IRAN Individual Views of Commissioner Johnnie Moore Iran is the world’s leading proprietor of hostage diplomacy and the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism, especially through its proxies like the terrorist Houthis, Hezbollah, and various Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)-affiliated groups active across Europe, South America, the Middle East, and elsewhere. Iran’s activities within and outside of the country target religious minorities and especially Jews, Evangelical Christians, and Baha’is. I’m appalled by reports that certain Biden administration officials would, in effect, reward Iran for its bad behavior by eliminating sanctions prematurely. Negotiations with Iran must only be pursued in consultation with America’s allies in the Middle East (including Saudi Arabia and Israel). They must involve the release of arbitrarily detained Americans (and others) and address Iran’s gross human rights abuses and proxy activities, and those negotiations are only reasonable if they produce an outcome that would be satisfactory to a bipartisan majority of members of Congress, as if a new deal were a treaty. Otherwise, Iran will only take advantage of American goodwill to lie more, kidnap more, kill more innocents, threaten the elimination of Israel, and further destabilize the world. Finally, I will give my remaining words to Wang Xiyue, the American PhD student from Princeton who was taken hostage by Iran during the Obama administration after the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA): “The menace of the Islamic Republic can’t be appeased . . . for 42 years Iran has demonstrated that it changes its behavior only in response to strength in the form of American-led international pressure.” 28 U S C I R F | A N N U A L R E P O R T 2 0 2 1