Reza Pahlavi on French Parliament TV Discusses Future of Iran

Ramin Parham, Iran Shahr Blog:

On Wednesday June 8, 2005, Reza Pahlavi was, "for the first time," the special guest of Catherine Boullay, anchor of a political roundtable on the French state-operated TV channel, La Chaine Parlementaire.

There, "Reza Pahlavi expressed his views on the future of Iran and his possible return." Other participants included high ranking French parliamentary members, an expert and the French veteran journalist Christian Malar, as presented below.

What follows is a summarized transcription translated into English. The debate was conducted in French. READ MORE

Partial Transcription:

The atomic weapon in the hands of the mullahs, America has already declared its readiness to go to war to prevent such eventuality. Meanwhile, the European attempt to defuse the crisis is dragging into an open-ended process of talks where the Iranian side, on the eve of its presidential elections, is showing fewer and fewer signs of cooperation. So, is Iran really the advanced post of tyranny as described by President Bush and a threat to the free world? To discuss this, Catherine Boullay, French journalist from the French Parliamentary TV Channel, moderated a roundtable discussion with:

Xavier de Roux, French Parliamlentary Member from the conservative UMP Party in power, and President of the French-Iranian Friendship Group; Jean Michel Boucheron, French Parliamentary Member from the opposition Socialist Party, and member of the Parliament’s Defense Commission; Philippe Folliot, French Parliamlentary Member from the center right UDF, and member of the Defense Commission of the parliament; Jean-Claude Lefort, French Parliamlentary Member from the opposition Communist Party, and member of the Foreign Affairs Commission; Denis Bauchard, researcher from the French International Relations Institute IFRI; Christian Malar, editorialist from the French State-operated TV France Television; Bijan Anquetil, Iranian-French film director who has recently ended a 3-year work in Iran on a documentary called the "Iran, waiting for tomorrow"; And His Majesty Reza Pahlavi, son of the deposed Shah of Iran and author of the Winds of Change where he presents his political strategy of civil disobedience and non-violence against the current regime in Iran.

The regime’s pursuit of nuclear weapons

Reacting to a speech made by Condoleeza Rice in Paris on February 8th, 2005, where the US Secretary of State had called on Iranians to "just do what they need to do and what everyone knows that they need to do" in order to get a clearance on the nuclear issue, Reza Pahlavi opened the discussion by saying that, since the events of September the 11th, the US Administration has come to understand "the distinction between the regime in Iran, on one hand, and the people of Iran on the other … thanks in part to the efforts of Iranian political activists inside and outside the country."

Reacting to the "advanced post of tyranny" statement by President Bush and analyzing Iran’s threat to the world, Denis Bauchard said that one has to keep in mind the long history of misunderstanding between Iran and the US which started with "the hostage taking event at the US embassy in Tehran by a group of so-called students." That event he said, "has left a deep scar in the mind of Americans." Currently, added the French expert, America’s reproach to Iran is based on two points: Iran’s pursuit of the atomic weapon and its support of terrorism, in particular in the Palestinian territories.

Jean Michel Boucheron, who has stated, in a recent article in the French daily Le Monde, that "Iran will, in any event, have the bomb", sees the nuclear debate as "obsolete". According to him, the real issue is not whether Iran will or will not have the bomb, "because they have both the willingness and the technical capacity to have it in any case", but whether we want to bring Iran into the "international concert of nations where the country can play its legitimate role."

Xavier de Roux, for his part, "fully subscribed to the words of Jean Michel Boucheron" and further added that the "French do not make a distinction between nations and their political regimes."

Jean Claude Lefort, French Communist MP, for his part criticized Dr. Rice and "the Americans who have made us used to their baseless assertions on WMD," for Lefort said, "the only such weapon they found in Iraq was Saddam himself."

Christian Malar, who has spent 3 years in Iran, brought the discussion to what he called "western naivety and responsibility." The Western world, with the US at the top, is responsible for this, said the veteran French journalist. "I remember, back in late 70s, when I talked to Jimmy Carter, the US President who had alined Valery Giscard d’Estaing on his position to drop the Shah and support Khomeini instead, I remember that Carter told me that he could make a deal with Khomeini because, he said, Khomeini was just like Carter himself, a man of God and a pious man!" He further added that his analysis of the Iran policy within the Bush administration is that the "Americans, stuck in Iraq and Afghanistan, are betting on a popular uprising in Iran in order to bring this regime down."

Philippe Folliot, MP and Defense Commissioner of the French Parliament, aligned himself with his MP colleagues on "Iran’s rights in the region" and brought the attention to the Iranian regime’s ballistic missiles capabilities, saying that, "the capacity to deliver the bomb is as important a matter as the bomb itself." Taking the discussion back to the distinction between the regime and Iran as a country, Folliot said that, "Iran existed before and will continue to exist after this regime." In any event, he said, "the question is not whether this regime will fall but when it will fall. In an interconnected world, the dam will, one day or another, cede. When and how it will cede is the only issue."

What does the regime intend to do with its bomb

Xavier de Roux, discarding the "prospect of a military confrontation", said that "what Iranians want today is peace and economic development." He further added that the real problem in the region is Palestine and Western countries "should stop accusing others in this region for the Palestinian problem," which, the French MP sees as the real issue in the current crisis. Denis Bauchard, in line with the analysis by Xavier de Roux, does not see the Americans in a position to confront Iran militarily, for several reasons he said. "First, Americans are stuck in Iraq. Second, the outcome of a military strike, due to Iran’s concealed underground nuclear installations, is highly uncertain; Third, there is the oil blackmail which the Iranians can exert at any time due to their position in the Persian Gulf and the in the oil market; a blackmail, which, on the other hand, limits also US abilities to impose economic sanctions on Iran." In a word, US options are very limited, and that’s why "they let us, Europeans, to do the job for them."

To the question, "how would you handle this nuclear issue, once in power" Reza Pahlavi responded by bringing the whole issue to the fundamental security question, saying, "today, the security, oil instability, and issues raised by terrorism cost the world an annual trillion dollars in economic terms. Besides, all this is happening over and above the head of an entire people which, muzzled, has no say in this matter. All this is going to change," said Pahlavi before adding, "in two weeks, you will see, an immense majority of the people will massively boycott the upcoming elections, thus showing to the entire world, in particular to you westerners, that this regime is no longer representative of the people of Iran, by denying this regime the legitimacy it is asking for." Pahlavi then broadened the issue by saying that "real security guarantees would not come unless Iran has a genuine democracy," thus, presenting democratic change in Iran as the only safe way out the nuclear and security crisis. "The question is not whether Iran has the right to nuclear technology or not, but whether Iran has a regime that truly represents its own people, a regime that is accountable to the people of Iran and acts responsibly" with regard to regional and international issues. Iran "has signed the non-proliferation treaty and is therefore bound to respect it," Pahlavi reminded the roundtable participants. "More than 76% of the people, he said, are anxious about the outcome of this nuclear crisis. They are anxious because of the very nature of this regime, and because the Revolutionary Guards have vested interests in pursuing such a path, anxious because they well know that the regime simply can not reached, due to its very nature, a positive conclusion to the crisis. The same elements, inside this regime, that are involved in terror and nuclear activities, are the main instrument of the regime for repressing the people at home." Regarding the EU-3 negotiations with Tehran, Lefort, objected to the "dual standards at work on the international arena. Referring to Israel and North Korea, he called for a "nuclear-free zone in the Middle East."

Going back to the issue of Palestine raised at several points by French MPs, Pahlavi reminded the audience that in Iran itself, the people’s slogan is "Leave Palestine aside and think about us!" Iran he said, "has always been a land that has welcomed endangered religious minorities; Iran, said Pahlavi, has never had any problem with Israel nor any religious problem of any sort. But today, every Head of State in the region would tell you in private that it is this regime that is the problem."

Denis Bauchard added that, US operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and US policy in general have paradoxically reinforced the regime in Tehran while, he said, the Iranian regime has shown moderation in Iraq by positively influencing the Shia community there. Malar objected to this point saying that, "nothing tells us that the Iraqi Shia community is following the Iranian [theocratic] model." Boucheron, for his part, sees the problem not as one emanating from "the nature of this or that regime" but from the overall "equilibrium of peace. Iran needs a major western partner. It is going to be either the Americans or us. This gives us the leverage to weight on Iran’s policy so it recognizes the state of Israel," Boucheron concluded.

Pahlavi, once again, brought the discussion to the its fundamentals, saying that there will be no happy outcome to the current crisis so long as there is no liberty and democracy in Iran, for, "the fundamental issue, he said, is the lack of democracy in Iran." "no time in their discussions with Iran, Western countries have taken into consideration the issue of liberties in Iran, at no time they have addressed the aspirations of the people of Iran."

Xavier de Roux objected to this point, saying that "only days ago, a delegation of European Ambassadors, including the French Ambassador, met with ayatollah Shahroudi, Head of the Islamic judiciary in Iran, to discuss the compatibility of the Islamic law, or Sharia’a, with freedom and Human Rights." Pahlavi objected to this by reminding his interlocutor of the catastrophic state of freedoms in Iran and the number of political prisoners and students in jail. For many reasons, the ongoing negotiations between the EU-3 and Iran are, in the words of Boucheron, "not going to achieve anything anytime soon because, he said, they are the objective itself and not just a means." Folliot, on the nuclear issue, talked of a possible "domino effect" once Iran, contrary to its international obligations, would have acquired its bomb.

What effects to expect from any economic boycott and the Iran Al-Qaeida suspected links

None of the actors at this point has any interest in sending Iran in front of the UN Security Council, said Xavier de Roux. China and Russia would certainly veto any economic sanction there, said Malar, pointing to the many business deals tying these countries to the Iranian regime. "Trust but verify, said an imminent US president. What means do we have to verify what the Iranians are saying," asked Malar. "The very nature of this regime requires it to maintain all the elements of instability in order to ensure its own power. This is why we are proposing an alternative to this regime based on democracy, secularism, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as the antithesis to a theocratic regime that is the contemporary example of what existed once in Europe and in the form of the Spanish inquisition … The West must invest, not in the regime, but in the people of Iran." The roundtaable then continued with exerpts from Bijan Anquetil's documentary on Iran entitled, "Iran, Waiting for Tomorrow."

Concluding remarks were made on the ineluctability of the dynamics of change in Iran.

An interesting peek into the variety of French positions on Iran and Reza Pahlavi's response.