The Wealthy Ansar-e Hezbollah Member

Rooz Online:

As soon as they said “slaughter them” and put Ansar-e Hezbollah’s name at the bottom of the statement, everyone imagined the bearded men who think of nothing but the forceful and violent imposition of a Qoranic dictum that calls for enjoining the right, and the forbidding of the wrong. No one suspected that the writer of the hateful statement was a technocrat who spoke excellent English and, more importantly, regularly signs 7 digit checks worth millions.

His name: Masoud Soltanpour. But who is he? READ MORE

Ansar-e Hezbollah, is a group of Muslim vigilantes that are notorious for their brutal attacks and who disrupt gatherings of any time, to enforce, they claim, Islamic values. In Iran they have powerful supporters and mentors, and they have a long record of hurting students, political activists, human rights advocates, politicians, writers, journalists, etc.

Soon after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a conservative Passdaran Revolutionary Guards commander and a former mayor of Tehran, was elected president, Ansar issued a statement that defines a new role for itself, while defending Ahmadinejad and even calling him the will of God. They again see themselves as the guardians of Islamic values and give themselves the license to impose their views and goals by any means. In their last statement they use the term “eradicate and suppress” for their opponents.

In a recent televised debate, even Abbass Salimi Namin, a prominent conservative and altruist journalist at Keyhan newspaper complains that “fire of anger and hatred stem from Ansar’s latest statement, while we need Islamic tolerance and kindness.” He continues with this message that Ansar is not even in line with the leader of the Islamic Republic, and that while its members are sincere religious people, they are just stooges in the hands of other more important and more powerful political and religious figures. “If I can demonstrate that a member of Ansar’s central committee is someone from Kargozaran party, then I will have done something very important in making people understand the complexity of our political culture”, he said. Even when pressed, Namin did not reveal the name of this person, thus questioning even his existence in the real world.

But a name has emerged. Farda website that belongs to altruists apparently exposes the person: Masoud Soltanpour. He is the CEO of an engineering company that builds marine installations, working closely with the Ministry of Oil and their offshore operations. This is how he gets to sign multi-million dollar contracts for the Iranian oil industry, while remaining a leader of the fundamentalist vigilante group, the Ansar.

Soltanpour is the boss of Iranian Offshore Engineering and Construction company (IOEC) which is the biggest contractor in the oil and gas fields in Iran, and is involved in the engineering, procurement, construction, piping, etc of oil equipment off shore. Founded in 1993, its main area of operations is the Persian Gulf, where Iran’s principal off shore assets are located. IOEC (Iran Offshore Engineering Company) has a professional staff of about 400 individuals, and even ranked high among Middle East pipe laying companies. Soltanpour claims that his company employees the best in the field to provide the best service and get the approval of their businesses. Currently, it has projects worth some $1.3 billion dollars that includes pipe laying at the bottom of the Persian Gulf. Apparently, all of this was done by foreign companies just a few years ago.

Soltanpour proudly talks of his company and its accomplishments. “We currently have 11 large projects in our hands. These range from the development of oil fields in cooperation with Petroiran Development company (PEDCO) to the construction of marine oil platforms in the Persian Gulf. The PEDCO project alone is a $300 million contact.”

IOEC is also active internationally with ventures in India and Qatar, but eyes ways beyond these. The company sub-contracts a lot of its work, but mostly to Iranian companies. Large contracts public sector contracts in Iran require some level of government or even parliament approval. On this, Soltanpour says that the Majlis (Parliament) has approved their contacts.

Iranian officials have been recently talking about large new investments in the oil and gas, and other sectors of the Iranian economy due to the unprojected increase in its oil income, due to higher oil prices in the market. Soltanpour confirmed earlier reports that his company and Iran were in negotiations with Kuwait to develop a gas pipeline between the two countries.

Since March 2005, IOEC has been involved in another large project for building and installing oil processing and accommodation platforms for the Foroozan and Esfandiar oil fields in the Persian Gulf. The client for this project too is PEDCO, worth about $300 million.

Soltanpour relationship with money and power and is not confined to Ansar and IOEC. Jamiate Isargarane Engelabe Eslami society has him on their central committee too, along with Nafiseh Fayazbakhsh, Masud Zaribaan, Lotfollah Foruzandeh, Bijan Moghadam, Alireza Sarbakhsh, Fatemeh Olia, Ali Ahmadi, among others.

IOEC has had other important and powerful managers. Hashemi Rafsanjani’s son, Mehdi, was the first CEO between 1993 and 1999. When Tajgardoon became the new CEO, Mehdi became the chairman of the board of directors.

Soltanpour has also been accused of having affiliations with the Kargozaran party that is run by Hashemi Rafsanjani. He has vehemently denied this going as far as saying that he hates the Kargozran.

Whatever the case, Soltanpour enjoys the full confidence of other Ansar leaders.