“The terror label on the PMOI was meant to preserve the Iranian regime”

Speaking to a press conference at the European Parliament in Brussels on December 18, Maryam Rajavi denounced the British government’s role in designating the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI) in the EU’s terrorist list.

“The British government was also the driving force behind EU’s refusal to implement the December 2006 judgment of the Court of First Instance, which had annulled the PMOI’s terror listing,” Rajavi regretted. Full text of her speech to MEPs follows:

Allow me first of all to thank Mr. Stevenson and 33 EPP leaders for their statement, demanding the removal of the PMOI from the EU terror list.

On 14 December 2007, a Court in the United Kingdom reaffirmed its earlier judgment that the PMOI’s proscription was ‘perverse’ and refused the Home Secretary’s application for leave to appeal.

The Proscribed Organisation Appeal Commission said: the Home Secretary’s request has been out of context and that she “has no reasonable prospects of succeeding on an appeal”.

On 30 November, following a detailed consideration, the Court ruled that the People’s Mojahedin of Iran was not engaged in terrorism.

It also ordered the Home Secretary to lay a draft order before the Parliament to remove the PMOI from the list of proscribed organizations.

The same day, the secretary of the mullahs’ Supreme Security Council said in London that the UK government had assured him that the government would reject the court verdict.

On 12 December, the British Prime Minister carried out his government’s pledge to the mullahs’ regime, and said that the decision to proscribe the PMOI would stand.

Promising the mullahs’ regime to defy the court goes beyond appeasement.

I ask:

Mr. Prime Minister, is this not a breach of the rule of law? Should Europe’s century-long achievements be lost simply because of appeasing the mullahs?

Who would benefit from Britain becoming the main supporter of the mullahs’ regime, the godfather of terrorism and fundamentalism?

Why do you not inform the British people and members of parliament of the real reason behind proscribing the PMOI?

Do you not know the consequences of this policy?

Do you not know that some day the British government must answer the people of the world for setting the stage for World War Three by the mullahs’ regime?

Do not let history judge you as it did Neville Chamberlain

The British government was also the driving force behind EU’s refusal to implement the December 2006 judgment of the Court of First Instance, which had annulled the PMOI’s terror listing.

The PMOI has again challenged the Council in court for not implementing its verdict and for unlawfully re-listing the PMOI.

Now, however, following the court ruling in the UK, the EU has no more excuses.

The basis of the EU listing of the PMOI was the UK Home Secretary’s decision, which has now been set aside by POAC.

The EU should end its defiance of the Court and the unlawful maintaining of the terror tag on the PMOI at once.

The terror label on the PMOI was meant to preserve the Iranian regime and destroy the Iranian Resistance. This has now failed.

One should look at the streets of Tehran. Last week, thousands of students demonstrated against the regime, chanting “death to the dictator”.

The Resistance network in Iran has organized hundreds of anti-government protests last year.

In recent weeks, they distributed 9.2 million copies of the message by the leader of the Iranian Resistance, Massoud Rajavi.

The West should distance itself from the mullahs’ regime, which has executed nearly 300 people this year, many of them in public.

Look at the carnage caused by the mullahs in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon and Palestine.

I take the opportunity here to welcome President Sarkozy’s remarks yesterday, stressing the need for an independent state of Palestine before the end of 2008, and I warn that the main barrier to this is the mullahs’ regime.

– Members in the European and British Parliaments should hold European leaders to account for their ‘perverse’ policy.

– They should hold them to account for defying their own court, laws and the demands of their own people;

– They should call on European leaders to remedy the huge losses they have inflicted on the Iranian people and Resistance.

The Iranian Resistance is the key player in developments relating to Iran.

The recent US National Intelligence Estimate reaffirmed that the Resistance’s revelations, disrupted the mullahs’ nuclear weapons program and brought about a halt to part of it.

Two week ago, US officials, including the Vice President, the National Security Advisor, Deputy Secretary of State and many members of Congress acknowledged this fact.

Let it be clear, the mullahs’ nuclear weapons program is still continuing.

Obtaining nuclear weapons is a strategic objective for the mullahs and a guarantee for their existence. They will never abandon it.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The only solution to prevent a fundamentalist regime from obtaining nuclear arms and to rid the world of Islamic fundamentalism is the third option: regime change in Iran.

Only the Iranian Resistance is competent and capable of bringing about this change.

By blockading the Iranian opposition, the West has delayed this change, which is the desire of the Iranian people and a need for the world community.

The EU should recognize the Iranian Resistance.

It is time for the EU to contribute to democracy in Iran and global peace by imposing sanctions on the mullahs’ regime.

I am confident that the European Parliament can play a decisive role in this regard.