Our Pain, Iran's Gain

The Islamist theocracy of the Islamic Republic of Iran is a despicable, criminal administration of an ancient country with an admirable heritage.  Its people and their overall culture, both traditional and intellectual are the equal of any, anywhere in the world.  Their values do not reflect those of their Ayatollahs under whom they remain in tight thrall to fundamentalist Islamism.  As a major sponsor of violent jihadist groups and a virulent espouser of anti-Semitism they present as a danger to the world.

Their sinister operation of nuclear facilities for the clear and obvious purpose of successfully manufacturing nuclear warheads, and their threats of violence against near and far neighbours mark them as the most incendiary and volatile of threats to world peace and stability.  Dissidents, those who fled Iran when the Islamic Revolution took place, have an honoured place abroad in many countries as citizens of countries like Canada.

Iran is glad to be rid of them, as antagonistic to the regime, and troublemakers.  The green revolution that followed on the second 'election' and inauguration of the second term for President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was met with violence by the Republican Guard and its civil militia at the behest of the Grand Ayatollah and his ruling council. Incarceration, torture and death is often meted out to political dissidents.

But you cannot always get it right, and Canada has been saddled with one Iranian whose criminal exploits within Canada may delight Iran, but enrages Canadian authorities.  Although Ashkan Forsat was born in Iran in 1978, his family migrated as refugees to Canada when he was ten years of age.  No way to determine at that age the kind of character that was being brought into the country.

But it didn't take long before it became evident what mettle he was made of.

By age nineteen Forsat had a string of crimes to his credit; crimes that included violent armed robbery.  He is a dedicated criminal.  He has landed immigrant status in Canada but not citizenship, a status that allows for his deportation to his country of origin.  And he was indeed taken by Canadian border officials to Tehran in 2004, at age 26, in the expectation that he would be repatriated in his country of birth.

Forsat is still in Canada nine years later, as the criminal charges brought against him continue to steadily mount.  Iran refused him entry; he was returned to Canada in the same plane that he left the country.  At the present time he is in a Quebec prison charged with breaking into a home north of Montreal, and assaulting a woman six weeks after having been released into the custody of a friend.

In 2009 Ashkan Forsat was denied parole, the reasons several, but which included a psychological assessment determining "the risk of reoffending in violent and acquisitive crimes is evaluated as high. [His] potential for being reinserted into society [is] weak."