Iranian opposition leader criticizes emerging nuclear agreement

PARIS, May 5, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Maryam Rajavi, the president of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), addressed a conference at the French Senate on Tuesday, where she voiced her organization's criticism regarding the current Western policy toward Iran, including what she described as a policy of appeasement in the nuclear negotiations.

This view has been echoed by a number of Western policymakers. Members of the US Congress from both parties have undertaken efforts to guarantee congressional oversight on the negotiations in order to constrain what many view as overreach by the Obama administration in attempting to secure Iranian acceptance of the final deal that is due on June 30.

Rajavi said: "the addition of six or nine months to the break out time is not any solution for a regime that has been engaged for three decades in concealment and deception… The guaranteed solution is comprised of stringent implementation of six Security Council resolutions, full halt to enrichment and closure of all nuclear sites."

A number of other attendees at the conference, titled "Islamic Fundamentalism from Middle East to Europe: Challenges and Solutions" endorsed Rajavi's views as well. These included former Prime Minister of Algeria Sid-Ahmed Ghozali, and National Coalition of Syrian Revolution Political Board Secretary Nadhir Hakim.

The session was co-chaired by Senator Alain Néri, president of the French Committee for a Democratic Iran and Senator Bernard Fournier, member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

The NCRI comprises the People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) and a number of other resistance organizations, the membership of which is comprised of moderate Muslims as well as some non-Muslims.

Rajavi devoted much of her time at the conference to undercutting the current narratives pervading Western negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program. She linked this topic to the more general conversation about Islamic fundamentalism, noting that the pursuit of a nuclear weapon is an essentially component of the Iranian regime's religiously-motivated efforts to dominate the region.

"Acquiring the nuclear bomb, violation of human rights, export of fundamentalism, and terrorism are four pillars of Iran's ruling theocracy," Rajavi said. She added that the failure of the regime to improve on its human rights situations and to cease its intrusive actions in the broader Middle East are sure signs that it has not given up on its nuclear ambitions either.

Rajavi made similar remarks last week in testimony to a Foreign Affairs Subcommittee of the US House of Representatives. At that hearing, titled "ISIS: Defining the Enemy," Rajavi cautioned against some Western policymakers' tendency to embrace an "artificial dichotomy" between Shiite and Sunni extremism, as embodied by Iran and ISIS, respectively.                  

In the French Senate meeting Rajavi warned: "It is a dangerous mistake to assume that the Iranian regime and the West are natural allies in confronting the ISIS, because instead of confronting the ISIS, the mullahs are engaged in a dreadful cleansing of the Sunnis and seek to expand their hegemony over Iraq and Syria."

SOURCE Iran News Update

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