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CHICAGO: Prominent European politicians on Tuesday urged their governments to more forcefully condemn the Iranian regime’s violent response to ongoing protests in the country and its crackdown on protesters’ rights.
At a Brussels Press Club meeting organized by the International Council for Justice, several former members of the European Parliament called for the closure of the Iranian embassy and the expulsion of diplomats, and demanded that all European countries “end their hypocrisy” and also close their embassies in Iran. .
Speakers at the event included: Alejo Vidal Quadras, President of the ISJ and former First Vice-President of the European Parliament; Struan Stevenson, Chairman of the ISJ Committee for the Protection of Political Freedoms in Iran and former Member of the European Parliament (1999-2014); Ingrid Bettencourt (Ingrid Betancourt) is a Colombian presidential candidate who was held hostage by guerrillas in her home country for more than six years.
Bettencourt, who also has French citizenship, said European governments should immediately recall their ambassadors in Iran, adding that embassies “must close” and the world needs to show “courage”.
She praised the ongoing demonstrations by protesters in Iran, which began on Sept. 16 last year and are mainly led by women. They began shortly after Mahsa Amini, 22, died in police custody after she was arrested for not covering her hair properly in accordance with the regime’s strict dress code.
The Tehran authorities responded with a brutal attempt to suppress the unrest. It is estimated that more than 500 civilians have been executed so far, many by public hanging from cranes, the spokesman said.
“This is the first revolution started by women … while women are fighting for their rights, men are being attacked and persecuted by the regime — everyone,” Bettencourt said.
“At this moment, these women are putting their lives at risk, and they’re doing it for all of us, all the women in the world… if we don’t do this, we won’t get any of the world’s Other questions.  …This is about humans, humans.
Bettencourt accused the Iranian regime of targeting its critics with terrorist attacks in an attempt to suppress their support for the protesters.
“If they had to … kill their young people, imagine what they did to their own country,” she said, before criticizing other countries for failing to act.
“We didn’t do anything. I’m angry at our government’s lack of action on what’s happening in Iran,” Betancourt added.
Late last year, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo was criticized by ISJ members for signing a prisoner exchange pact with the Iranian regime. Their protest, signed by 21 former European ministers and dignitaries, urged Belgian authorities not to include convicted terrorists in the treaty, particularly terrorist mastermind Assadollah Assadi, who was accused of involvement in the plot to carry out He was sentenced to 20 years in prison in Belgium in 2021 for a terrorist attack. Bombing a rally of Iran’s opposition group, the National Council of Iranian Resistance.
Quadras said many European countries had not been strong enough in condemning the Iranian regime’s violence against civilian protesters and called for an alternative government in the country that respects human and civil rights.
“It’s not a question of replacing one dictatorship with another,” he said. “The alternative must ensure the transition from dictatorship to democracy.”
Democracy was undermined in 1953, Quadras said, when Britain and the United States staged a coup that overthrew the democratically elected Iranian government. This, he said, led to the rise of tyranny in Iran, first by the former shah and later by the ayatollahs.
More than 500 people, including five professors, have been executed as a result of the current protests, Stevenson said. Still, he said, the regime had “failed” to end the protests. It also stepped up a disinformation campaign that falsely labeled the opposition group the People’s Mujahideen of Iran, also known as MEK, as “Islamist” and “Marxist,” he added.
MEK is a politically militant group in Iran that advocates the overthrow of the Islamic Republic and the appointment of Rajawi as the country’s new democratic leader.
“The West has been fooled,” Stevenson said. “But in the past 40 years, MEK is the first and only organization in Iran that has stood up to the authoritarian regime” and exposed its brutality.
As if to prove his point, in the question-and-answer session after the meeting, the first question came from an audience member who accused MEK leader Rajawi of being an Islamist. All speakers denounced the claims as “false propaganda” of typical misinformation spread by the Iranian regime in response to negative media coverage of its atrocities. Stevenson again said governments should close Iranian embassies on their soil and expel diplomats and staff.
“Those responsible for these atrocities must not go unpunished,” he said. “They must be held accountable for these crimes.
“If we remain silent, it will lead to more executions. But words alone will not prevent these executions – withdraw our ambassador from Iran, close their embassy, ​​and expel all aides to their regime from our soil and from Europe . Then we can think about restoring democracy.”
The meeting was broadcast live on Twitter. The speakers’ presentations are included in ISJ’s newly published 78-page report entitled “Iran’s Democratic Revolution,” which examines the current uprising from multiple political, human rights, strategic and international perspectives.
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