Tuesday, 25th January 2011
Iran regime ‘like Nazi Germany’
Iran’s ruling regime is as brutal as Nazi Germany and will stop at nothing to acquire nuclear weapons, Scottish Conservative MEP Struan Stevenson told a gathering attended by top US officials today.
Speaking at the Iranian Opposition Conference in Brussels before an audience including key advisers to US Presidents Clinton, Bush and Obama, Mr Stevenson called for them to back the pro-democracy People’s Mojahedin of Iran (PMOI) in its ongoing struggle against the fundamentalist regime in Tehran.
Mr Stevenson called on the US to remove the PMOI from its list of terrorist organizations, following a similar move by the European Union in 2009, at te conclusions of a campaign led by Mr Stevenson, who is President of the European Parliament’s Friends of Free Iran Intergroup.
Among those attending the conference were John Bolton, US Ambassador to the UN under ex-President Bush and Iren Khan, until recently the head of Amnesty International.
In his keynote speech, Mr Stevenson told delegates:
“It had been my intention to compare the Islamic Republic of Iran to Nazi Germany, but in fact, in many ways it is worse. The mullahs have hanged 88 people so far this year. Ten were hanged on one day last week, but first they were brutally flogged before being dragged to the gallows.
“Ahmadinejad is a Holocaust denier and a hater of the Jews. He and Khamenei preside over the ruthless suppression of the citizens of Iran with hangings, torture, stoning to death, amputations and floggings.
The execution of children and even pregnant women is now commonplace.”
Mr Stevenson highlighted the plight of Nasrin Sotoudeh, a courageous human rights lawyer who has defended many of the innocent people who have been unjustly sentenced and executed by the regime. She was recently sentenced to 11 years imprisonment on trumped-up charges.
He added:
“In a pathetic attempt to appear dismissive, the criminal regime in Tehran describes the PMOI as a ‘terrorist grouplet’ as if they are a tiny and insignificant nuisance to be casually swatted like a mosquito.
“The truth is that they fear and loathe the PMOI in equal measure. They fear them because they are the only realistic opposition to their corrupt, fascist regime. The PMOI networks inside Iran were the ones who risked their lives to expose the regime’s aggressive nuclear plans to the West.
“The real hope of tens of millions of Iranians is the PMOI and that is why they are feared and loathed by Tehran. The mullahs believe they can handle the West, but they don’t know how to deal with the PMOI. They play games with the West, zig-zagging through a succession of talks, always playing for time, stretching out the West’s obsession with dialogue at any price, while in the secret bunkers and caves of Iran, manic activity continues to produce their first viable nuclear warhead.
“If we go on playing for time we will end up paying for time and we will pay dearly. A nuclear armed Iran will be a global threat.”
Mr Stevenson ended his speech by calling for the international community to support the PMOI as the key opposition to the fascist regime in Iran :
“We have to stop talking to the despots and start listening to the people. Back the Iranian masses in their efforts to overthrow this brutal and corrupt tyranny. Back the PMOI in their efforts to bring democracy, freedom, women’s rights and human rights to Iran. Back PMOI leader Mrs Maryam Rajavi in her campaign to clear Iran of nuclear weapons and free her people from the constant fear of torture and the death penalty.”
Notes to Editors
1. Key US officials attending the conference in Brussels today were:
• General James Jones (4 star) who was the National Security
Advisor to President Obama until November 2009. Before that he was the supreme commander of NATO for 3 years.
• Bill Richardson, Energy Secretary under President Clinton, US
ambassador in the UIN, Governor of New Mexico for two terms and a presidential candidate.
• Michael Mukasey, former Attorney General under President Bush
2007-2009
• John Bolton, US ambassador in the UN under President Bush
• Ambassador Dell L. Dailey, Assistant Secretary of State and
Coordinator for Counterterrorism 2007-2009.
• Iren Khan, former head of Amnesty International, 2001-2010
2. Struan Stevenson MEP is President of the President of the Friends
of Free Iran Intergroup.
