Iranian immigrant’s training by militia stalls residency bid

It was in the first few weeks of the Iran-Iraq war in 1980, and Sadegh Behrouz Vazeri was a 20-year-old engineering student at the University of Tehran.

Iraqi forces were still far from the capital, but Vazeri heard about self-defense training being conducted by the newly formed Basij militia group. The training consisted mostly of how to use a rifle.

Twenty-nine years later, Vazeri told his story to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services personnel during a two-hour videotaped interview.

It was the latest chapter in Vazeri’s six-year effort to become a permanent resident.

Two weeks later, Vazeri, 49, received a letter at the Carlsbad home he shares with his wife, 3-year-old daughter, mother and sister -- all U.S. citizens -- informing him that his application had been denied. He was deemed ineligible because he had received military-type training from a group that at the time was considered “a terrorist organization,” according to the letter dated Sept. 3.

“Did I commit any crime?” said Vazeri, who is fighting to reopen the case. “They just came with a ridiculous judgment.”

Neither the Basij nor the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, of which the Basij is a branch, are or ever have been labeled terrorist organizations by the U.S. State Department.

In 2007, the State and Treasury departments designated the revolutionary corps as being involved in the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and one of the corps’ units -- IRGC-Qods Force -- as supporting terrorist organizations. But neither the corps nor the IRGC-Qods Force were designated as terrorist organizations.

“It’s almost as if there’s a de facto heightened review of Middle Eastern immigrants and of denials based on frivolous allegations and terrorist connections,” said Peter Schey, Vazeri’s attorney. “I don’t think this is an unusual case.”

A spokeswoman for Citizenship and Immigration Services said she could not comment specifically on the case. “We feel that our adjudications are justified,” said Sharon Rummery. “And if they don’t agree with our judgment, they have the option to file a motion to reopen.”

Vazeri first came to the United States in September 1991. When he was still in Iran, he had applied for a tourist visa several times -- believing that a better life awaited him, as well as his developmentally disabled sister, in the U.S. -- but he was repeatedly denied. He flew to Mexico, again applied for a visa and, when he was rejected, decided to illegally enter the country from Tijuana. He hoped to eventually bring his sister to this country.

“I had a kind of belief that I would do better in the U.S.,” he said. “Iran is not playing a role model for the rest of the world. You don’t have that much of a voice where people can hear you.”

He came to Los Angeles, where his brother worked for a towing company, which in 1994 applied for and received a work permit on Vazeri’s behalf. Most recently he worked at a semiconductor company, from which he was laid off in November 2008.

Soon after his residency application was rejected, Vazeri got another letter informing him that his work permit had been revoked. He stopped receiving unemployment benefits. The family is living off the disability that both Vazeri’s mother and sister receive and help from family friends. Vazeri has filed a motion to reopen his case.

During questioning by immigration officials in August, he said, he never hesitated about mentioning his Basij training. “They told me to answer questions honestly,” Vazeri said. “So I told them honestly. . . . It didn’t occur to my mind that it could be a problem.”

He told them that his training lasted about five hours and was conducted over three days, during which presenters spoke about the safest place to be in the house in the event of a bombing and where to go for shelter. On the last day, the men were taken to a field outside the city and each was allowed to practice shooting a rifle.

In Iran it is illegal for civilians to own guns, Vazeri said, so much of the population is unfamiliar with how to operate them.

Mateo Farzaneh, a doctoral student in Iranian studies at UC Santa Barbara, lived in Iran during the first four years of the Iran-Iraq war. He said that in some neighborhoods the majority of residents -- including women -- participated in the training classes because it was unknown how quickly or how far Iraqi forces would advance into the country.

“The people who got the minimal training at the neighborhood mosque just wanted to defend their homes,” said Farzaneh, who lectures in world history at Cal State Fullerton. “I remember vividly we would go to the mosque and get some karate training.”

The Basij at that time had been newly formed in the wake of the Islamic Revolution as junior members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, Farzaneh said.

“Twenty-five years ago nobody thought of them as a terrorism organization; now they’ve become terrorists and this guy is going to get punished,” he said. “Everybody participated in the Basij [training] because we thought we were being conquered.”

raja.abdulrahim@latimes.com