Iran scholar urges U.S. to shift focus to democracy

CHICAGO (Reuters) - A prominent Islamic scholar and Iranian dissident said on Friday the United States was missing an opportunity by negotiating with Iran solely over its nuclear capability and not the country's nascent democracy movement.

Mohsen Kadivar, once an active participant in Iran's Islamic revolution who has become a critic of its theocracy, told students at Chicago's DePaul University he was pessimistic about U.S.-Iranian relations but suggested patience with President Barack Obama's 10-month-old administration.

"The U.S. administration has focused on nuclear energy. I don't hear anything about human rights and democracy in Iran. The main issue for Iranians is not nuclear energy. The main issue for Iranians is human rights and democracy," said Kadivar, now a visiting divinity professor at Duke University after serving a one-year jail term for sedition in Iran.

"Americans only think about their interests, not human beings' interest," he said, citing U.S. backing of what he termed autocratic regimes in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, and America's perceived focus on middle eastern oil supplies.

Of a possible warming of U.S.-Iranian relations sought by Obama, Kadivar said, "I'm not so optimistic on this point, unfortunately."

The Obama administration has been restrained in its reaction to the street demonstrations and violent government crackdown that followed June elections in Iran and to the subsequent trials of dozens of dissidents.

Instead, the United States and other world powers are tussling with Iran over terms for a nuclear fuel export deal in which the West is seeking to have Iran turn over 75 percent of its stockpile of enriched uranium for further enrichment and help in converting it to civilian use.

Western powers suspect the Islamic Republic of covertly seeking nuclear arms capability, while Tehran insists its program is only for peaceful purposes.

Kadivar said that while the Obama administration's stance was a vast improvement over that of its predecessor, U.S. ignorance of Iran could precipitate a repeat U.S. policy following the 1979 Iranian revolution.

There is a great diversity of opinion inside Iran about what the opposition "Green movement" represents, he said, and perhaps the only consensus was on the need for an end to the absolute power of Iran's clerical leadership, Kadivar said.

Kadivar espouses an Islamic state with an elected, democratic government that has flexibility in creating laws and is not bound by the dictates of Sharia law.

He advocated a citizens' referendum in Iran that would choose between a strictly secular government and one that contained religious elements.

The younger generation of Iranians, and Iranians in the United States, may favor a secular republic but "the traditions of Islamic Iran are very strong," Kadivar said.

(Editing by Todd Eastham)