Iran May Be Blowing Up Its Own Nuclear Scientists

Majid Shahriari, an Iranian nuclear expert who was blown up on Monday, is not the first Iranian scientist to be killed:

In January Massoud Ali-Mohammadi was killed by a bomb strapped to a motorcycle parked outside his house. Ali-Mohammadi shared professional links with the victims of the latest attack.

He and Shahriari worked on the Sesame Council, a bilateral particle accelerator project in Jordan. Their work would have introduced them to experts in their field from across the world, including Israel. Dr Abbasi and Ali-Mohammadi both taught at Imam Hussein University for the Revolutionary Guard.

After his murder it emerged that Ali-Mohammadi was a sympathiser with the pro-reform opposition movement and had been at demonstrations after the disputed presidential election last year. It was claimed he had planned to flee Iran and was killed by the government before he could escape.

Meir Javedanfar, an expert on Iran at the Middle East Economic and Political Analysis Company, notes that following the disputed 2009 elections and the resultant crackdown, not only regular citizens but officials as well have flocked to the reform movement. The Iranian regime would have attacked scientists suspected of potentially leaking secrets to to other scientists.

Javedanfar notes:

Iran already has the biggest brain drain in the world, according to the UN, and nuclear physicists getting blown up in their cars in Tehran is not going to help it.

No, probably not.

Iran's brain drain was already an issue in January 2007:

According to the IMF more than a 150,000 of the best young minds in Iran are leaving every year.

"They want to go abroad to find a decent job, well paid - that's the main purpose... A minority wants freedom and liberty, but the main point is jobs," explains Siavosh who's hoping to move to Australia.

...And the cost to Iran of not stemming this brain drain - one government estimate put it at nearly $40bn a year.

I would imagine that after the 2009 election, the crackdown--and scientists being blown up, that the brain drain is increasing.

Is it any wonder the Iranian parliament wants to impeach Ahmadinejad?

Technorati Tag: Iran.