British foreign minister David Miliband in an article for New York Times has outlined the situation regarding Iran’s nuclear program and the way forward for the world to deal with it.He has argued that “there are many Irans” one of which is “an Iran seen in a highly educated, entrepreneurial people, with a celebrated culture and civilization.”
Describing the other Irans as he argues, The Minister draws a dark and unpleasant picture of Iran: “one whose economy is a mess” , one “that According to the I.M.F. has the highest brain drain in the world” , “one that destabilizes its neighborhood by supporting terrorism” , and one “whose regime talks of winning the battle for technology when it launches worms into space 40 years after man went to the moon and claims to be a defender of human rights while imprison, beat, shot in the streets and execute after show trials the Iranians who assert their basic freedoms.”
The writer of these lines is not a political activist either pro or anti regime. I am an Iranian journalist from the so called “Iran with celebrated culture”. We could argue about your allegations against Iran for hours, but this not the point here. I also ignore the acrimonious words about the technological advances of my country. But as an Iranian I can not ignore the counterfeiting of the cultural and civilizational heritage of my ancient land, Persia.
Mr. Foreign minister of Great Britain , as an educated man as you suppose to be especially in the field of history and foreign law and relations, you are supposed to speak and write with correct words and phrases when it comes to naming places which have long historical background. In your long article about Iran, once you have mentioned “Gulf countries”. Please as a high official of the revered and accountable government of England, explain why you utter a fake and deficient word instead of the real name of a place which is registered in the most ancient maps and documents: “Persian Gulf”. Is it because you forgot something or you are aware of some new historical findings which is only accessible to you and some other media which use the fake word. I am not familiar with international relations and strategic bargaining as you are. But don’t you think that you are altering and hijacking the heritage of a nation for sake of courting some other countries which happen to be oil-dollar-rich and maybe of some strategic importance to you, what do you call it?
Mr. Miliband Iran may be a country with economic problems, a country that suffers brain drain and some or many other problems, but none of these give your excellency an excuse to rub the history of a nation at least as ancient as yours.
