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THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC IS A "CENTRE FOR TERRORIST INDUSTRY":

REZA PAHLAVI

By Safa Haeri

PARIS, 10 Feb. (IPS) Iran, under the rule of the ayatollahs, has become a "convention centre for terrorist industry" and the Islamic Republic has created a "brotherhood of terror which is the greatest threat to international peace and security", according to Iranian Prince Reza Pahlavi.

"The strategic vacuum created by the Islamic Revolution in Iran drew the Soviets into Afghanistan the following year. To counter them, the West organized and trained the killers we now know as trhe Taleban. Similarly the Iran-Iraq War brought the West to Saddam’s support, fueling ambitions responsible for the current predicament. Iran itself became a convention center for terrorist industry, a meeting place for those who fund, organize, lend logistic and scientific support, plan events and coordinate strategies against the free world. Add up all of the cost. This is a problem that must be solved", he said during a press conference held on Tuesday at the Foreign Press Centre in Paris.

Speaking on Tuesday to a packed audience of journalists, Mr. Pahlavi reiterated that he had no other mission than to help Iranians organize a national and free referendum on the future regime of Iran and recommended "civil disobedience" to achieve this goal "peacefully", reminding that the method that started in India yielded "positive results" in South Africa, some Latin nations as well as in the former Soviet Union satellites like Poland, Czechoslovakia or Serbia.

"It is noteworthy that the idea of national referendum – that he suggested more than two years ago -- has become the leitmotiv of the majority of Iranians opposed to the regime, among them and foremost the students ", he gladly observed, calling on all Iranians of all walks and political ideologies opposed to the Islamic Republic to unite together in achieving this goal.

"We are all in the same boat and we have to row in unison. In the past 25 years, we never had such a golden chance. It is up to all of us to take it and the international community will also help", he went on.

In Paris to launch the French translation of his new book entitled "For Iran"*, a 248 pages of interview with Mr. Ahmad Ahraar, one of Iran’s most respected journalist and commentator reckoned also by all critics as one of the most serious analyst of Iranian affairs, Mr. Pahlavi also cautioned the Western world against sending "confusing signals" that Iranians translates as support for the present theocracy.

"If you are really for democracy, human rights and freedom in Iran, meeting and talking with the powerless president (Mohammad) Khatami about the so-called dialogue of civilizations is not the best way", he said, referring to the just concluded trip to Iran by Prince Charles of England and his talks with Mr. Khatami.

Expressing his "confidence" to see the Islamic Republic "crumble" as did the Soviet Union, he told his fellow Iranians: "We also would be free. Later if the free world lends this regime credibility, sooner if it supports the people in establishing a new order based on the sovereignty of the people and fundamental human rights", he added.

"You have to choose between the 90 per cent of the Iranians which reject this regime and the 10 per cent that cling to power for their own personal interests. But don’t forget that the day the Iranians free themselves from this regime, they would remember the governments that turned their back to them during the hard years they suffered", he said, increasing visibly the tone of his criticism against the European Union.

To those in the West, officials, analysts or journalists, who see in the present cacophony over the elections signs of democracy, the son of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi who was toppled by the Islamic Revolution in January 1979 said "it is critical not to mistake the so-called reforms and elections as "a cure" for the Islamic Republic.

"Even perfect elections are meaningless for a parliament that does not have the right to make laws. This is a theocracy where daring to think free and decide your future is seen as the arrogance of the infidel. The obligation of the faithful is full obedience to those who reveal the law of god, those around the Faqih, or the Supreme Leader. This is not election, but a masquerade of selection", he noted.

Asked about plans by Washington to also attack Iran, Prince Reza observed immediately that the situation in Iran was "totally different" from those that prevailed in neighbouring Afghanistan and Iraq. "In Iran, you have a sold administration with experienced cadre, a people that despite repressions expresses its demands, dissidents that despite crackdowns challenge the regime, a lively society that oppose the system that wants keep isolated from the world that the Iranians, particularly the younger generation, want to join", he said.

To a question about Tehran backing the Iraqi Shi’ite for an Islamic Republic similar to the one ruling Iran, Mr. Pahlavi observed that in the struggle between the "hauzeh" (religious circle) of Qom where religion "has been nationalized" and is crumbling fast in the one hand and that of Najaf in Iraq that has "recovered its freedom and increases its influence" the Islamic Republic would let "no one stone unturned to spread trouble".

However he expressed optimism as to the Middle East crisis, seeing peace coming back to the region after the resent Iranian theocracy changes into a free, secular, democratic regime based on a parliamentary system, "a nation then that would play the key role in maintaining stability for the whole of area".

To a question about the future regime he recommends for Iran, Prince Reza said that was not his concern. "What I’m interested and all my efforts are turned and concentrated is to achieve the referendum. The form of the future regime would be and must be decided by the people, no matter if they go for a constitutional monarchy or a republic, provided either form is based on parliamentary democracy, secularism and plurality, where all Iranians are equal, regardless of sex, ethnic or religion". This is my mission and don’t expect more than that from me”, he pointed out, adding with conviction that the future king of queen should reign, but not rule”, a veiled reference to the former Monarchy where his father had become an authoritarian Monarch.

ENDS REZA PAHLAVI PRESS CONF 10204

http://www.iran-press-service.com/articles_2004/Feb_04/reza_pahlavi_press_conf_10204.htm