Tom Ridge, first U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security addressed an online global conference on the conviction of Iran’s diplomat-terrorist Assadollah Assadi by a Belgian court for attempting to bomb the 2018 Free Iran gathering in Paris.
On February 4, 2021, simultaneous with the court ruling against the Iranian regime’s diplomat-terrorist, Assadollah Assadi, and his accomplices in Antwerp, Belgium, a global online conference was held, where Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, the President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), and dozens of prominent figures from various European countries, the United States and Canada, joined thousands of Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK/PMOI) members based in Ashraf-3 (Albania) as well as the supporters of the Iranian Resistance worldwide.
The Belgian court rejected Assadollah Assadi’s claim of diplomatic immunity and sentenced him to 20 years in prison. The three intelligence agents, Nasimeh Naami, Mehrdad Arefani, and Amir Saadouni, were sentenced to 18, 17, and 15 years in prison, respectively. Their Belgian citizenships was also revoked.
Tom Ridge, first U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security
I’m very grateful for the opportunity to share my thoughts with you and what I consider to be a fairly historic day. And in thinking about the significance of this day, I was reminded of a passage from a Shakespearean play, which is often used by others in a variety of different forms. But Shakespeare wrote, The truth will out.
The world owes a debt of gratitude to the Belgian people, the Belgian State Security Service in the Belgian judicial system, they did not turn away from seeking the truth. They accepted the responsibility to find the truth, to gather information behind a planned bombing of a public event in the outskirts of Paris in July 2019.
And to identify those responsible for even planning such a reprehensible act, Iranian diplomat, Assadollah Assadi, worked with three accomplices in an effort to achieve the objective set by the leaders of Iran, particularly the Ministry of intelligence Security Affairs, the objective simply being the bombing of an event hosted by the National Council of resistance in Iran, and attended by literally 1000s of individuals, including diplomats from multiple countries from around the world. The world should ask why, and then the truth will out. The NCRI is an immediate threat to the repressive Iranian regime.
It is the largest best organized and most popular democratic alternative to the regime. And over the years, its leaders and its advocacy, and their advocacy for a peaceful, tolerant, democratic non nuclear Iran has attracted greater and greater internal support within the people of Iran, and greater international support. And that was evidenced by the incredible number of political representatives from countries around the world attending that event, all of whom were potential targets of the Iranian conceived and supported terrorist plot.
Regime’s fear of a democratic alternative, attracting even greater and greater domestic and international port was and still remains so intense. It directed one of its diplomats to oversee this plot, collaborate with the accomplices, act as a courier for the explosives and coordinate the activity with the Iranian government. The truth will out.
The planned bombing was a state sponsored event. It is time for all freedom loving nations to take notice not only this event, but the words of President Bush in his State of the Union address as far back as 2002. When he condemned the Iranian regime for its aggressive pursuit of weapons of mass destruction. He described the leadership of the regime as, and I quote, an unelected few seeking to repress the Iranian people’s hopes for freedom.
And the NCRI certainly reflects those hopes, and has grown stronger and stronger every year. And for the past 20 years, the regimes effort to suppress the truth and eliminate any efforts to bring democracy and freedom to Iran has been brutally, but unsuccessfully sustained regime is killed dissidents.
It is not killed their quest for freedom. In light of the findings of the Belgian court, the world particularly our allies, must also remind themselves that Iran has continued to subsidize terror in the Middle East, support regional proxies in Syria and Iraq, imprison or murder, democratic dissidents, advanced its ballistic missile technology and accelerate its plutonium enrichment.
The planned bombing was a state sponsored operation by a terrorist state that continues to operate with arrogance with impunity, with disdain for human race and common decency, basic norms with civil society, European Union, the United States, nations around the world must applaud the courage and the diligence of the Belgian government, its judicial system and their citizens and loudly resoundingly condemn the action of the Iranian government.
But rhetorical condemnation without further action, will be of little impact on this rogue regime, which heretofore has been totally unwilling to change its behavior. countries whose citizens were in harm’s way, in the July event should consider downgrading, seriously, considering downgrading diplomatic relationships with Iran, the operation of the Ministry of intelligence and security affairs, that whole shop should be labeled a foreign terrorist organization.
This way to hold them accountable worldwide. And we need to hold the foreign minister accountable. in some fashion. I’ll let the diplomats figure that one out for his use of the diplomatic pouch, the diplomatic corps, the embassies in the missions as hubs for their terrorist activity. And there’s one final action that countries who have repudiated and condemned the Iranian government for not only this terrorist act, but it’s terror and repression over previous decades, that I think would be the most powerful and the most meaningful of all. These countries and their leaders should align themselves with the hopes of the Iranian people for freedom.
I would call on them to recognize publicly the National Council for resistance in Iran as the alternative to the existing regime. That is the ultimate. It’s the ultimate condemnation of their action. in that fashion, the truth will out. Again, I thank you for the opportunity to share with you my thoughts on this very important day.
