An Open Letter to European Parliament’s Delegates

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An Open Letter to European Parliament’s Delegates
by Dr. Mansur Rastani
26-Oct-2011
 

European Parliament’s delegates are taking a trip to visit Iran next week. Since we believe that such trip will not produce any useful output for Iranians but to provide publicity and credit for IRI, a letter signed by a group of Iranians has been submitted to the EP delegates to reconsider and cancel their trip.

Note: European Parliament is in session in Strasbourg this week, so if anyone wants to give them a call or send them a fax, use the following Strasbourg phone and fax numbers.

Phone : +33 / (0)3 88 17 40 01

Fax : +33 / (0)3 88 17 51 84

***********************************************************

10, 25, 2011

European Parliament - the Iran Delegation,

Tarja Cronberg (Chair) ,

Kurt Lechner (member), Cornelia Ernst (member), Marietje Schaake (member),

Kathleen Van Brempt (member), and Barbara Lochbihler (substitute member)

Dear Madam Chair,

Recently we the undersigned have learned that European Parliament’s delegation under your chair is planning to pay a visit to Iran at the end of this month. The news came as shock to us and it is indescribable to let you know how distressing it was to our oppressed Iranians once they heard about it.

Ever since taking U.S. embassy staff hostage in 1979, the Islamist regime in Tehran has led an international spree of bombings, hijacking, and other terrorist attacks on American and Westerners. Over years Iran under IRI regime has become training camps for terrorists groups like Hezbollah, Al Qaeda operatives, and Iraqi insurgents. Iran's leaders have already funded the world's most powerful terrorist organizations across the globe.

Madam Chair, recently the U.N. nuclear agency announced it is "increasingly concerned" about a stream of intelligence suggesting that Iran continues to work secretly on developing a nuclear payload for a missile and other components of a nuclear weapons program. A nuclear-armed Iran would severely threaten the security and stability of a part of the world crucial to West’s interests and the health of the global economy. Despite different unilateral and joint sanctions imposed on various elements of the IRI infrastructure ranging from arm embargo to targeting Iran’s financial sector by UN, U.S., and EU, IRI has managed to find ways to bypass these sanctions without having to revise its political stance. For three decades IRI has managed to fool the world community by deception and hypocritical preaching and convince them that dialogue is the way to settle the problems, while the experience has shown absolute different results.

Madam Chair, more than two years after Iran’s disputed presidential election, IRI authorities continue to harass, arbitrarily detain, torture, imprison, and executes Iranians. UN recent special rapporteur’s report speaks of imposing death sentence on minors, practices that amount to torture, cruel or degrading treatment of political activists, journalists, students, artists, lawyers and environmentalists. It also addresses of denial of freedom of assembly, women’s rights, and the rights of religious and ethnic minorities. This regime has no respect for the lives of its own people; they govern through the force of tyranny and their ideological cult. Tens of young prisoners are transferred to death row every week. Anyone who stands for his human rights is doomed to be executed; the regime survival has been built upon bloodsheds.

Madam Chair, based on Article 6 and 11, of the EU Treaty, EP delegations shall maintain and develop Parliament’s international contacts. Accordingly, delegation activities shall contribute to promoting in third countries the values on which the European Union is founded, namely the principles of liberty, democracy, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, and the rule of law. How would you justify contributing such promotions while scheduling to meet the IRI parliamentary delegates many of whom are among commanders of the disreputable Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) that have been involved in horrifying human rights abuses in the 1980s, not to mention its involvement in the alleged terror-plot to assassinate Saudi Ambassador in the United States this month.

Madam Chair, 33 years of useless UN Security Council resolutions have overshadowed the violations of human rights by IRI and at the same time have provided the leisure and tranquility for the regime in Iran to commit its mass murder genocide against our young generation. Similarly the EP visit of IRI regime will not result in any goal but to provide credit and publicity for a criminal regime that has become illegitimate to its own people. No matter what tactical approach the EP delegates plan to implement in their visits to Iran to find the truth about the regime’s behavior against its people, you can be assured that the corrupt and deceptive IRI regime will execute methods to have a complete control of the team’s visit, resulting a futile trip but a handshake with criminals, as it has been the case with other groups of delegates, i.e., IAEA, Human Rights Watch, etc.

Madam Chair, rather than setting out a delegation team to Iran, which would give the regime a new blood to revitalize, it would serve Europe and the world community a great extent to put their hope on Iranian people. The people of Iran are struggling to secure their civil and political rights and advocate for greater public participation in the political process, as well as the respect of human rights, freedoms and the rule of law, which will only be achieved through a regime change toward securing a secular and democratic government based on the principle of human rights. It is time for the world community to stand unified in support of the people of Iran.

CC: President of European Parliament, Jerzy Buzek,

CC: Offices of European Parliament

Respectfully,

Undersigned:

1. Dr. Mansur Rastani, University Professor, USA

2. Dr. Siavash Abghari, Professor of Finance, USA

3. Firouzeh Ghaffarpour, Political and Human Rights activist, USA

4. Dr. Parviz Haddadizadeh “The New Iran” (TNI) Election commissioner, USA

5. Cina Dabestani, Constitutionalist Party of Iran, Chair of Washington DC Chapter

6. Dr. M Asan, Physician, Canada

7. Shabnam Assadollahi , Human Rights Defender, Canada

8. Pardis irani Graduate College Student Iran

9. Anti-Suppression Student Movement in Iran – Iran Branch

10. Saied Shemirani, Political Activist - United Persian Organization, USA

11. Sheri Alvandian, human rights activist, publisher, USA

12. Esmaeil Hoshyar, Author, and Comics Writer, Swiss

13. John S. Burke, Freelance Writer, USA

14. Soheila Nikpour, Human Rights and Refugee Rights activist, U.S.A.

15. Dr. A. Samadani, X-President, Global University, USA

16. Dr. Jahanshah Rashidian, Psychologist, Freelance Writer, Germany

17. Shoreh Irani, Aerobic Coach, Germany

18. Shahin Khordehpaz, Political Activist, USA

19. Dr. N Rochan, Physician, Canada

20. Dr. Gill Gillespie, Director, the Iran Information Project, UK

21. Walton K. Martin III, Director, the Iran Information Project, USA

22. 23. Nina Sadeghi, Student of Sociology, Italy

24. Soheil Parhizi, Artist and Human Rights Activist, Switzerland

25. Carol Savageau, Political Activist, USA

26. Aruo Arian, Entrepreneur, Canada

27. Roya Chelbea, Political & Social Activist, Austria

28. Shahriyar Gorugi, Political Activist & College Student, USA

29. Siamak Zand, Freelance Journalist, Canada

30. Shawn Bahrami, Business Owner, USA

31. Afshin Azizian Political activist and Human Rights Advocate, UK

32. Besabeh Bagheri, CEO Entrepreneur, USA

33. Massoud Nasseri, Business Owner & Political & Social Activist, USA

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Mansur Rastani <mansurrastani@gmail.com>
Date: Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 7:34 PM
Subject: An Open Letter to European Parliament's Delegation

To: Chair <tarja.cronberg@europarl.europa.eu>, Member <kathleen.vanbrempt@europarl.europa.eu>, Member <cornelia.ernst@europarl.europa.eu>, Member <kurt.lechner@europarl.europa.eu>, Member <marietje.schaake@europarl.europa.eu>, Substitute Member <barbara.lochbihler@europarl.europa.eu>

Cc: epathinai@europarl.europa.eu, epbarcelona@europarl.europa.eu, epberlin@europarl.europa.eu, epbratislava@europarl.europa.eu, epbrussel@europarl.europa.eu,epbucuresti@europarl.europa.eu, epbudapest@europarl.europa.eu, epdenhaag@europarl.europa.eu, epdublin@europarl.europa.eu, epedinburgh@europarl.europa.eu,ephelsinki@europarl.europa.eu, epkobenhavn@europarl.europa.eu, eplisboa@europarl.europa.eu, epljubljana@europarl.europa.eu, eplondon@europarl.europa.eu, epluxembourg@europarl.europa.eu, epmadrid@europarl.europa.eu, epmarseille@europarl.europa.eu, epmilano@europarl.europa.eu, epmuenchen@europarl.europa.eu, epnicosie@europarl.europa.eu,epparis@europarl.europa.eu, eppraha@europarl.europa.eu, epriga@europarl.europa.eu, eproma@europarl.europa.eu, epsofia@europarl.europa.eu, epstockholm@europarl.europa.eu,epstrasbourg@europarl.europa.eu, eptallinn@europarl.europa.eu, epvalletta@europarl.europa.eu, epvilnius@europarl.europa.eu, epwarszawa@europarl.europa.eu, epwashington@europarl.europa.eu, epwien@europarl.europa.eu, EP President <jerzy.buzek@europarl.europa.eu>

Mansur Rastani, PhD

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Dr. Mansur Rastani

The trip of The EP's Delegation to Iran has been cancelled.

by Dr. Mansur Rastani on

 

A Big congratulation to all who tried  is in order.

The trip of The EP's Delegation to Iran has
been cancelled.

(econews.ir)

//www.econews.ir/fa/news/150464/%D8%B3%D9%81%D8%B1_%D9%87%DB%8C%D8%A7%D8%AA_%D9%BE%D8%A7%D8%B1%D9%84%D9%85%D8%A7%D9%86_%D8%A7%D8%B1%D9%88%D9%BE%D8%A7_%D8%A8%D9%87_%D8%A7%DB%8C%D8%B1%D8%A7%D9%86_%D9%84%D8%BA%D9%88_%D8%B4%D8%AF

 

//tinyurl.com/44mgm6l

 

Since EP and EU still lobby IRI they made it
look like it was a visa problem, they couldn't announce it directly
that they support Iranian people. However, I've heard from different sources that EP and EU were under enormous pressure to cancel their trip to Iran.