August 19, 2016
One year after her children were taken from Canada by their Iranian father, Alison Azer says she feels let down by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who called their safety a “high priority” but has failed to secure their return.
She is pressing the Prime Minister to show “leadership” and contact his Iranian counterpart to negotiate the safe return of her kids—as Britain’s prime minister last week telephoned Iran’s president about Britons jailed in Iran.
“It can be as straightforward as a phone call,” she said. “It can be as straightforward as making good on a promise.”
Alison Azer’s year of agony began August 21, 2015, when Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) officers arrived at her door to say that her children had not boarded their return flight from a vacation with their father in Europe.
In an op-ed in Sunday’s Globe and Mail, Canada’s largest national newspaper, she describes her failed court fight to keep the children from traveling internationally with either parent.
Her eleven-year marriage to Saren Azer had dissolved bitterly in 2012 after she says he threatened to kill her and the children.
The children – Sharvahn, 12; Rojevahn, 10; Dersim, 7; and Meitan, 4 – are her “life,” she says. Since the alleged abduction, her life has been consumed with trying to bring them back. Like Richard Ratcliffe in Britain, whose British-Iranian wife is jailed in Iran, Alison Azer has been shouting loudly, staging events to draw attention to her issue and trying to shame her government into doing more. However, it isn’t really clear that either government can do much. The Islamic Republic is not noted for its responsiveness to the concerns of foreigners.
What’s more, Trudeau made a campaign pledge to restore relations with Iran. He has now been in office almost 10 months but hasn’t yet been able to re-open the embassy in Tehran, suggesting to some that Iran is making many demands of Trudeau before it will allow the embassy to re-open.
Alison Azer says, “I never felt that I should have to become an expert on the geopolitics of the region. I am a mom. All I want is my kids back.”
She said, “I wake up every morning unsure of how I’m going to make it through the day, because the grief is just colossal. And the fear could be paralyzing. But I can’t afford to give in to the fear. And I can’t afford to give in to the grief.”
Last October, she went to Iraq by herself for several months, traveling across the country until she arrived at what she thought was the village where her children were staying. Local elders met with her, but only to buy her ex-husband time to flee, she now believes. In February, he took the children to Iran, where he has family.
“The children aren’t safe,” she said. “I am terrified for them. That’s what has kept me going.”
A social-media campaign around her website, FindAzerKids Now.com, has garnered heavy press attention. But the case hasn’t always seemed like a high priority for Trudeau’s Liberal Party government, or the Stephen Harper Conservative Party government before it, she says.
“Since the abduction, our government has constantly been four steps behind,” she wrote in the op-ed.
Not content with what she saw as a limp bureaucratic effort, she continued her lobbying in Ottawa, Canada’s capital. She has visited the capital 11 times to discuss her children with government officials. In May, she met with Prime Minister Trudeau, who assured her that the Azer file would not leave his desk until the children were safely home, she said.
And in June, there seemed to be a breakthrough: Iranian officials, acting on an Interpol Red Notice, detained the father for child abduction. But Alison Azer asserts Canadian officials didn’t respond when Iranian law enforcement contacted them about the arrest, and eventually the charges were dropped.
The Canadian government denies this. “The Iranian authorities never reached out to Canada when they brought Mr. Azer in for questioning,” said Omar Alghabra, a Liberal MP and parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Under Iranian law, children of the ages of Azers are under the custody of the father, not the mother, so it isn’t clear why Iran would even summon the father for an investigation.
Alghabra insists the Canadian government has been working diligently on the case. He said seven missions abroad have been pursuing the matter and Trudeau has spoken with Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, whose country represents Canada’s interests in Iran.
Alison Azer believes Canada’s failure to secure the children’s return is partly due to the absence of Canadian diplomatic staff on the ground in Iran. In 2012, the Harper government severed ties.
Still, she insists the government could do more to engage with Iran. She has repeatedly asked Trudeau to call President Rohani to discuss the case directly.