rather, something more akin to personal outrage that ‘someone like Haleh’ could be sent to prison abroad?
Mr. Kraig doesn’t accuse the Iranian authorities outright of illegal detention or employing interrogation techniques that equate to acts of torture, but he certainly skirts the line on torture by mentioning “grueling and intimidating” interrogation sessions that Ms. Esfandiari has reportedly experienced. It’s instructive to review exactly how the UN Convention on Torture defines torture.? According to the convention, torture means:
“any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him information or a confession, punishing him for an act he has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity.”
Thus, it seems that Mr. Kraig is indirectly leveling a very serious charge against Iran. And if Ms. Esfandiari has been intimidated or tortured, as defined under international law, I am indeed appalled; appalled because I believe in the rule of law and don’t believe in the torture of my fellow man — full stop — whether it’s by American interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, Abu Ghraib, and secret CIA prisons, our proxy (outsourced) “interrogators” in Egypt, Jordan, and Uzbekistan, or other national security apparatuses. Torture is universally immoral and illegal. However, Mr. Kraig argues that it is Ms. Esfandiari’s “global citizen” status not her humanity that places her detention and interrogation “beyond the pale.” He states:
Trading and interrogating true spies is one thing; we’ve all studied the Cold War, and people who join intelligence agencies as operatives know what they’re in for when they join. But interrogating and imprisoning truly global citizens who clearly exist across multiple societies and state boundaries is beyond the pale. I am as outraged about this as I would be if (for instance) Gianni Picco were imprisoned; it just ought to be clear, by now, that a norm has developed in regard to such individuals. Most people are clearly defined and described as nationalist; they define themselves and their own actions in traditional terms. But not all, and certainly not Haleh.
I must question the “They-know-what-they’re-in-for” logic. Moral relativism of this nature is frankly shocking. Does this line of thinking extend to relief workers on the ground in Darfur? I suspect these well-meaning and indispensable individuals knew what they were in for when they joined. How about U.S. Foreign Service officers stationed around the globe? They certainly should know the potential risk associated with their jobs. Is it okay to trade and interrogate them? I, as well as many in the international community, don’t think so.
I believe the international community must draw a broad, deep line in the sand on interrogation and torture not just for global elites like Haleh Esfandiari and Gianni Picco but for every man, woman and child that inhabits our increasingly interconnected world regardless of national origin/citizenship, educational attainment or professional background. If we don’t, individual states will be well within their perceived rights to interrogate any individuals they deem to be security threats or “true spies” (Ms. Esfandiari has been accused of espionage) just as the Bush administration has interrogated and tortured ‘enemy combatants’ (or simply outsourced these dirty deeds to allies and enemies alike).
I wonder if Mr. Kraig will travel to Saudi Arabia or Syria the next time a scheduled trip coincides with the detention, imprisonment or interrogation of a dual-passport carrying global citizen. For instance, would he travel to Saudi Arabia now while the country plans to execute two Saudi-born Palestinians with Canadian citizenship who confessed to murdering a young Syrian during a schoolyard fight in Jeddah? (It’s reported that the confession was forced and that the boys have experienced both physical and mental torture during their detention.) Or what about the case of Maher Arar, the Syrian-born, Canadian software engineer who made the mistake of touching down on U.S. soil only to be “transferred” by the U.S. to a prison in Syria via Jordan where he spent two years being tortured in the name of national security? Does the plight of these global citizens meet the threshold for boycotting international travel and engagement?
Surely the issue here is either one of the chilling effect that detentions and interrogations have on international relations, cultural exchanges and other relationship cultivating programs between countries, or about the basic rights that every person — regardless of the number of passports and airline mileage points — is entitled to. Surely it cannot be the infringement of Ms. Esfandiari’s “elite status” as characterized by Mr. Kraig (and not by anyone speaking on Ms. Esfandiari’s behalf).
Terms such as “citizen” and “national” are quickly becoming obsolete in our increasingly interrelated world. To say that people who are clearly defined as nationalist can expect to be interrogated or tortured, while those enjoying the status/passport/association of “global citizen” are protected from such treatment by virtue of that status is to essentially say what the Bush administration (and numerous presidential candidates) has been saying for six years: sometimes it’s acceptable to torture (or employ “enhanced interrogation techniques”) against “enemy combatants.” Mr. Kraig simply calls them “nationalist.”
Finally, I must question the wisdom of Mr. Kraig’s refusal to attend an event that is hosted by a respected Iranian institution with a “pro-engagement, positive-sum vision.” In the rhetorically-heated, politically-charged atmosphere surrounding current U.S.-Iran relations, it is the belief of this pro-engagement, global citizen (although I only possess a U.S. passport) that we need more channels of communication — not less — if we are to avoid what many neoconservatives and neoliberals want us to believe is an unavoidable confrontation with Iran. Let’s keep our fingers crossed and hope that Haleh Esfandiari is soon cleared of any forthcoming charges and released unharmed so Mr. Kraig won’t be forced to make this difficult decision and will instead be allowed to work “respectfully across differences to create fair, just, and lasting solutions” to the world’s most pressing challenges.
