Iran opposition group calls for regime change in Paris march
Thousands of supporters of an exiled Iranian opposition group marched through Paris on Friday, calling for an end to Iran’s clerical regime 40 years after the revolution that toppled the country’s monarchy.
The Mujahedeen-e-Khalq were joined at the rally by an array of speakers, ranging from former and current French politicians to a former Algerian prime minister and a Syrian opposition figure.
Crowds waved posters of group leader Maryam Rajavi and founder Massoud Rajavi – not seen since 2003 in Iraq, where the group once had a camp and waged war against Iran before being disarmed by US troops.
The group is based outside Paris and has several thousand members in Albania, extracted in a UN-brokered effort from Iraq, while supporters are also scattered elsewhere in the West as part of the Iranian diaspora.
Security was tight during the rally and march and the group’s rally last year was the target of an alleged bomb plot, which was thwarted by police.
An Iranian diplomat is being held in Belgium, where police found bomb material in the car of a couple of Iranian origin.
“As long as we’re dealing with the main state sponsor of extremism, there is a concern. But that will never stop us,” Mujahedeen-e-Khalq spokesman Shahin Gobadi said.
The group is aligned with US President Donald Trump’s hard stance on Iran, and supports US sanctions on Iran.
One speaker at the rally, former French Senator JeanPierre Michel, said: “I’m not a fanatic of Mr Trump but I think that the United States is right about Iran.”
He also chastised European nations for what he described as a softer approach to Tehran.
Mr Michel, 80, is a long-time supporter of the Mujahedeen, which has drawn support from several US and European parliamentarians and former officials.
He praised the group for having a woman at its head who says she wants democracy in Iran, and he hoped one day to visit Tehran with Ms Rajavi. “It keeps me alive,” he said.
Meanwhile, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Friday his country could not trust Europe, a week after the EU launched a special trade mechanism to bypass US sanctions on Tehran.
“I’m not saying we shouldn’t have relations with them. This is about trust,” he said.
Britain, France and Germany last week launched the trade mechanism, which is called Instex, in an attempt to save the 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers.
It would allow Tehran to keep trading with EU companies in spite of US sanctions, renewed after Washington quit the accord last year.
Tehran has welcomed Instex cautiously and called it a “first step”, but US officials said the new entity would not have any impact on efforts to exert economic pressure on Iran.
Mr Khamenei also accused Europe of hypocrisy over human rights, criticising France’s treatment of Yellow Vest protesters in Paris.
“Anti-riot police attack protesters in Paris streets and blind them, then they have the audacity to make human rights requests of us,” he said.