British peer calls for international support for Iranian opposition PMOI (MEK)

                   

A leading British peer has said it is now time for the West to give its full backing to the Iranian Resistance as the only alternative to the theocratic regime in Tehran.

Lord Carlile of Berriew also praised Resistance leader Maryam Rajavi's ten point plan for the creation of a 'democratic, secular, diverse state' in Iran.

Writing in the online magazine Epolitix, he said there was now 'real concern' that the turmoil in Iraq may lead Western democracies to turn a blind eye to the abuses and terrorism being perpetrated or funded by Iran.

He wrote: "This is no time to truck or trade with these tyrants. The collapse of government in Iraq is in itself a part result of the adherence to Iran’s will of the outgoing Prime Minister Maliki.

"There is little disagreement about Iran's destructive meddling in neighbouring countries and its unfettered support for terrorism and Islamic fundamentalism in the region.

"However, Western policy towards Iran has for the past 30 years focused on accommodating the theocratic rulers in Tehran to rein in its expansionist policies. This is in stark contrast to Syria where the international community supports the moderate opposition."

The NCRI had been wrongly labelled a terrorist group for many years, and the West had demonised the PMOI (MEK) in the hope of appeasing Iran's mullahs in the nuclear negotiations, he said.

He added: "More than a decade later the failure of this policy is evident as terrorist extremist groups run amok in Iraq and Syria while Tehran pushes ahead with its clandestine nuclear weapons programme.

"Extreme Islamic fundamentalism and the barbarity that goes with that ideology has been enshrined into the Iranian regime's constitution and is the ideology of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps."

The recent French court ruling clearing the NCRI of any links to terrorism of illegal financial activity and confirming its legitimacy and legality will now hopefully hail a new era of support for the NCRI, Lord Carlile said.

He wrote: "In the past few years, I have been witness to a rapid growing momentum for Maryam Rajavi's vision for a future Iran.

"Our government should now support and cooperate with the moderate Iranian opposition, as they play their historic role to bring democracy and freedom to Iran, and to eliminate a major source source of savage fundamentalism in the name of religion, the theocratic regime in Iran."

Lord Carlile of Berriew CBE QC, is a Liberal Democrat member of the UK House of Lords and co-chair of the British Parliamentary Committee for Iran Freedom (BPCIF). He was the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation in the United Kingdom from 2001 to 2011.