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Iran Focus
 Brussels, Nov. 08 – Thousands of banner-waving Iranians rallied
outside the European Union headquarters in Brussels on Monday calling for
Tehran’s nuclear dossier to be hauled before the United Nations Security
Council for possible trade sanctions and the removal of the name of Iran’s
principal opposition Mojahedin-e Khalq (MeK) from the EU’s list of terrorist organisations.
Organisers estimated the crowd at 35,000 and the
rally was attended and addressed by dozens of European parliamentarians as
EU foreign ministers met in the EU headquarters to discuss ways of tackling
Tehran’s
nuclear menace.
“Since [Iranian President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad has come to power, the West can no longer
pretend that the Iranian regime is moderate and will change if appeased by
the EU. They are after the bomb; they are after Iraq;
and they want to stop the peace process in the Middle East”, said Hadi Esmaeili, an Iranian
exile who had travelled from Berlin to take part in the rally.
Since Ahmadinejad ascended to the presidency, Tehran’s nuclear negotiations with the European 3 –
France, Germany, and the
United Kingdom – have
stalled over Iran’s
refusal to suspend the nuclear fuel cycle, the precursor to obtaining an
atomic bomb. The hard-line President has also come under international
scrutiny for calling for the destruction of Israel and threatening neighbouring Arab nations that develop ties with the
Jewish state.
Masoud Zabeti, an
Anglo-Iranian lawyer working in London, said
that he had joined the gathering to speak out against “barbaric and
medieval” human rights abuses in Iran, whilst at the same time
demanding that the international community refer
the Islamic Republic’s nuclear file to the UN Security Council. “We also
want to protest against the injustice of the inclusion of Iran’s main
opposition, People’s Mojahedin, which has been
responsible for revealing the Iranian regime’s nuclear program and human
rights violations, in the terrorist list”, Zabeti
said.
“What we want is a comprehensive oil embargo on the regime”, said Omid, who
was in his late 20s. “Europe should stop
giving the regime lifelines and must end its pressures on the Iranian
opposition”.
In a satellite link to the rally, Maryam Rajavi, the President-elect of the National Council of
Resistance of Iran (NCRI), urged the West to end “two decades of appeasing”
Tehran’s
rulers. She said that the West should neither appease the regime nor
attempt a foreign military invasion; rather, it should rely on the Iranian
people and their Resistance to bring about democratic change in Iran.
Highlighting Ahmadinejad’s remarks, which
threatened instability in the Middle East,
Rajavi said, “Owing to deep crises and
fundamental weakness of their regime, the mullahs have in a pre-emptive move
declared war on the international community”.
"Western countries have condemned the pernicious remarks by the
mullahs' President. Long overdue, the reaction is in no way sufficient.
What is necessary is to take action. Western leaders keep silent on the
fundamental fact that Ahmadinejad's warmongering
is a direct consequence of their policy of appeasement”, the charismatic
opposition leader added.
“More than half of the British House of Commons and 122 Peers in the House
of Lords demand that the PMOI (MeK) be removed
from the list of terrorist organisations”,
British Labour Peer Lord Corbett of Castle Vale
said in an address to the demonstrators.
Above the protestors were several large balloons which carried the message,
“Expel mullahs from UN” and “Take PMOI off the [terrorist] list”.
The demonstration also included scenes of mock executions and stoning as
well a large truck with a model nuclear missile on its back.
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