NCRI – Speaking about the “harsh realities” of life for women, children and young people in Iran during the presidency of Hassan Rouhani, Baroness Cox, together with “hundreds of parliamentarians and dignitaries,” pledged to support the Free Iran mass rally in Paris on July 9.
Calling the Iranian regime the “world’s leading executioner per capita,” there was, she said, in spite of the nuclear deal, a “deteriorating human rights situation in Iran.”
Baroness Cox, a cross-bench member of the United Kingdom’s House of Lords, quoted a UN report, from earlier this year, which said, “Iran’s regime must reform its laws that allow girls as young as nine to be executed for crimes, or forced into marriage with much older husbands.”
Citing other recent examples of human rights abuses under Rouhani – the public flogging of a young woman for a relationship with a man outside marriage and the 99 lashes meted out to the 35 young people at a graduation party – Baroness Cox said that she and her fellow parliamentarians had, “called on the British government to impose punitive sanctions and travel bans on those responsible for these blatant and systematic abuses in Iran.”
In spite of the seriousness of the situation in Iran, Baroness Cox drew attention to the courage of women in struggling against the Iranian regime. In particular, she highlighted the bravery of the thousand women of the opposition People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI or MEK) who have been at Camp Liberty in Iraq: A “better future is on the horizon,” she said.
The Free Iran gathering on July 9 in Paris will see members from legislatures across the globe, together with other decision-makers and civic leaders, in conference with tens of thousands of supporters of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI).