Ripe Social Conditions
In the first of seven parts of his message, Mr. Rajavi noted the rising wave of spontaneous or guided public protests and the most extensive boycott of the recent election sham and said: The public hangings and amputations, throwing off heights (used as a form of execution), the serial security plans for social crackdown, the systematic suppression of women and youths, etc. are this regime’s response to a massive social insurgence.
For this reason, on September 29, 2007, the Revolutionary Guards’ new commander, Jaafari declared, “Based on the views of the leader of the Islamic Republic, the IRGC’s strategy will change. Namely, the main mission of the IRGCpresently is to confront domestic threats. In case of a foreign military threat, theIRGC would assist the Army.”
He said the IRGC was capable of confronting any ’missile’ or ’intelligence’ force, and described the 33-day war in Lebanon as ’an example of strategic confrontation with the enemy.’
On November 7, he declared, “U.S. military strike against the Islamic Republic is possible, but domestic threats are more dangerous than any other threat to the country.”
Meanwhile, the budget allocated for security has been increased twenty folds. On August 16, 2007, Mohammad Sha’eri, a deputy minister in the Interior Ministry, acknowledged: “Last year, these credits amounted to 7,000 billion Rials ($800 million) whereas now they amount to 140,000 billion Rials ($16 billion).”
On August 13, 2007, the Minister of Welfare and Social Security stated that 9.2 million Iranians live under the poverty line and 2 million live under the absolute poverty line (i.e. with an income of less than $1 per day). The price of gasoline has increased more than ten folds, and the price of housing has raised seven folds in some parts of Tehran.
On December 21, 2007, Rafsanjani said ’inflation and high prices’ are ’a very serious issue’.
The Phase of Disintegration
In another part, Mr. Rajavi said: In the recent elections, it became more evident that the regime is faltering apart, going through a phase of disintegration and defections. This is characteristic of the final stage of overthrowing this anachronistic regime. The mullahs’ supreme leader imposed his absolute authority on all three branches and the power structure became homogenous in its entirety. The recent elections, therefore, should be considered a turning point in two respects: its nationwide boycott by the people as well as the political ’surgery’ carried out within the regime.
In this election, Khamenei completed the plan he had started in 2005 by appointing Ahmadinejad as his regime’s president. Such an internal power balance has been unprecedented even under Khomeini, himself. Today we face a regime that stands on a ’single leg’ and is totally disabled.
Of course, the main objective in this election was not to purge the so-called ’reformist’ factions; this was a task already accomplished in the March 2004 Majlis elections and the subsequent empowerment of Ahmadinejad (in the 2005 presidential elections). The objective, however, was to pave the way and provide all the necessary domestic and international prerequisites for acquiring the nuclear bomb. The aim was to contain and close up the gaps within the pro-Khamenei so-called ’fundamentalist’ front and get ready for the looming attacks, counterattacks and crises.
On January 6, two months prior to the elections, Khamenei warned: “Those people who tend to be submissive, showing weakness before the (super) powers and those who tend to be passive in the face of international commotions, should not be allowed to the parliament.”
Immediately afterwards, Ahmadinejad declared that the outcome of the elections would safeguard ’the right to enjoy full nuclear energy capacity’.
Citing eyewitness reports from 25,000 polling stations across the country, Mr. Rajavi said the election’s outcome indicated extraordinary rigging measures and fraud on the part of the regime and the most wide-scale boycott on the part of the Iranian people.
All those in charge of this election were agents of the Ministry of Intelligence or the Guards Corps. Nevertheless, official figures indicate that despite astronomical fraud the regime obtained only 5 to 12 percent of votes in Tehran and seven other major cities -- with populations of over 1 million people -- for the first rank of candidates allowed to the Majlis.
On February 7, 2008, the Guards Corps commander said: “Fundamentalism has been revived after 25-26 years and put at the helms of two elected powers (i.e. the parliament and the government)… If (the paramilitary) Bassij (force) wants to have any activity in the elections, which is feasible with the permission of the leadership, it should safeguard, complete and expand the movement it has created… We should endeavor to expand our revolution to the world… We should get prepared for a more difficult future when we will expand the revolution. All past efforts to destroy, halt or divert the revolution are over… Our revolution has now become universal.’
In a word, like Ahmadinejad’s cabinet, the parliament was turned into an assembly of Khamenei’s disciples, to remove all obstacles and enable the regime to forge ahead “without gear or brake” in its nuclear efforts, terrorism and suppression.
Mr. Rajavi applauded the European Union in declaring that “the people of Iran deserve a democratic and fair election” and that “the election was neither fair nor free’. He said: “Our dispute with the Velayat-e Faqih regime is solely over our people’s suffrage and sovereignty and their right to a democratic election where everyone can cast an equal, direct and secret vote under the auspices of international organizations. So, the terrorist designation of the PMOI is a cause for shame. Which are we to believe? The lack of legitimacy of the regime’s elections or the terrorist designation of the PMOI for defending free elections and the Iranian people’s right to sovereignty?”
The Alternative
The leader of the Iranian Resistance said in another part of his message: The mullahs’ regime slandered and smeared the PMOI and the Iranian Resistance at least 9,876 times over the past year in its radio and television, press, news agencies and affiliated websites. The actual figure is higher since not all of the regime’s media were monitored. The articles and books distributed by the mullahs’ embassies and agents in foreign languages have not been included in this figure, either.
To find a complete sense of this hysteric antagonism, one should also take into account other measures like purchase of programs from Arab and western TV channels (for anti-PMOI broadcasts), paying unprincipled reporters and giving them receptions in Tehran to write articles against the PMOI, sending agents to ICRC offices, organizing meetings in Arab and western countries to misinform people about the PMOI, filing serial complaints against the PMOI in France, Iraq and Germany, attempting to manipulate Iraq’s judiciary to examine the alleged slaughter of Shiites and Kurds, etc.
The motive behind such an extensive, wicked misinformation crusade is a boundless fear from a dedicated resistance movement that holds the monster’s life bottle; a movement that has not been defeated despite all the forces and resources assigned to eliminate it.
In November 2007, Mike Gibbs, chairman of the British Foreign Relations Committee in the House of Commons, said upon return from Iran: “My colleagues and I were shocked by the number of times Iranian officials frenetically wanted to talk about what they called terrorist PMOI organization.” He asked the British deputy Foreign Secretary on November 28, 2007: “Why PMOI is so important to the Iranian regime?”
Crushing Blows to the Nuclear Projects
The Iranian Resistance leader noted the US National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) in another part of his message and underlined the impact of the clerical regime’s concealment and deception on this report. He said: The contradictions contained in this estimate were obvious in the first glance especially in a year when all events are overshadowed by the (U.S. presidential) elections. In the outset, we said: “Very few people believe that the Iranian regime has actually repented and abandoned its deception and concealment in acquiring nuclear weapon.”
Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, the President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, called on the NCRI Investigations and Research Committee, the PMOISocial Section and other sources of the Iranian Resistance inside the country to prevent the ruling religious fascism from continuing its deception in its efforts to obtain the Atomic bomb.
Soon afterwards, the Iranian Resistance revealed the mullahs’ big concealment and inflicted a crushing blow to their nuclear plans.
On February 20, 2008, in Brussels, the Iranian Resistance divulged the mullahs’ ’Command and Control Center for Production of Atomic Bomb and Nuclear Warheads.’
Tehran’s prime objective was to prevent the UN Security Council’s adoption of yet another resolution. From December 4, 2007, when the NIE was made public, until March 3, 2008, when the UNSC resolution was passed, it took only three months to defeat the clerical regime’s biggest intelligence ploy and political maneuver. The regime deployed all its financial, economic, political, regional and international capacity to evade a new resolution. Accordingly, one should realize that the impact of UNSC Resolution 1803 goes far beyond the articles contained in it. It would have been most preferable for the regime if it could avoid it.
Strategic Confrontation in Iraq: Iranian Resistance vs. Tehran regime
In another part, Mr. Rajavi said: Iraq is the scene of a strategic confrontation between the Tehran regime and the Iranian Resistance. Without warmongering, crisis-making and export of terrorism and fundamentalism, the mullahs’ religious fascism has no place in Iran.
The Iranian regime has set up its frontline in Baghdad and openly claims that Lebanon and Palestine constitute the ’strategic depth’ of their rule. The Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) and the Hezbollah of Lebanon are the regime’s arms established upon Khomeini’s order.
If the mullahs’ Velayat-e Faqih regime decides, one day, to abandon its export of fundamentalism and terrorism to other countries and limit itself to the borders of Iran, it would lose its dynamism and would collapse from within. It is for this reason that peace in the Middle East and democracy in Iraq will hang the noose around the mullahs’ neck. That is why on August 28, 2007, Ahmadinejad said the regime’s strategy in Iraq and the Middle East is to ’fill the huge power vacuum’ and claimed that the United States’ ’power curve’ in Iraq is approaching the ’zero line’.
The Iranian regime is seeking to oust the U.S. from the Middle East and this is why it is in so much haste to acquire the nuclear bomb. This is while everyone knows it entered Iraq with all its agents and proxies under the U.S. cloak.
The enormous and unpaid for benefits the mullahs gained in Iraq have caused them a misunderstanding. The daily Kayhan, the mouthpiece of the mullahs’ supreme leader, wrote on March 7, 2007: “Today, thousands of Iranian specialists help in the reconstruction of Iraq which in the least has provided a $100billion virgin market for Iran for 10 years. But what have Americans gained in Iraq? And in future, are they able to retrieve even 5 percent of what they have spent in Iraq over a period of 20 to 30 years? We have many cards to play in the nuclear negotiations and we can use them to undermine international agreements against Iran. As for our influence in the region, Iran has created a strategic situation which joins the lands of Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine and Syria together. This is a major achievement and an enormous success.”
Naturally, however, the first positive impacts of the blacklisting of the Revolutionary Guards Corps and the terrorist Qods Force surfaced in Iraq. Those who had to understand did figure that it is most unlikely that the U.S. leaves any ’power vacuum’ for the Iranian regime.
On the other hand, Ahmadinejad’s visit to Iraq was a dismal failure so much that the regime was forced to claim that the PMOI had paid $100 dollars to every one who demonstrated in the streets against Ahmadinejad. Iraq’s democratic forces evaluated their people’s spontaneous and thunderous revolt against this visit as the most important development of the past five years in Iraq as regards the Iranian regime.
Today, the strategic motto of evicting the clerical regime from Iraq has turned into a popular demand, acting in favor of the (nationalist and democratic) Iraqi alternative and against the (fundamentalist) alternative offered for Iraq by Iran’s ruling mullahs.
As for the PMOI’s presence in Iraq, the country’s Sunni and Shiite leaders have repeatedly attested to the legal and political status of the PMOI as it concerns the people of Iraq.
Today, one can say with full confidence that absolutely nobody wants to expel thePMOI from Iraq except the Iranian regime and its agents and proxies. All antagonism and enmity towards the PMOI in Iraq are provoked a regime that sees the PMOI as a bulwark stalling its belligerent efforts to dominate Iraq.
Ashraf
In conclusion, Mr. Rajavi said: Over the past year, Ashraf was the scene of the most intensive strategic confrontation between the Iranian Resistance and the religious fascism ruling Iran.
Throughout the year, the clerical regime resorted to every hysterical means to drive out the PMOI: intimidation, terror and explosions, food, fuel and medical blockade, water cut-offs and power shutdowns, manipulation of the judicial, legislative and executive powers in Iraq as well as the press, incessant psychological war, filthy misinformation campaigns, massacre of PMOI’s workers, bombing of PMOI’s friends, repeated appeals to the U.S., pressuring innocent families and relatives of Ashraf residents in Iran, and the list goes on.
Nonetheless, the PMOI and the Iranian Resistance remained steadfast and adhered to their vows to bring their people freedom and national sovereignty. They refused to succumb to the enemy’s hollow shows of force, ruthless conspiracies and shameless propaganda.
They relied on their fellow countrymen and supporters of the Resistance and built every thing anew, creating a new balance. The numerous developments of the past year promise further achievements in the decisive year we have ahead of us.
It is time to rise up. We are the ones to determine our future. Listen and you can hear the chains of religious tyranny torn asunder!
Iran will be free!
