Dirk CLaes, leader of the Flemish Christian Democrat Group in the Belgian Senate: Ladies and gentlemen, dear Mrs. Rajavi, I am speaking as president of the Belgian Committee of Parliamentarians for a Democratic Iran. Yesterday, President Obama ordered new sanctions into force on Iran, including its central bank, seeking to tighten a chokehold on Iran’s economy.
This is good news, and of course a step forward. But we cannot go on leaving the biggest mistake of the West uncorrected and pinning hopes on sanctions to bring about a change in Iran. The biggest mistake is that the only hope of the Iranian people for democracy, which is Ashraf and the PMOI are still in the U.S. blacklisted. Unless we correct this big mistake, no sanctions will ever bring about a change, because we are sending the wrong signals to the fascist rulers of Iran. We correct this mistake in Europe and this needs to be done in Washington too. We must send the right signal to the mullahs now. Let them know that the PMOI and the NCRI are recognized by the international community. Then we will see that this is the hardest blow on them, much harder than sanctions.
Now going back to the case of the Ashraf residents and plans to transfer them to Camp Liberty. The Iranian regime will not lose any opportunity to bring this solution to failure and to bring harm to the lives and dignity of Ashraf residents during their transfer to Liberty and during their stay in Liberty. It will use any means to impose pressure on the residents to force them to surrender. It will use all types of lies and deceptive measures to damage their dignity. We are certain that the regime will not spare anything to reach these goals. With this explanation I ask the U.N. ambassador, Martin Kobler, why he’s going so easy on the Iraqi government that is the puppet of the mullahs and implements their orders word by word? How does he trust Maliki on preserving the lives and dignity of Ashraf residents? I give Ashraf residents the right to be seriously worried. There is no trust in the Iraqi government.
You, Mr. Kobler, can do one thing. Make Maliki understand very well that following two massacres in Ashraf and after three years of psychological torture and besieging the residents, the least that he must do to gain trust is to lift all the restrictions he has current imposed on Ashraf residents in Liberty. Allow them freedom of movement. Allow them access to their lawyers and families, and station your armed police outside the camp. None of these of course will be welcomed by the mullahs, and implementing such measures will naturally be hard for Iraq. But the time has come for the international community to clearly observe the choice the Iraqi government will make. And you, Mr. Kobler, are the one you should make Maliki face the decision and make the choice.
I believe, Mrs. Rajavi and the leadership of Ashraf have been extremely cooperative and have made many concessions. The UN and USA must be thankful to the people of Ashraf. They are not only refugees, they are the best children of Iran. They are the best hopes of the Iranian people. We all as elected politicians have to act as the conscience of our people in Europe. We must call on our governments, including my own government here in Belgium, to accept these refugees, especially the critically ill and wounded. This is the least we can do. I would like to tell our brothers and sisters in Ashraf that we will keep fighting for your rights and we will fight for a free Iran. And we hope and believe we will have Mrs. Rajavi and a free and democratic Tehran in near future. Thank you.