Maryam Rajavi: US, Europe must break their silence about Iraqi deadline for closure of Ashraf

Speech to a conference in Brussels

Ladies and Gentlemen,
Greetings to you,
It is a pleasure to be with this gathering of elected representatives and honorable personalities from Europe and the United States of America; a gathering to consider two very important issues: first, the state terrorism practiced by the religious dictatorship in Iran and second, the urgent situation of the residents of Ashraf.

I have come here, to the capital of the European Union, to tell the governments of Europe and the United States of America that the continuation of the appeasement policy of the Mullahs’ regime in Iran will only lead to a catastrophe.
Silence and inaction in the face of the religious fascism ruling in Iran, is enough.

Why are you standing idly by in the face of an Iraqi government deadline for the closure of Ashraf and another massacre that it could bring?
I would like to warn Western governments that if you do not stop the Iraqi government’s flouting of International Law and its effort to destroy Ashraf residents today, tomorrow will be too late.

I would like to warn them to not allow the praise that they won for the saving of Benghazi, to now be turned into eternal shame on the issue of Ashraf.

Dear Friends,
Now the octopus of the religious dictatorship in Iran has extended its tentacles to Washington, DC. The United States should certainly take a lesson from this important event.
The first lesson to be learnt is from the great error of your deviation from the counter-terrorism effort. Instead of targeting the central banker of terrorism, you targeted its opposition. You, therefore, paved the way for the advance of the real terrorists.

Open your eyes now to what your gift of designating the PMOI as terrorists to the mullahs has achieved for you.
Look and see how your biggest concession to Khamenei, which was the handover of the security of Ashraf to the puppet Iraqi government, has whetted the appetite of the mullahs.

If the United States were to take the right lessons from recent events, it would certainly apologize to the Iranian nation for the unjust designation which was in effect participation in suppression.
You should indeed apologize to the Iranian people for the mistake of obstructing the path to change in Iran and paving the way for a massacre in Ashraf and correct your ways.

This is also the demand of representatives and eminent politicians of the United States and we know United States by them.
And now we come to the second lesson.

The second lesson is that this regime will never abandon terrorism.
The religious dictatorship, for lack of any support among Iranian society, because of its backward nature, due to its fundamental hostility to the democratic aspiration of Iran’s women and youth, has no other foundation other than merciless suppression and export of terrorism.

The leader of the Iranian Resistance, Massoud Rajavi, has said on several occasions: “If the Iranian regime is stopped from exporting sectarianism and terrorism to outside Iran’s borders one day, and is contained to within Iran, it will lose its purpose and collapse from within.”

Indeed, the mullahs resort to terrorism to avoid collapse. They seek nuclear weapons by all means to avoid their downfall. They execute our sons and daughters every day to prevent uprisings. But we tell them that it is impossible for you to avoid the fate that befell Ben-Ali, Mubarak, and Qaddafi.
The third lesson to be learnt is that a policy of conciliation and appeasement of this terrorist and dictatorial regime is either out of folly or is a deception to justify appeasement of this regime.
Regardless of how you look at it, the fact that the mullahs’ terrorism has reached Washington DC, and the fact that the regime’s missiles have put Europe within range, and the fact that nuclear weapons are within this regime’s reach, is a direct result of the policy of conciliation and appeasement.

The irony is that the mullahs have ravaged the world from Beirut, Cairo, Karachi, Manila, Tokyo, to European capitals, and Buenos Aires with terror, but have only received gifts and concessions in return.
More ironic is that in Iraq, the US did not stop at closing its eyes at the regime’s terroristic atrocities there, but it also gave way to Iranian regime influence over the Iraqi government.

Therefore, to paraphrase Winston Churchill, we say, by bowing to the religious fascism in Iran, the US has gained nothing but its savage terrorism in the heart of Washington DC.

While this regime has been engaged in covert support of terrorism throughout all these years, it has publicly pointed its finger at the Iranian Resistance to accuse it of terrorism and all sorts of demonizing claims.
The Iranian regime has assassinated thousands of Iraqi pilots, judges, lawyers, scientists, doctors, professors and Iraqi patriots. But at the same time it accused the PMOI of having killed Kurds and Shiites in Iraq in a demonization campaign.

It was the regime in Iran that fed lies to the US State Department and other foreign ministries in EU countries about cults and the PMOI training of women suicide bombers in Karbala in Iraq, or the alleged plan for an attack on the Green Zone in Baghdad. The US State Department’s entire classified file to keep the PMOI in the terrorist list is full of information and documents fed to it by the mullahs and crimes that the mullahs have committed.

Dear Friends,

There is no doubt that the terrorist Qods Force takes orders only from the regime’s supreme religious leader, particularly for its operation in Washington DC.
Numerous courts in Europe and the US, including a court in Berlin in 1997 and a court in Rome in 2006 have emphasized the role of Khamenei in issuing orders for terrorist crimes.

The fact is that all power is centralized in Khamenei’s hands. Several days ago he even declared that he may want to eliminate the sham presidential elections and leave that to the regime’s rubber-stamp parliament. Khamenei is personally in charge of torture and execution in Iran and terrorist attacks abroad.
Therefore, he should be tried for crimes against humanity in an international court.

But why has the leader of the mullahs regime so clearly challenged international covenants and threatens the international community with war?

Because he is seeking a way out of the crippling crises that have surrounded his regime. You have the explosive dissatisfaction of the Iranian people who have repeatedly risen up to overthrow this regime during the past two years. The circumstances for the restart of such uprisings remain and the root reasons for the uprisings have not been redressed.

On the other hand, after the advance of freedom-seeking uprisings throughout the region, Khamenei sees his regime engulfed.
Khamenei has inferred from the fall of Qaddafi and the portending collapse of the Syrian regime, that to avert the fall of his dictatorship he must push ahead to a new higher level of extremism.

Khamenei’s strategy consists of several measures:

Attacking Ashraf through his proxies in Iraq and Qods force,
Increasing the number of executions in Iran – only last month one person was hanged every 7 hours,
Acceleration of his nuclear weapons program,
Expansion of the export of terrorism to the West. His spokesmen have described it as: “An international Jihad.”
Therefore, Khamenei hoped to turn events in the region on its head by implementing a high profile terrorist act in the center of American power in Washington. He failed, however, and has been snared.
This is only the beginning ladies and gentlemen. This is a dilemma that the religious dictatorship is faced with, due to its natural weaknesses and its ultra-backward nature and it will be impossible for the regime to free itself from this situation. Khamenei has two options: either to back-off or to continue on the road to more terrorism and adventurism due to his regime’s critical circumstances. But no matter which way he goes, his fate will be to be overthrow at the hands of the Iranian people and resistance.

In such a situation, it is critically important that the United States not repeat its mistakes of the past three decades in the face of the Iranian regime’s terrorism.
I would like to warn against any complacency in the face of the evil determination of the Iranian regime to acquire nuclear weapons. Declare without any uncertainty for once that the mullahs are building a nuclear bomb.
I would like to warn that the US should not close its eyes to the terrorist plot in Washington DC like the Khobar Towers affair; be careful not to just complain and protest like you have done up until now in Iraq; and a warning not to cover up the facts of this terrorist plot. Do not try to save the regime in its entirety or Khamenei in particular. Most of all, do not just limit the reaction to some hollow acts to mollify public anger at this plot.

I will present you with some real yardsticks of a meaningful and firm response:

Release the Iranian Resistance who has been the victim of Western appeasement of the Iranian regime from the confines of your terrorist listings.
Implement your international obligations in protecting Ashraf.

Refer the Iranian regime’s terrorism file and its violations of human rights to the UN Security Council.
Implement a full oil boycott of this regime and stop fueling its suppressive machinery.
Recognize the Iranian people’s resistance for overthrowing the religious fascism in Iran.
The time has come to delist the resistance movement that is the victim of Western appeasement of this regime and instead designate those who openly and clearly deny or justify this regime’s terrorism and aid the terrorism machine of this regime as terrorists.

They are spokesmen and political representatives of Qods force in Europe and the United States and they advocate mullahs under various guises.
They should be put in the list now.

Dear Friends,

It is now 20 months that Ashraf residents are living in a state of an inhuman siege by the Iranian Qods Force and Iraqi government. In the attack on Ashraf on April 8, 36 defenseless and innocent residents of Ashraf were killed by attacking Iraqi government forces on the orders of the Iranian regime.

Five of the seriously ill patients in Ashraf have lost their lives due to denial of medical services and the unending psychological torture of the residents continues with 300 loudspeakers.
At the same time, the terrorist Qods Force has built surveillance towers to block television and communications signals next to Ashraf as part of a plan to launch the next attack.

The Iranian Resistance has received evidence and intelligence from within the regime that shows the Iraqi Government, on pretext of its deadline to close Ashraf, and on orders of Khamenei is preparing to attack Ashraf. The Iraqi government is obstructing UN agencies work in resolving the Ashraf issue.

They are for instance applying pressure to disrupt the work of the UNHCR in determining the refugee status of Ashraf residents.
As they have already hindered and blocked the European Plan of Mr. Stevenson.

We have gathered here to ask European states and the United States of America why they are silent about the Iraqi deadline for closure of Ashraf when the aim of such a deadline is the massacre of Ashraf residents.
We say to them that you must not sit idly by in the face of this evil plot against Ashraf residents which is being advanced under the guise of the Iraqi deadline.

Extensive political, security, and economic relations with Iraq, enables Western governments to pressure the Iraqis to abide by international norms.

After the UNHCR’s statement that Ashraf residents are recognized refugee seekers and have a right to fundamental protections, and after the initiative by the European High Representative on Security and Foreign Affairs, Baroness Ashton, in appointing Ambassador de Ruyt as her personal representative on the Ashraf issue, the United States and EU states must now support the special representative’s mission so that he can travel to Iraq, visit Ashraf, prepare a direct report and take measures to protect Ashraf residents. They must not allow any obstruction of these efforts.
The time has come for the UN Secretary General and the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights to act to station UN monitors in Ashraf and to cancel the suppressive deadline set by the Iraqi government.

The time has come for Western governments to stand alongside the Iranian Resistance that represents the will of the Iranian people for freedom, democracy, separation of religion and state, gender equality and a non-nuclear Iran.

Thank you all.