Free Missing Man by Barry Meier Page B

but he still bore scars. Bouzari was then in his fifties, and his hair and beard were prematurely white.
    By 2006, Mehdi Rafsanjani and the South Pars deal had drawn the interest of law enforcement officials in several countries. Documents seized by Norwegian officials during a raid on that country’s biggest energy company, Statoil, uncovered multimillion-dollar payments to a London-based firm with ties to Rafsanjani’s son. Statoil executives admitted they had retained Mehdi as a “political advisor” and were paying him to make sure the company’s work in Iran ran smoothly.
    When Bob told Bouzari he was eager to locate Rafsanjani family assets in Canada, the consultant laid out what he had heard over the years. He said the family owned condominiums near the city of Vancouver, investments made in the names of Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani’s daughters. Along with the Highway 407 toll road in Toronto, the elder Rafsanjani had supposedly invested in an area shopping mall called Times Square. Bob drove out to the mall, a modest three-story suburban development, and took photographs of it. He called Ira. “I think we’ve hit the mother lode,” he told him. He typed up an analytical report for the Illicit Finance Group summarizing what Bouzari had said and sent it to Anne Jablonski.
    In mid-2006, Bob was also presented with an opening to push forward his relationship with Dawud Salahuddin. The occasion was a planned trip to the United States by the former Iranian president Mohammed Khatami, who left office in 2005 following the election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Khatami was viewed in the West as a moderate, and the former U.S. president Jimmy Carter had invited him to speak at his public policy institute in Atlanta. Then Dawud called Ira to tell him that Khatami was considering canceling the trip because American officials hadn’t notified him he would be treated as a diplomat, a status that would allow him to avoid fingerprinting and other humiliating entry procedures. The fugitive asked Ira if he knew anyone who could pull strings on Khatami’s behalf, and Ira contacted Bob.
    The former agent liked to tell FBI recruits when giving lectures about developing sources that it was critical to show a potential informant you possessed the clout to fix his or her problem. He emailed Ira: “Just so you know, I’m trying to be of assistance on the fingerprints issue. If I can, in fact, deliver, I’ll let you know immediately so you can advise our mutual friend. If it’s, in fact, possible, I would like to be the one who made even this small part possible—and be viewed as a problem solver.”
    Bob sent a note to a friend with the State Department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security, in which he hyped his CIA relationship to get traction.
    Have an op going w/Iranians for the “dark side” and would like to know if you or a buddy might be able to assist quietly. A former president of Iran, Mohammed Khatami is traveling to Washington for a speech … He’s also going to hold some very hush-hush talks with former President Carter at the Carter Center in Atlanta. Hang up is that he has heartburn with being fingerprinted upon entering the U.S., saying it is, to him anyway, insulting to have to submit to same.
    If DSS is possibly going to afford security for a visit, is there any way you might be able to get DHS/Immigration to forego the normal fingerprinting. This, believe it or not, would assist me greatly in the op. Please advise ASAP if you can do me any good.
    A few days later, Bob’s contact got back to him to say he didn’t need to worry; U.S. officials had already granted Khatami diplomatic status. But Bob still wanted Dawud to think he was the one who had made it happen. He wrote Ira: “Please tell our friend that MK is going to be met planeside. As a result of a personal favor, he will not be subjected to any indignities.”
    Along with