BRITISH COMMITTEE FOR IRAN FREEDOM MEETING

London

Wednesday 16 July

17.30-18.30hrs.

NO TO THE CROWN – NO TO THE TURBAN

As a fragile ceasefire is maintained between Israel, America and Iran, the world holds its breath. Following the series of critical setbacks that have impacted on the mullahs’ regime in the past year, with the virtual collapse of their so-called ‘Axis of Resistance’, including Bashar al-Assad in Syria, Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon, there is an almost unprecedented opportunity for regime change. Even their long-time allies China and Russia seem unwilling to intervene. But true to form, every time there is the faintest hint of a collapse of the mullahs’ regime, up pops Reza Pahlavi, the son of the former Shah and self-styled ‘Crown Prince’ of Iran. I believe he was here on 30 June, where I am told the London office of a high price U.S. lobby firm arranged a meeting with a handful of MPs and peers?

Pahlavi’s calls for the Iranian people to rise up against the current theocratic regime, during the 12-day war, have spectacularly backfired. He seriously misread the situation, siding with Israel in his bid for the people of Iran to overthrow Khamenei. The truth is, his lack of support, his privileged background and the historical context of the Pahlavi family’s repressive rule, have all ensured that Reza Pahlavi can never be the leader of a democratic Iran. He is the ‘Clown Prince’ or the ‘Emperor with no clothes’, as he jets around the Western world making his claim to the Peacock Throne.

Since the 1979 revolution, which saw the overthrow of his father, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, the sentiment towards the Pahlavi family has been overwhelmingly negative. Most Iranians associate the Shah’s regime with oppression, human rights abuse, and Western imperialism, which has led to a deep-seated distrust of that style of monarchy as a form of governance. The Shah’s hated secret police – SAVAK – routinely tortured dissidents by whipping them with electric cables and tearing out their finger and toenails to obtain false confessions, before they were executed.

The Iranian people today suffer the same vicious brutality under the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and the thuggish Basij militia. That is why the contemporary political landscape in Iran is marked by a desire for genuine democratic reform and self-determination. Young Iranians will never rally behind a figure who represents the old regime and its failures. The legacy of this period still looms large in the collective memory of Iranians, who fought hard to overthrow a government they deemed tyrannical. For many, the idea of re-establishing the Shah is a non-starter. Instead, they seek leaders who understand their struggles and aspirations for a modern, secular, and democratic Iran.

Reza Pahlavi’s life of luxury, funded by the estimated $25 to $30 billion that his father the Shah looted, further alienates him from the Iranian people. Living in exile in a wealthy suburb of Washington D.C, Pahlavi symbolizes the very elitism that many Iranians resent. Placards declaring: “Down with the oppressor, be it the shah or the mullahs” and “No to the crown, no to the turban,” are appearing regularly on the regime’s bridges and buildings across Iran and are chanted by protestors in frequent demonstrations.

Incredibly, Pahlavi told a press conference in Paris on 23 June that he was in direct communication with the IRGC – the regime’s Gestapo – which he sees as necessary to maintain order after the overthrow of the mullahs. He said that he is establishing: “a formal channel for military, security, and police personnel to reach out directly to me, my team, and our expanding operation.” He claimed: “I know these officers, these soldiers, these brave men exist because they are reaching out to me and telling me they want to be part of this national salvation.”

Describing members of the IRGC and Basij as “brave men”, will have outraged the tens of thousands of families of those who have been arrested, tortured and murdered by the mullahs’ repressive forces. It is no wonder that the people of Iran reject both the current criminal theocracy and the past cruel monarchy.

 The Iranian people seek a leader who reflects their values, struggles, and aspirations for a truly democratic society. They have recognised Maryam Rajavi, president-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), as that leader. Mrs Rajavi’s ten-point plan for a future democratic secular republic in Iran, embracing freedom, justice, human rights, women’s rights, an end to the death penalty and an end to the nuclear threat, offers the  greatest chance for peace and prosperity in Iran and in the Middle East. Achieving this objective is not possible through foreign military intervention, nor through appeasement of the regime. Real change can only come about through the Iranian people and their organised resistance.