Norway and Iran: Hashtags, Hearts, and Hypocrisy

Could there be a sharper illustration of European hypocrisy on Iran as Norway’s conduct during a single week in November?

On November 21st, after weeks of a vicious crackdown on Iranian protestors, the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs tweeted how it was “[d]eeply disturbed by reports on death toll in Iran and excessive use of violence. In meeting w Iranian Embassy, we urged Iran to respect the right to peaceful protest, #FreedomOf Expression, access to information, to re-establish access to internet #HumanRights…”

So how did Norway follow through on this message of support to ordinary Iranians? As eight days ticked by -- during which Iran declined the opportunity to moderate its behavior at the request of Norwegian “urging,” by continuing the mass slaughter -- how did Norway respond to Iranian authorities murdering more than 200 of its own people?

It responded by rewarding the regime – enlisting in Europe’s sanctions-busting scheme known as INSTEX. Thus, a little more than a week after that tweet, on November 29^th, the Norwegian Ambassador to Iran Lars Nordrum announced that Norway would be helping “to facilitate trade with Iran and help preserve the JCPOA.”

A more accurate rendering was offered by one Iranian critic: “Today [Norway], [Sweden], [Denmark], [Finland], [the Netherlands] announced they are joining a money laundering scheme concocted to help a regime that is committing mass murder in the streets of the Iranian cities.”

And that’s the tragic truth.

Norwegians, together with their Scandinavian and northern European neighbors are invariably held up as world flag-bearers for human rights. But they demonstrate a big moral blind-spot regarding Iran, the world’s number one state sponsor of terrorism.

Of course, it was always laughable to imagine that Norwegian diplomats “urging” Iran’s restraint and respect for peaceful protest would have any effect at all on this violent, ruthless regime. Still, any messages of support from foreign governments - however feeble with their “preach love” emojis and #HumanRights tags - can provide crumbs of comfort to large swathes of Iran’s populace – to at least know that some members of the international community of responsible nations have not forgotten their struggles.

But given how very ‘deeply disturbed’ it pronounced itself, perhaps Oslo might have imposed some kind of sanction or asset freeze on the IRGC top brass, its Basij militia, or other security forces. Perhaps it might have issued stricter guidance for Norwegian oil and gas firms seeking opportunities in Iran. Perhaps it might have urged its European partners to get tougher on Iranian behavior. After all, as a non-EU state, Norwegian sanctions architecture need not converge with Brussels diktats.

Predictably, none of that happened.

Norway’s ‘follow-up,’ while more innocent Iranian civilians were being massacred, was to simply reward the Iranian regime with a welcome trade and status boost.

As for Ambassador Nordrum, he has now taken to blocking Iranians as they have angrily articulated similar criticisms. (It seems that Iranians are neither free to voice their concerns either at the regime or even to young Norwegian Ambassadors - notwithstanding his Ministry’s #FreedomOfExpression hashtag). 

The anger is understandable. This dual-track policy of supposed beacons of liberal democracy is: on one hand, tweet glib platitudes of sympathy to the brutalized Iranian people; while on the other, provide tangible solid support to the same regime doing the brutalizing. How else does one characterize this but as hypocrisy and ‘virtue-signaling’ on a grand scale?

Europe’s unscrupulous determination to prop up the Iranian theocracy cannot be softened by tweeting Human Rights hashtags and Preach Love emojis to those living under its yoke. Perhaps Iranians might even prefer if countries like Norway just cut out the compassionate tweeting altogether if their actual policies continue to provide succor not to them, but to this detestable regime.