Maryam Rajavi addresses 20,000 Iranians in Paris rally

“On the second anniversary of the June 17 raid, which was conducted as part of a deal with the mullahs and in order to preserve their regime, we must ask those who planned that raid and the appeasers, did you hear the resounding “no” by the Iranian people to the clerical regime.

Did you hear that Iranian people said loud and clear that they rejected religious dictatorship?

Whether the mullahs’ supporters heard the “no” or not, the dawn of change in Iran is on its way.”

My dear fellow-Iranians in Iran and across the world,
Friends of the Iranian Resistance,
Ladies and gentlemen,

I salute you for your perseverance and faith in defeating the dirty deal that was behind the events of June 17, 2003, for establishing an active political front made up of advocates of democratic change in Iran in the past two years. You are advancing the Iranian people’s movement toward victory.

I also salute freedom-loving French citizens who rose to confront the conspirators, and who found the defense of this resistance movement synonymous with the defense of human rights and democracy.

Let us commemorate June 20, the twenty-fourth anniversary of the resistance against clerical dictatorship, the day of martyrs and political prisoners, the anniversary of the foundation of the National Liberation Army of Iran, the national Day of Resistance against the evil rule of darkness and compulsion, and the day when the foundations for peace, freedom and democracy for future Iran were laid.

My fellow-Iranians,

I congratulate you for the great victory of the Iranian people and resistance in the boycott of the clerical regime’s sham election. I hail all our compatriots nationwide.

The Iranian people have spoken. They gave a resounding “no” to religious fascism in Iran. It was the biggest election boycott. This solid boycott confronted the mullahs with a major crisis and forced a run-off. Eyewitness reports and monitoring of 15,000 voting stations across the country showed that the turnout was less than 10 percent. There were more than fifty million eligible voters nationwide.

The boycott was a historic “no” and “rejection” of the regime and shook the regime to its foundations. It demonstrated the illegitimacy of the mullahs before the international community.

Different factions of the regime have resorted to an assortment of riggings to down play this nationwide boycott. One of the ruling factions spoke of five million ID cards of dead persons being in the hands of rival factions for multiple-voting.

This boycott is a milestone on the road to achieving democracy and freedom and offers a complete portrait of a defeated regime.

Yesterday’s boycott was greater than that in all sham elections in the past quarter century. Every one saw that the Iranian people rejected the ruling mullahs.

The composition of the candidates exposed the clerical regime’s all-out deadlock. None of the factions had any candidate who could offer a way out of the crisis.
Discord and disarray within the regime aggravated as both factions are in the throes of unprecedented schisms.

In short, far from a show of survival and stability of the regime, the election turned into a manifestation of the most important crises and defeats the mullahs face.

The end of the failed reform game by Khatami, the failure of the mullahs’ evil designs to destroy the Resistance, the boiling over of social protests and international challenges, all of them engulfed the mullahs in a major crisis and the election turned into a major defeat for the entirety of the regime.

The portrait the candidates painted for the regime in recent weeks reflected this reality. They acknowledged that they had carried out terrorist attacks in Europe and set fire to Ka’ba in Mecca in 1987.

They said seventy percent of the drug trafficking was organized by the regime and that the economy was the monopoly of ten to twenty children of the regime’s leaders.

Thus, what happened yesterday was a major signal that the regime had entered the final phase.

This was also a testament to the reality that the real solution to the Iranian problem was not the clerical regime, internal factions or internal developments. The real solution is democratic change by the Iranian people and Resistance.

Clearly, the boycotted election carries serious implications for the mullahs’ regime. It would not make a difference who wins, meaning that the regime in its totality would emerge weaker.

With respect to Rafsanjani, it is common knowledge that he was among the most senior officials involved in the massacre of 30,000 political prisoners. He was the principal official in charge of the devastating war that left one million dead. He was responsible for the chain murders at home and assassinations abroad. A German Federal court condemned him as one of the principals in the murder of dissidents. He also leads the list of officials who plundered the Iranian nation. The coming to power of Rafsanjani would create such a power struggle at the top echelons of the regime that would paralyze it from moving forward. At the same time, Rafsanjani’s failure would be tantamount to the faltering of one of the regime’s major pillars.

The other candidate is a Revolutionary Guards commander, Mahmoud Ahmadijead, among the leaders of the most extremist factions affiliated with the Supreme Leader. As a commander of the clerical regime’s terrorist operations, he played a major role in the heinous murder of Dr. Kazem Sami in Tehran and in the assassination of Dr. Abdol-Rahman Qassemlou in Vienna. He was also among the ringleaders of plainclothes criminals and Ansar Hezbollah gangs who have in recent years attacked the dormitories of students and the beatings and arrest of protesters.

A win by Ahmadinejad would complete the control of the Revolutionary Guards over the regime as a whole. For a Revolutionary Guard will be the chief executive, a ring leader of terrorist outfits is the Judiciary Chief, a Revolutionary Guard heads the state-run radio and television and dozens of Guards are Majlis deputies. The plain-clothes officers and the faction lead by former deputy Intelligence Minister Saeed Emami would occupy the leading positions.

Those who would assume power as a result of this election do not represent the Iranian people. Thus, appeasing this regime would be tantamount to blatantly participating in the suppression of the Iranian people and paving the way for greater export of terrorism and fundamentalism.

Appeasing this regime runs counter to the highest interests of the Iranian people and to peace and stability in the Middle East. It must be stopped.

On behalf of the Iranian people and Resistance, we call on governments around the world not to recognize the mullahs’ illegitimate elections. We want them to join our people in their demand for democratic change in Iran.

Dear Friends,

On the second anniversary of the June 17 raid, which was conducted as part of a deal with the mullahs and in order to preserve their regime, we must ask those who planned that raid and the appeasers, did you hear the resounding “no” by the Iranian people to the clerical regime.

Did you hear that Iranian people said loud and clear that they rejected religious dictatorship?

Whether the mullahs’ supporters heard the “no” or not, the dawn of change in Iran is on its way.

Two years after the spectacular raid on offices of the NCRI in France and four years after the start of investigations, all jurists and experts have reached a consensus that the case that began under the pretext of terrorism is empty and devoid of even a trace of terrorism. In February 2005, Le Monde quoted sources informed of the investigation in this case, “The terrorist nature of the activities of the Iranian opposition organization has not been established.”

Yes, there was no sign of terrorism. They knew this very well from the beginning.

It was at the behest of the mullahs and to secure lucrative deals that they targeted the Iranian Resistance.

Now that the terrorism allegation has been discredited, instead of acknowledging the truth, they are raising bogus financial allegations.

These allegations represent nothing but a brazen attempt to continue the injustice against the Iranian people and the Resistance and to help preserve the mullahs’ regime.

Keeping this file open is a lever to restrict the legitimate and lawful activities of the National Council of Resistance of Iran and a lever to continue the deals with bloody fundamentalists. None of it has any legal and material justification.

To this end, they are trying to make a plaything out of the justice, the media and democracy.

Indeed, we are facing new methods to suppress the Resistance movement.

Previously, appeasers, guided by the regime ruling Iran, directly shared responsibility for wiping out resistance movements. Now, they have changed tactics. In the twenty-first century, new methods are used to shackle the resistance movement, new suppressive tactics to impede the Resistance from advancing and to waste its time and resources.

One day, André Malraux told his German interrogators, “Those who are fighting you want to testify that France is alive, whether they win or lose, whether they face the firing squad or torture.”

And we now say those who are fighting the religious fascism ruling Iran want to testify that human rights and freedom are alive, whether they win or lose, whether they are attacked, whether they become the target of a barrage of allegations of being a cult or terrorist.

Allow me, therefore, to say that these allegations would not tarnish the image of the Iranian Resistance.

While warning those who are trying to help a regime that is devoid of stability and future through such action, we say, you will gain nothing other than harming French justice. Trumping false charges against the Resistance movement, or accusing it of terrorism would not weaken our resolve and would not save the mullahs’ already defeated regime.

Fortunately, dignified French judges, as they have shown in the past two years, did not succumb to blackmail and demagoguery.

Why should the government of France be the most important supporter of the religious fascism ruling Iran?

Pre-eminent experts and scholars of international law have presented definitive legal briefs, which prove, based on international covenants, the legitimacy and the just nature of the Resistance against clerical dictatorship. The most distinguished French jurists have also reiterated that one could not use the terror tag to hunt down the Resistance’s activists. This would be a violation of the European Convention on Human Rights and the principle of the presumption of innocence.

Indeed, majorities in the parliaments of Britain, Italy, Norway, and Luxembourg, both Houses of Parliament in Belgium, and the United States Congress, as well as 120 members of the European Parliament have declared that the Iranian Resistance is a legitimate movement. Some 2.8 million Iraqis have signed a declaration in support of the Iranian Resistance.

Dear Friends,

Today, June 18, is the anniversary of the call of General Charles de Gaulle from exile in London, who called on the people of France to launch their anti-fascist resistance.

While I hail all the heroes of the French Resistance, I want to ask those who accuse the Iranian Resistance of terrorism, what do they think of the French Resistance and General de Gaulle?

What do they think of Jean Moulin, the head of France’s National Council of Resistance?

Do they consider Manoukian’s resistance group as a murderous and terrorist group or freedom fighters?

What do they think of l’Affiche Rouge, in which the Nazis described that group as terrorist?

Let me underscore that our Resistance movement seeks the very values for which Jean Moulin and Manoukian suffered and sacrificed their lives. Let us recall the song the partisans were singing: Our friends, do you hear the outcries of our nation that has been enchained?

And you, residents of Val d’Oise and Auvers-sur-Oise and all French citizens who have rushed to the aid of our enchained nation, in our view, you have risen in defense of the noble human values symbolized by the likes of Manoukian and Jean Moulin.

We identify France with you, for you took the side of freedom, justice and humanity. For you condemned suppression in the cloak of deception. And indeed, this is worthy of the people in the land of human rights and political asylum.

Dear compatriots,

The conspirators who directed the June 17 raid two years ago said they had come to annihilate the Iranian Resistance. You persevered, because you represent a movement that does not act based on the interests of the great powers. You represent a movement that was not born out of short-term regional or international circumstances and could not be therefore destroyed through deals.

This is a movement for freedom, a movement that has been roaring and resisting for forty years. It is a movement that safeguards the pillars of Iran.

You persevered, because the tree of Iran’s freedom has been watered with the blood of 120,000 martyrs from the Resistance.

Let us salute those martyrs, from Zahra and Kobra Ebrahimian, Homeira Eshraq and Dariush Salahshour, who faced the firing squads after enduring barbaric torture after June 20, 1981, to Sediqeh Mojaveri and Neda Hassani, the standard bearers who carried the torch of liberty, those who found the solution to darkness in “resisting at all costs.”

The clerical regime is facing the explosive discontent of society. However, it is neither interested nor capable of change or reform because that would lead to its overthrow. To secure their own interests, appeasers are hard at work to preserve the regime.

This situation has created an important showdown internationally that has manifested itself in recent months. It is a showdown over the right of the Iranian people for freedom.

On the one side there is a front that seeks to preserve the velayat-e faqih regime. On the other side, there is a front that advocates democratic change. What has enabled this front to advance and been indispensable to this period are evermore endeavors by the supporters of the Resistance.

Indeed, everyday and everywhere in Iran and around the globe new action must be undertaken to secure the victory of democracy and freedom. The river that roars, shall become the sea.

It is incumbent upon you to invigorate everywhere with your endeavors and stir up the world in solidarity with the demands of the Iranian people.

Human solidarity and values are this Resistance’s most precious source of strength.

Let us hope that with the advent of freedom of speech, the press, assembly, covering, travel and other individual and social freedoms in future Iran, all repressed talents would blossom so that we can erect an advanced and prosperous country.

Indeed, our solution and our path are based on freedom. We seek to revive the oppressed gem of humanity: freedom.

The Iranian Resistance is committed to all the rights and freedoms stipulated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and related international covenants.

In Iran free of mullahs’ oppression, we advocate and are committed to end capital punishment and annul all forms of barbaric punishments.

We reiterate our commitment to the Convention against Torture, International Humanitarian Law and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women.

We must soothe broken hearts, reconcile a devastated society, and rebuild a country laid to ruins by hatred, despair and vengeance, through forgiveness, compassion and trust.

After transferring power to the people, this Resistance wants nothing more than democracy, a republic based on the separation of church and state, and the people’s free choice.

Our aim is not to attain power at all costs. Our aim is to guarantee freedom and democracy at all costs, even at the cost of sacrificing our own existence.

We have rushed toward great sacrifices and sufferings so that the Iranian nation would enjoy freedom and prosperity.

We have forsaken everything, so that the Iranian nation would gain everything. And that will happen.

We must thus be confident of the Iranian people’s victory and freedom.

The night of despotism and oppression shall no longer endure.

God bless you all.