Free Iran 2025 Rally – Brussels

Remarks by Maryam Rajavi Honoring the 60th Founding Anniversary of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran

Fellow compatriots!
Sixty years have passed.
Sixty years since the day the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran was founded.
Fourteen years under the Shah’s dictatorship, and forty-six years under the religious dictatorship.
Sixty years, without a single day or even an hour of pause.
It may be hard to believe, but it is the absolute truth.
That is why today, the PMOI lights sixty shining flames—flames that can never be extinguished.
Yes, this is the generation of the hundreds of thousands, the generation of the countless, who proudly passed through the torture chambers, the firing squads, and the gallows—from the first martyr, Ahmad Rezaii, to the most recent martyrs, Behrouz Ehsani and Mehdi Hassani, whose 40th day of martyrdom was marked yesterday.

And today, the valiant political prisoner, Mehran Bahramian, the brave son of the people of Semirom, has joined the proud caravan of our people’s martyrs. Glory to the martyrs!

Honoring the 60th year for, as Massoud (Rajavi) put it, loyalty to the pledge and boundless sacrifice in the struggle for the freedom of the Iranian people against the gravest conspiracies.
For the union of politics with honor,
for breaking the deadlock of the times through Mohammad Hanifnejad, the founder,
for rising up against fundamentalist, reactionary Islam,
and for rising up against the distortion and perversion of the message of Mohammad, the Beloved of God, and Jesus Christ, the Spirit of God.

The Key to the PMOI’s Endurance

In this way, the Mojahedin cried out to the prison cells, the torture racks, the gallows, and the bullets: “Take us!”—but they endured, and they prevailed.
The Shah fell, and the mullahs will fall as well.
But throughout these sixty years, the PMOI rose time and again from its ashes, and endured—especially in the face of baseless labels and boundless demonization.
And today, the PMOI, within the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), has presented the only democratic and independent alternative, carrying forward the 120-year struggle of the Iranian people for freedom.

The Great Deception of the Mullahs

Here with us today are Vice President Mike Pence, Prof. Alejo Vidal-Quadras, Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt, the Hon. John Bercow the Hon. Patrick Kennedy, and other distinguished figures.
Three years ago, Vice President Pence traveled 5,000 miles from Indiana to Albania to meet the PMOI at Ashraf 3. I want to recall some of his words.
Before all the wars and bloodshed in the region, and even before the 2022 uprising in Iran, he said:
“One of the biggest lies the ruling regime sold to the wider world is that there is no alternative to the status quo. But you all know there is an alternative, well-organized, fully prepared, perfectly qualified.
“The regime in Tehran wants to trick the world into believing that the Iranian protesters want to return to the dictatorship of the Shah as well. But we are not confused by their lies.”
Yes, if the democratic alternative had been recognized at that time, the world would have rid itself of this religious fascism much sooner. There would have been no need for the wars and crises that followed.
And if on August 19, 1953, many years ago, there had not been the dark coup against Dr. Mossadegh and if the Shah had not been restored to the throne, Khomeini would never have come to power, and the destiny of Iran and the region would have been entirely different.

The Immediate Tasks of a Six-Month Interim Government after the Overthrow of the Mullahs’ Regime
Regarding the democratic alternative, let me recall that after the establishment of the National Council of Resistance in Tehran, on Massoud’s initiative, the NCRI, in its first session in February–March 1982 in Paris, defined specific duties for a six-month interim government.
Its primary task, of course, is to hold free elections, a constituent and national legislative assembly. Elections must be held by all the people of Iran, where the people of Iran will cast their vote through a universal, direct, equal, and secret process.

The ten immediate tasks, published at that time, are as follows:
1. Freedom for all political prisoners.
2. Disarming and dissolving all reactionary institutions and repressive and censorship bodies—from the Revolutionary Guards and Basij to the Revolutionary Courts.
Yes, all of these must be dismantled: from the Sharia courts, ideological political bureaus, the so-called Cultural Revolution Council in educational institutions, to the repressive agencies that suppress the farmers and workers.
3. Restoration of rights to all those who have been unjustly purged, especially government employees, teachers, workers, and retirees.
4. Invitation to all patriotic citizens and specialists, both inside the country and abroad to return to work.
5. Abolition of all oppression, coercion, and discrimination against women, including the right to choose their occupation, attire, and complete gender equality in social, political, cultural, and economic rights.
6. Autonomy for Iranian Kurdistan within the framework of Iran’s territorial integrity.
7. Investigating the crimes of the Khomeini and Shah regimes in public trials, with juries, defense lawyers and international observers.
8. Guaranteeing the right to defense and the right to operate bar associations.
9. Ensuring the independence of universities and their administration under university councils.

10. Formally recognizing the individual and social rights of the people, the same rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
As you know, in April 2006, these tasks and commitments were further elevated into a Ten-Point Plan.

The PMOI Seeks to Transfer Sovereignty to the People of Iran

The value of the PMOI lies in the fact that, for sixty years, under the greatest pressures, it has preserved its political and financial independence.
It wants nothing for itself. It is not seeking power.
It is pursuing freedom and the transfer of sovereignty to the people of Iran, which the regime and our detractors say is the greatest “crime” of this Resistance!
Thirty-seven years ago, Khomeini issued a fatwa ordering the annihilation all PMOI members, those who stood firm in their ideals and principles.
Today, Khamenei has once again mobilized his courts to issue death sentences against the PMOI members.
Regarding the trial of 104 individuals, including myself, accused of rebellion and waging war against God, we say to the mullahs:
Hold your sham trials every day, not every two weeks!
Because the PMOI’s so-called “crimes,” their relentless struggle against the mullahs’ tyranny, are countless!

Its “crime” is this:
It said no—resolutely—to the Constitution of Velayat-e Faqih!
It exposed the selling of religion under the name of Islam!
It unmasked the falsehood behind the slogan of “liberating Jerusalem through Karbala”!
During Khomeini’s anti-patriotic war with Iraq, it raised the banner of peace and freedom!
It shattered Khomeini’s war machine!
It exposed the atomic bomb program relentlessly, preventing the ruling religious fascism from obtaining the nuclear bomb!
It set up a Liberation Army and created the Resistance Units!
It rose up against the mullahs’ patriarchal regime!
It raised the banner of complete gender equality!
It placed women in the most critical leadership positions!
Like the pioneering women who, for over three decades, have led the PMOI—my dear sisters Fahimeh Arvani, Shahrzad Sadr, Mahvash Sepehri, Beheshteh Shadrou, Mojgan Parsaii, Sediqeh Hosseini, Zohreh Akhiyani, and now Zahra Merrikhi, with all her qualifications.
These heroic women, together with the courageous women in the PMOI Central Council, have created a new role model for society: liberation for women and men alike, that is the key to the progress of tomorrow’s society!

Democratic Revolution! Democratic Republic!

In 1979, in his first speech after being released from the Shah’s prison, Massoud Rajavi declared: “We demand a Democratic Revolution!”
Today, we demand the same—nothing less!
A Democratic Revolution!
A Democratic Republic!
Democratic rights and freedoms for all!

The Only Way: The Third Option!

On behalf of the Iranian people and Resistance, I declare:
The answer to the Iranian crisis is the overthrow of the entire religious tyranny!
The people of Iran are more prepared than ever!
Iranian society is in a volatile state, and the only solution is the Third Option, neither appeasement nor war, but regime change by the people and their organized resistance!

Let me emphasize to the West:
Do not delay designating the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) a terrorist organization any longer!
Do not delay enforcing UN Security Council resolutions against the regime’s nuclear projects any longer!
Do not delay recognizing the right of the Resistance Units to resist and confront the IRGC any longer!
This decisiveness is in the interest of the Iranian people!
This decisiveness is an imperative for regional and global peace and security!
Giving more time to this regime will once again bring war, and that must never be allowed!

Forward to a Free Iran!

Fellow compatriots, Dear supporters of the Iranian Resistance!
The time for uprising and rebellion has arrived, and I say to you wherever you are:
If you look within yourselves, you will see a rebel for freedom, in the uprisings that are coming;
in the protests and rebellions of a people who have had enough, demanding water, electricity, and freedom!
Yes, uprising and overthrow are on the way!
I warn the mullahs: The waves of executions will not extinguish the volcano of the Iranian people’s revolt!
Beware: imprisonment and torture will no longer work.
Khamenei, beware: stoking war and destruction, or imposing economic suffering on the people of Iran will not save your decaying regime!
Yes, uprising and overthrow are on the way!
And to you, the vanguard generation, and you, women and youth, who pursue freedom, democracy, and equality, I say:
It is all is in your hands, and depends on your will!
You will ignite the uprising!
You will liberate Iran!
You will achieve victory and build the future! It can be done—and it must be done!
Thank you all very much.