On the brink of the U.N. General Assembly’s annual session, an online international summit, entitled “Trans-Atlantic Summit on Iran Policy, Time to Hold the Iranian Regime Accountable,” was held September 18. The Summit brought together Iranians in various countries around the world from 10,000 locations. Mr. Tom McClintock a member of the U.S. House of Representatives joined to the summit.
Among the personalities who addressed the summit were 30 bipartisan U.S. lawmakers from the House and the Senate. Personalities including:
Senator Ted Cruz, Senator Roy Blunt, Senator Marco Rubio, Senator Bob Menendez, and dignitaries like Rudy Giuliani, former New York City mayor, General James Jones, National Security Advisor to President Obama (2009-2010), Newt Gingrich, 50th Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, Joseph Lieberman, former U.S. Senator, as well as a delegation of U.K. lawmakers, and Ambassador Giulio Terzi, former Foreign Minister of Italy.
Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, the keynote speaker of the summit
Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, the President-elect of the NCRI was the keynote speaker of the summit. She paid tribute to Navid Afkari, a rebellious national hero recently executed by the regime. Mrs. Rajavi said: “Faced with executions and massacres, the people of Iran urge the U.N. and the U.N. Security Council, in particular, to restore snapback sanctions stipulated in the six U.N. resolutions against the clerical regime in Iran.”
She continued,” Otherwise, Khamenei will continue to ravage the nation as his regime’s survival depends on murder and suppression. If Khamenei were to stop executions, he would lose control of the situation, and uprisings simmering in the depths of Iranian society would erupt and overthrow the mullahs’ religious fascism.”
At the summit, speakers demanded justice for over 30,000 MEK and other activists, political prisoners massacred in 1988. As a result they urged an end to the appeasement policy and requested those who ordered and carried out this great crime, who currently occupy high positions in the regime, to be brought to justice.
Tom McClintock, member of the U.S. House of Representatives joined to the summit. In his remarks, Mr. McClintock said, “Dozens of the Iranian regime’s so-called diplomats, as well as its agents, have been expelled or jailed by the European nations including Belgium, France, Albania, as well as the United States for their terror plots, particularly against the NCRI officials.”
Tom McClintock, member of the U.S. House of Representatives
Thirty-two years ago, the Iranian regime waged a brutal campaign of torturing and executing thousands of its citizens, who were in prison for merely exercising their fundamental human right, to express their own opinions. The Supreme Leader’s Death Committee sought out those whose political ideas were regarded as incompatible with the theocratic state and ensured that they would simply disappear. To date, the Iranian government continues to deny this atrocity and still frequently calls upon the Revolutionary Guard to wage violence against its own people, peacefully protesting and dissenting from the political regime.
Today’s Iran is full of impassioned citizens who are demanding liberty, justice and fundamental human rights. But if we fail to hold this rogue regime accountable, there’s no telling what it may decide to do next about those who long for such basic freedoms. Iran is one of the oldest and greatest civilizations in history.
But it’s been suppressed and plundered by a clique of theocratic thugs who comprise the illegitimate Iranian government. In past eras, the Iranian people have known the happiness and prosperity that freedom makes possible, and they are now seeking to reclaim it as their birthright. As the mullahs have become more repressive and extreme, the international resistance to them has become stronger and more resolute. The more the story of Iran is told, of its proud ancient heritage, of freedom and civilization, and of its current curse of despotism and terror, the more the world has rallied to your call.
In the House of Representatives, I have introduced a resolution condemning Iran’s terrorist acts and its nuclear aspirations and supporting the Iranian people’s desire for a democratic, secular and nonnuclear republic. That resolution now has gone to 221 cosponsors, a strong bipartisan majority of the chamber. That so many members of Congress have come together to condemn these terrorist acts and express in no uncertain terms our support for the Iranian people’s fight for freedom is a testament to the effectiveness and resiliency of the opposition movement.
I’ve written Secretary of State Pompeo to call attention to this resolution, and I am pleased the United States has taken such a strong stance of support of the Iranian people’s quest for freedom.
The United States has pulled out of the disastrous nuclear deal, that would have lifted sanctions against the world’s largest sponsor of global terrorism and allowed it to develop nuclear weapons with no meaningful oversight. Most recently, the United States has pressed the United Nations to extend an arms embargo against Iran. While this effort has faced resistance from certain nations, the U.S. remains capable of utilizing this Act provisions of the accord to restore all U.N. sanctions on Iran.
These efforts, God willing, will drastically curb Iran’s nuclear weapons development. However, there remain foreign leaders who have yet to commit to a stance as strong as that of the United States. That’s why it’s more important than ever to elevate the voices of the Iranian people who are experiencing every day the consequences of regime committed to foreign and domestic chaos and terror.
It is becoming increasingly evident that Iran’s rulers are beginning to fear the resistance. During the massive opposition protests in late 2018, the authorities shut down the Internet for more than a week to suppress information about protests and related state violence. When silencing protesters wasn’t enough for them, they killed those protesters in the streets. Recently, the regime rejected humanitarian assistance from the United States to share coronavirus treatments, and they sought to convince the world that sanctions were the cause of the coronavirus wave sweeping the country.
This despite the fact that the regime has spent over $16 billion since 2012 to fund its terror proxies abroad, while Iranian healthcare services have remained critically underfunded. Now of course the Iranian people are no strangers to the lies of its despotic rulers. This graffiti on a Tehran suburb that summed it all up…it said the Islamic republic of Iran is the real coronavirus. In fact, most prominent hashtags coming from Iran have been #kohmeini virus and #islamic republic virus.
Despite domestic and international acknowledgment of Iran’s oppression, the regime has remained intent on provocation and destabilization. They attacked foreign oil tankers in the Straight of Hormuz and continue using embassies as spots to plot terrorism. But after the killing of General Soleimani, who was responsible for an incalculable number of killings, the regime has been placed on notice that their acts of international terrorism will be countered by lethal force. Nonetheless, it remains clear that the regime is willing to crush its economy and kill its own people for the sake of nuclear aspirations and spreading terror, further jeopardizing the safety of the Iranian people and threatening the peace of the world.
My resolution has gained attention at a time when the Iranian opposition to the regime, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, is steadily gaining momentum and has thus become the main target of the regime’s global terrorists. Dozens of the Iranian regime’s so-called diplomats, as well as its agents, have been expelled or jailed by the European nations including Belgium, France, Albania, as well as the United States for their terror plots, particularly against the NCRI officials.
The Iranian resistance remains as a target of repression in Iran. Many of its supporters have recently been arrested in Iran for their affiliation with this movement. Last November, the regime murdered at least 1,500 innocent Iranians protesting its cover-ups, its mismanagement and its rank corruption.
While progress has been made, it’s clear that today’s regime is just as willing as Kohmeini’s to silence those who call attention to this brutality. True change will require treating the Iranian dictatorship as the international pariah that it is. And it will require providing every ounce of moral and material support that the Iranian opposition needs to rid their nation of this fascist Islamic dictatorship, to restore their proud heritage of Persia, and to restore their rightful place among the civilized nations of the world.
To each of you who every day is working toward this glorious end goes the thanks of all the mankind and the respect of every person of goodwill on this planet.
