On January 13, 2016, the United States Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the landmark case, Bank Markazi v. Peterson. The case will decide whether American victims of Iranian terrorism are able to seize assets belonging to the Central Bank of Iran in order to collect on judgments won against the state. At stake: the U.S. government's ability to use the economic sanctions to combat the full range of Iranian illicit activities. The Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), a non-partisan, Washington, DC-based think tank, filed an amicus curiae brief analyzing the legal and constitutional principles of the case and explaining the broader foreign policy context. In an introduction to the brief, FDD Executive Director and noted Iran sanctions expert Mark Dubowitz explains that Iran is trying to use the American legal system to undercut the sanctions architecture developed over decades by the U.S. Congress and successive Republican and Democratic administrations. The legal brief and its introduction provide compelling arguments that Iran must be held responsible for its support for global terrorism and that economic tools play a critical role in the America's efforts to combat Iran's violent and destabilizing activities around the world.
Author Biography:
Mark Dubowitz is the executive director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD), a Washington, D.C.-based nonpartisan policy institute, where he leads projects on Iran, sanctions, and nonproliferation. A former venture capitalist and technology executive, Mark heads FDD's Center on Sanctions and Illicit Finance. He co-leads The Iran Task Force and is co-chair of the Project on U.S. Middle East Nonproliferation Strategy. Widely recognized as one of the key influencers in shaping the Iran sanctions architecture of the past decade, Mark has advised U.S. administrations and lawmakers and testified nineteen times before Congress and foreign legislative committees on Iran sanctions and nuclear issues. He is the author or co-author of over twenty studies on economic sanctions and Iran's nuclear program. Mark teaches courses on sanctions and international negotiations at the University of Toronto's Munk School of Global Affairs, where he is a senior fellow. Mark has written for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, Foreign Policy, The Atlantic, USA Today, Forbes, Slate, The Weekly Standard, The Globe & Mail, and The National Post, and appeared on CBS Evening News, CNN, Fox News, NPR, PBS, BBC and CBC. Mark has a masters in international public policy from Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies, and law and MBA degrees from the University of Toronto. Raised in Toronto, and a proud American citizen, he has lived in Washington, D.C. since 2003.
