The recent national elections in Iran have raised important issues about how foreign powers should view the case of Iran. Many international media outlets have repeated the story that the Iranian regime has sold them on; that Iran is moving towards moderation, and these “elections” are proof of that.
However, anyone with even a rudimentary understanding of Iranian politics would know that any reformists contesting the elections are reformists in name only. Their personal views and political records demonstrate steadfast allegiance to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the vicious policies of the Islamic Republic.
One such “reformist” leader is former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Rafsanjani presided over the worst period of Iran’s foreign terrorist activities. He helped in the realization of the fatwa that led to the execution of approximately 30,000 political prisoners in 1988, the overwhelming majority of who were activists of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI or MEK). He represents what is wrong with the regime, and how the ayatollahs deal with dissent and alternative views. What he does not represent is moderation or any move towards a workable model of democracy.
Many other candidates are the same. The list of their names has ironically been called the “list of hope”. These names include the former Intelligence Minister and Prosecutor General Ghorbanali Dorri Najafabadi, who oversaw the assassination of dozens of authors and intellectuals, and former Revolutionary Court Prosecutor Ali Razini, who supervised all executions of political prisoners and became globally infamous for issuing medieval sentences including the stoning of four military servicemen and the torture and execution of hundreds of dissident religious scholars.
With this cast of characters, the warnings of the MEK have come true that there is no alternative to the situation of repression, other than regime change.
It is hard to understand why international media and policymakers pay lip service to the regime and are trying so hard to believe the rebranding of the tyrant regime. The people who are part of the next Parliament are the same as the old one. Just because they hold power, does not make that power right. The MEK’s call for reform must be taken up by international activists if the people of Iran are to have any semblance of political and human rights.
It has been less than three years since the last attempt to reach out to the regime’s “moderates,” and the world has nothing to show for it. Hassan Rouhani was carried into the Iranian presidency in 2013 on promises to defend free expression. As time has passed it has become clear that the renowned “moderate” has taken no steps in the direction of fulfilling these promises, and the domestic situation has gotten worse, with rising rates of execution and more repression of writers and artists. It is inexplicable that Western countries would endorse such elections. There is another option, another group that can be supported – the MEK, who support a liberal and democratic Iran.
It is a heartening development that some foreign powers have recognized this and have offered support to Iran’s genuine reformists. Albania, for instance, has taken in MEK refugees who have been subject to several politically-motivated attacks while living in Iraq at camps Ashraf and Liberty under an agreement brokered by the US and the UN. Foreigners are now not allowed to visit these camps as the Iraqi government at the behest of Iran has imposed a total blockade on the camps. Such foreign support can exhaust the efforts of Tehran. However, the regime has tried its best to demonize these dissenting voices.
Albania, a candidate of EU membership, has taken the appropriate first step towards acknowledging a peaceful and legitimate alternative. The decision is morally and politically sound. We can only hope that more countries follow suit, so that the power of the mullahs in Tehran can be challenged and diminished.