Building Peace with Iran
The Iranian flag flies over Tehran
On this week’s episode of Black Diplomats, host Terrell Starr does what very few American journalists do - talk to Iranians about Iran.
Iran is surrounded by nuclear armed adversaries and American military bases. It is reasonable for them to feel threatened, but that’s a perspective we rarely hear in the U.S. media because we keep being force fed the same crewcut white boys going on about the mullahs.
Today we have two Iranians and a nuclear policy analyst on to provide some context to the conversation.
Negar Mortazavi is an Iranian-American journalist, columnist for The Independent, and host of the Iran Podcast. Ellie Geranmayeh is a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations who advises governments and companies on developments with the Iran nuclear deal. They both have deep personal and family ties to Iran that inform their understanding of these nuanced issues.
Michelle Dover is the host of the Ploughshares Fund podcast and a nuclear non-proliferation expert who has followed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action from its first draft.
They get into the details of the JCPOA, the current status of the deal after Trump pulled the US out, Biden’t plans, and what peace in the Middle East could look like. This is a great episode that fills a lot of gaps left by the standard American reporting.
The article referenced in the episode can be found at -
https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/how-to-write-about-iran-a-guide-for-journalists-analysts-and-policymakers
Thanks for listening!
Negar Mortazavi
Negar Mortazavi is an Iranian-American journalist and political analyst based in Washington. She has been covering Iranian affairs and US-Iran relations for over a decade. She is a columnist for The Independent and host of the Iran Podcast. She is a frequent media analyst on Iran and has appeared on CNN, MSNBC, NPR, BBC, France24, Aljazeera, and other media outlets in China, Turkey, and Israel.
Negar regularly writes on Iranian politics and US foreign policy towards the middle east. Her pieces have appeared in Foreign Policy, The Intercept, Politico, Huffington Post, and elsewhere. She frequently speaks about Iranian affairs at international institutions including the Atlantic Council, Gulf International Forum, MIT, Johns Hopkins University, and American University among others.
Find out more at negarmortazavi.com
Ellie Geranmayeh
Ellie Geranmayeh is a senior policy fellow and deputy head of the Middle East and North Africa programme at the European Council on Foreign Relations. She specializes in European foreign policy in relation to Iran, particularly on the nuclear and regional dossiers and sanctions policy. Geranmayeh advised European governments and companies on the nuclear negotiations between Iran and world powers from 2013-2015 and continues to brief senior policy makers on how to effectively safeguard the implementation of the nuclear agreement. Prior to joining ECFR, Geranmayeh worked at Herbert Smith Freehills law firm. She graduated in Law from the University of Cambridge.
Follow her work on Twitter
Michelle Dover
Michelle is the director of programs at Ploughshares Fund, where she leads the grantmaking team. She provides guidance on grantmaking strategies, performance and direction to the program team and Ploughshares leadership, as well as conducting due diligence on grants.
Prior to joining Ploughshares Fund in 2015, Michelle conducted research at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies on nuclear, chemical, and biological cooperative threat reduction programs. She was previously a Nonproliferation Graduate Fellow at the National Nuclear Security Administration, where she worked on International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards. Michelle holds a master’s degree in conflict resolution from American University and graduated with honors from the University of Denver with a degree in international studies and French.
Read selected works written by Dover here.