Testing America’s Iran Ban

An Iranian human rights activist is suing the U.S. government for the right to work with an American literary agent in the publication of her memoirs. “[U.S.] Treasury Department regulations… impose penalties on anybody who transacts business with Iran,” but Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi says that she doesn’t want to have to submit her manuscript to Iran’s repressive mullahs for approval. U.S. law does permit “American publishers to reproduce, translate and edit ‘informational materials’ from countries subject to U.S. sanctions. But even advising an author how to structure a book ‘would be a problem.'”