Rudy Giuliani, former Mayor of New York City
Madame Maryam Rajavi, all of you who are assembled in the name of justice, liberty and the rule of law, good morning. And it is a good morning. I first I want to take just a moment to personally thank you, Madame Rajavi, and Farzin and Alireza, and all of my good friends that I’ve made over the years for giving me the honor to participate in something that’s bigger than all of us, something that’s more important than most of everything else we do, and that is to fight for freedom, and to fight for liberty and to fight for justice. You don’t get that many opportunities in your life to do something as important and as meaningful, and as wonderful as this, to try to work as hard as you can to bring people to what God has intended for, a life in which they have, the ability to control their own lives, the ability to be safe, the ability to take care of their families, and to be left alone from the hard that have been inflicted on the Iranian people by what can only be called a regime of terror, a regime of barbarity and terrorism, that has done great damage to the whole world, but the most damage to the great and good Iranian people. And particularly to those in Ashraf, and now at the new Ashraf. I think I speak for many, many of my colleagues, I know I speak for Dr. Rhea Ryan, when we spent that time with you for a number of days and really got to know you, I do feel like you’re members of my family and I will fight for you the same way I fight for members of my family and for an Italian-American who fight very, very hard for the members of their families. I hope we’re members of your family. I hope we’ve earned that. If we have it, we’re going to continue to try. I dream of a Tehran in which we could all be together and you can show me the beauties of your city, your culture, your civilization. And I remember the contributions that an Iran like that can make to the United States. And I believe we’re much closer to it.
In many ways, to me, it’s an indication of just how fragile this regime is, just how close this regime is to collapse. At a time in which you’re seeking a renewal of an agreement in order to move forward with your nuclear program, that will also give you relief from stifling crushing economic sanctions to put in charge of your government, not just a mass murder, there are probably many mass murderers within the regime of terror, but one who is a prominent mass murderer, one who is identified as a mass murderer, one for which there are tape recordings of his being a mass murderer, and one who basically a butcher. It’s extraordinary. It’s extraordinary stupid, risky. These people are not stupid or risky. They are very, very shrewd, evil people. And we’ve seen a pattern of this, haven’t we, Madame Rajavi and my colleagues? We saw it a few years ago in their attempts to assassinate us and going so far as to include Iranian personnel, diplomatic personnel, in the groups that were coming to France and into Tehran to blow us out. That’s a sign of desperation. That’s a sign that you really feel that things are moving against you and you have to become as brutal as possible. Well, the selection of Raisi is exactly that. There have been many, many people that he could have put there that would probably be as evil as he seemed, but without the background, but maybe there’s no one he can trust as much as Raisi to be cruel, to be ultimately prone to be so cruel to terrorize the movement. Well, it’s not going to work, it’s not going to work, it’s not going to work. From the time the protests renewed several years ago and President Trump, of whom I’m very, very proud, did what President Reagan did, he approved, rather than turned his back on him as President Obama did, unfortunately, which I think delayed us greatly. From the moment that has happened, I don’t know that the international world really understands how many protests there have been, how far they have gone, how they’ve permeated the entire country, and they permeated the social structure of Iran. This is a regime that understands better than the world does, because the world has much of this censored by either a corrupt or foolish press that uses their propaganda and is dominated by it. But the regime understands all of these protests that they can’t seem to stop. And the kind of barratry and the kind of homicidal, maniacal behavior they displayed in 1988 with Raisi as a major player, it’s still there. Anyone who’s a member of the MEK, even people they suspect of being members of the MEK, who may not be too sympathetic. I mean, the luckiest thing you’ll have will be in prison for a long period of time. And more than likely, they’ll be killed and shot and sometimes right on the street. But you know that’s going to happen to you. If I know I’m going to go into the street and I’m going to carry a sign that says, “We want Madame Rajavi,” we’re down with the ayatollah. Well, some of them a few years ago we’re carrying Trump signs. If you know you’re going to be shot and killed and you still do that, can you imagine the level of desperation that the people feel? Can you imagine the strength of their desire to overcome this regime that had just gone too far that pushed them beyond what people can sit back and tolerate? And of course, you, Madame Rajavi and your brave and wonderful movement, you’re at the core of this. And for all those who have said in the past that the MEK is a cult, or it’s a strange group, or it has marginal support, how can they say that any longer? You are an obsessive compulsion for Ayatollah to me, you are an obsessive compulsion for Raisi. You are an obsessive compulsion for all of the criminals that run around– the war criminals and the rest of them.
They have proven to us that you are a legitimate alternative. Oh, my goodness, they even said it about a year ago. The Ayatollah said, “The MEK is the only group that can really threaten us.” And yet we have so many in the West, who close their ears to it. I heard it. I know it, you know it. And unfortunately, some of our people pay the price of that in the streets of Iran. When we reflect, as you have done so brilliantly, what happened in 1988, that’s the same regime of terror that we have today. And it may actually be at a point of desperation now, that is very frightening, but also very encouraging.
Let me conclude by saying something that again is discounted by many of the people in the press who seem overwhelmed by Iranian propaganda. You are ready, and by you, I mean, the collective you, Madame Rajavi, you and the groups that you have brought together so brilliantly. You are ready tomorrow. This is unlike other revolutions that we had when we went through the Arab Spring, and there’s a question as to whether those revolutions were long-term good or bad or were people ready, were their groups ready, were they groups ready to sabotage them. If this regime is out, however it goes out, we’re not going to have a situation like a terrible problem in restructuring the government like we had in Iraq. We’re not going to have the possibility that it’s turned over to the Muslim Brotherhood, like we had an Egypt that finally was solved, but it took a lot of time, a lot of effort and a lot of minds to do that.
More time has to be spent on the media, examining carefully what you have. You have a government waiting. People have great expertise, I mean, there was a brain drain from Iran. Starting 40 years ago, you got the benefit of that. Iran can get the benefit again, and you’re ready to govern, but only on an instrument basis, to the point where as quickly as possible, that can be a free and fair election. It would go to more than 10% of the population, I assure you, this is not an attempt to impose on your great people, their government, it’s an attempt to keep it together for a short period of time, get it to function really well and then to move on to.. And we know the principles and let me conclude with that.
A government that is elected, that’s a democracy. That is a government that will be fair to all genders, to all races, all religions, you will have freedom of religion and you will be non-nuclear. And a government that seeks to reestablish Iran and we capture and revitalize its great culture, as a country of enormously talented people, making great contributions to the world. And in the case of Iran, making certain that the horrors of the last 40 years are erased. The people who accomplish them are brought to justice. And the people who fought so hard like all of you and lost so much will be given an opportunity to lead out the rest of your life with what God guaranteed to you. You’re not fighting for something that the government gives you, you’re fighting for something that God gives you– freedom, rights, rule of law, and just a decent opportunity to bring up your children in peace. We’re very close to it. The way in which the regime reacted to the premier of Sylvania’s brave comments at the beginning is every indication that they are desperate.
Madame Rajavi, you won this debate on the first day of this conference with the reaction of the regime. Now it’s a matter of solidifying it. And thank you for letting me participate in it. And thank you to my colleagues from America. As senator Torricelli demonstrated, span Democrat and Republican, show that all Americans are with you in your fight for freedom. We’re willing to sacrifice as if we’re fighting for our own freedom because we admire you so much and we know how much you can do for the world. Thank you.