Name: Maryam

Date of Birth: December 4, 1953

Place of Birth: Tehran, Iran

Marital Status: Married

Spouse: Massoud Rajavi

Date of Marriage: 1985

Children: Mostafa (Son – born in 1980),  Ashraf (Daughter – born in 1982)

Education: Degree in Metallurgy from Sharif University of Technology in Tehran

Current Profession: President-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)

Political Duties:

- Responsible for social section of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran from 1979-1981

- Candidate for parliamentary elections in 1980

- Co-Chair of the PMOI from 1985-1989

- Secretary General of the PMOI from 1989-1993

- President-elect of the NCRI

President-elect

In August 1993, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), the Iranian Resistance's parliament-in-exile, elected Maryam Rajavi as Iran's future president for the transitional period following the mullahs' overthrow.

Rajavi subsequently resigned from her other posts to focus on her new responsibility as NCRI’s President-elect.

In this capacity, she led the Resistance's campaign on the international stage, leading a worldwide effort to expose human rights violations in Iran, Tehran's export of terrorism and fundamentalism and its bid to acquire nuclear weapons. She also worked to inform the world community about the objectives of the Iranian Resistance on a variety of issues.

In her new position as the President-elect of the Iranian Resistance, Rajavi, as a Muslim woman, presented a formidable political, social, cultural and ideological challenge to the misogynist mullahs who invoked God to justify their actions. In Maryam Rajavi, the fundamentalist mullahs see a leader who represents everything they hold in contempt.

Propelling women forward

Under Maryam Rajavi's leadership, women assumed the most senior positions within the ranks of the Resistance. Women make up half the members of the NCRI while the PMOI's entire Leadership Council is comprised of women.

Rajavi's election gave Iran's oppressed society, especially women, new hopes for a brighter future. With beliefs covering the entire political spectrum, Iranians rallied to her support and she became a true symbol of national unity against the religious tyranny in Iran.

Rajavi has given extensive lectures on modern and democratic interpretations of Islam as opposed to the reactionary, fundamentalist interpretation of the religion. In her view, the most prominent distinction between these two diametrically opposed viewpoints centers around their outlook on women.

She believes that women are a determining force in the struggle to achieve democracy in Iran.

She has also brought attention to Iran's rich, but endangered, artistic and cultural heritage. Many famous performers, filmmakers, artists, painters, sculptors, poets and writers have expressed their support for her platform for a free and secular Iran.

Democratic Islam

In 1995, after an invitation from Norwegian political parties, Maryam Rajavi visited Oslo to meet with them. There, she warned about the threats posed by the octopus of theocracy and Islamic fundamentalism, the heart of which beats in Tehran, and added, “Fundamentalism is now the primary threat to global and regional peace.” She also said, “The mullahs ruling in Iran exploit the religious beliefs of more than a billion Muslims in the world and seek to expand their rule and export crises and tensions outside Iran’s borders.”

Rajavi presented “democratic Islam” as her alternative to fundamentalism.

As she points out in her book “Women, Islam, and Equality” (printed in Farsi), in her view, in accordance with Prophet Mohammad’s traditions and explicit Quranic texts, Islam considers human freedom and respect for freedom of choice as an inviolable principle. Islam advocates and defends freedom because it sees free votes and elections as the criteria of legitimacy.

Maryam Rajavi emphasizes that in contrast to the mullahs that falsely drape reactionary rules as God’s commands, the main tenet of Islam is popular sovereignty. It is the people that must pass their own laws.

She adds that Islam rejects forcible promotion of religion and has obligated its followers to respect and show tolerance and peacefully co-exist with believers of other faiths and religions.

According to Maryam Rajavi, the principle of human equality, regardless of gender, race, and ethnicity, forms one of the tenets of Islamic ideas. In contrast to the mullahs’ misogynist views, Islam also advocates gender equality.

Maryam Rajavi believes that Islam and Quran are endowed with a dynamic spirit. She says: The mullahs stress that the commands and rules of Islam must be enacted precisely as they were enacted 1400 years ago. However, Quranic verses prove that commands must not turn into fixed dogmas, but rather that they must give way to newer commands that correspond with the always changing circumstances in order to help pave the way for human progress and best respond to social needs.

Call for a Referendum under UN Auspices

Since 2003, regional developments (and particularly the US invasion of Iraq) set the stage for the intensification of the mullahs’ aggressive policies and export of fundamentalism and terrorism. During this period, Maryam Rajavi launched an intense campaign to challenge the fundamentalists ruling Iran and to promote the ideal of democracy in Iran.

In October 2003, she called for a referendum under UN auspices to change the regime in Iran. But, the Iranian regime responded to the call with more killings.

The Iran of Tomorrow

In June 2004, at a gathering attended by more than 20,000 Iranians near Paris, Maryam Rajavi announced that the Iranian Resistance will advocate a ban on the death penalty after Iran has been freed from the mullahs’ tyranny.

Maryam Rajavi announced the position even though supporters of the Iranian Resistance are still being executed by the clerical regime.

In April 2006, Mrs. Rajavi outlined the Iranian Resistance’s viewpoints for the future of Iran in a ten-point plan during a speech in the presence of Liberal and Socialist political groups at the European Council. These views include: Compliance with the people’s vote as the sole criterion of legitimacy, emphasis on a pluralistic system of governance, respect for all individual freedoms, a ban on the death penalty, separation of church and state, full equality between men and women, equal participation of women in political leadership, a modern judicial system which upholds the principle of innocence and right to defense and due process, respect for free enterprise, establishment of relations with all countries in the world, and commitment to a non-nuclear Iran.

These positions are all meant to serve the creation of a true and stable democracy in Iran, for which Maryam Rajavi has dedicated her life. She says, “This Resistance wants nothing but free elections for the people. Our goal is not to obtain power at any cost. Our goal is to secure freedom and democracy at any cost, even if that cost is to sacrifice our own existence.”

The Third Option

On December 2004, in a speech at the European Parliament, Maryam Rajavi proposed a third way and a clear prospect to resolve the Iranian crisis, a crisis that has profoundly worried the international community. She said:

“The mullahs in Tehran, along with those who stand to benefit from the status quo, have sought to inculcate the idea that any serious change would necessarily be contingent on a foreign war, which renders compromise [with the regime] as the only remaining option. But, I have come here today to say that there is a third option: Change by the Iranian people and the Iranian Resistance.

“Formulating the prospects on Iran between ‘either a conflict and military intervention or appeasement’ is nothing more than a political deception. With the removal of foreign obstacles, the Iranian people and Resistance would have the ability and inclination to bring about such change. This presents the only way for averting a foreign war. Offering concessions to the mullahs is not the alternative to a foreign conflict and will not discourage them from pursuing their malevolent ends.”

Religious Tolerance

Maryam Rajavi advocates tolerance among various religions and faiths. She consistently stresses promotion of secularism and recalls that on the basis of a tolerant interpretation of Islam, Islam rejects forcing religious beliefs on others, and considers the followers of all religions equal in the eyes of the law.

During her visits to various countries, she regularly visits churches and meets with Christian leaders.

To counter Ahmadinejad’s ominous statements about the denial of the horrendous massacres committed during the Holocaust, on November 25, 2008, during her first trip to Germany, Mrs. Rajavi visited the Holocaust Memorial in Berlin, and said:

“The experience of Holocaust must always grip our memories; It came out of the painful experience of appeasement towards fascism, the outcome of offering concessions to an inhumane power, and the result of trusting fascism’s deceptions and claims and ignoring its growing threats.

“This experience serves as a warning to the contemporary world that it must recognize the threat posed by the religious fascism ruling Iran.

“The German nation’s identity is not mirrored in Hitler just as the Iranian people’s identity cannot be seen through Khomeini, Khamenei and Ahmadinejad. The true spirit of the Iranian nation can be discerned through a resistance movement that has thus far dedicated 120,000 of its best and brightest for the cause of freedom.”

The beginning of the end for the regime

On June 20, 2009, in a major gathering in the Paris suburb of Villepinte, Mrs. Rajavi noted the recent anti-regime rallies in Tehran’s streets, and issued the following remarks with complete faith and conviction:

“The shattering of the deception of velayat-e faqih [principle of absolute clerical rule], the heightened war among wolves [among regime factions], the million-strong uprisings with the chants of ‘Death to dictator,’ and the tearing into pieces of the clerical regime’s worn-out robe, marks a point of no return that has caused the wheels of events to spin against the regime in its entirety and in favor of the democratic option. Thus, a new chapter has opened for resistance for freedom. This is the Iranian people’s great spring: The beginning of the end for the velayat-e faqih regime and the promise for the Iranian people’s democratic and victorious revolution.”