Nosratollah Tajik

Nosratollah Tajik ( Persian نصرت‌الله تاجیک Nasrollah Tajik ; * 1954 in Tehran ) is aretired Iranian diplomat accusedby the Office of Export Enforcement of attempting tointroduce night vision devices into Iran in violation of the relevant laws of the United States.

Career

After entering the university, he was arrested and detained several times by security forces and the SAVAK (Iranian Intelligence Service) on suspicion of being an opponent of the Pahlavi dynasty. He was ill-treated and disclosed his political views to fellow prisoners. After the victory of the Islamists in the course of the Islamic revolution in Iran, he was entrusted with various responsible tasks: He was the managing director of the Islamic Revolution Housing Foundation in Qom .

From September 22nd, 1980 to August 20th, 1988, during the Iran-Iraq war he was governor of Hormozgan and as such was responsible for the infrastructure of the province with the three islands off the Persian Gulf. From 1999 to 2003, during his second presidency, Mohammad-Reza Chātamī appointed him ambassador to Amman . After his retirement , Tajik and his family moved to Durham on a Fellowship to teach Farsi at the University of Durham's Institute for Middle East and Islamic Studies and to earn a PhD from the University of Westminster .

As managing director of UK Islamic Direct Business Limited with offices in Tehran and Harrow , London , he ordered a number of night vision devices from an official in the Office of Export Enforcement . The agency applied to HM Revenue and Customs for arrest and extradition to the United States.

The British authorities arrested Tajik on November 4, 2006. A subsequent custody test date confirmed the pre-trial detention. The Iranian embassy in London put half a million pounds on bail and Tajik was placed under house arrest. During the following period of house arrest, an application by the lawyers of Tajik, which asked the British authorities to request the US authorities to withdraw the extradition request from Tajik for health reasons, was rejected by the British authorities and the British embassy in Tehran was stormed . In November 2012, the UK Supreme Court dismissed an appeal by the US authorities against a ruling by the High Court of Justice denying the legality of extradition to the US. After returning to his homeland, he published various articles on foreign policy in Iran. In January 2012 he announced his candidacy for the Madschles (Parliament of Iran).

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Former high ranking Iranian diplomat Nosratollah Tajik avoids extradition to US, 59-year-old claimed he was being kept 'hostage' in a politically tainted case, The Independent , November 27, 2012 [1] [2]

predecessor	Office	successor
Mohammad Ali Sobhani	Iranian ambassador to Amman from 1999 to 2003	Mohammad Irani