By the Editorial Staff
At a meeting held at the Palais du Luxembourg on 25 November, former MEP and Middle East specialist Struan Stevenson met with senators to discuss prospects for the Iranian situation. The Scottish figure — senior official at the International Committee In Search of Justice (ISJ), coordinator of the Campaign for Change in Iran (CIC), former chair of the European Parliament’s delegation for relations with Iraq (2009–2014) and of the intergroup “Friends of a Free Iran” (2004–2014), and author of several books on Iran and the Middle East — warned the lawmakers about the fragility of the Iranian theocracy and the need to support the Iranian people’s aspiration for democracy and secularism.
The meeting was held at the invitation of Senator Vincent Louault, Vice-President of the Parliamentary Committee for a Democratic Iran (CPID), in partnership with the Foundation for Middle East Studies (FEMO), in the presence of several senators from different political backgrounds.
Struan Stevenson painted a particularly troubling picture of the situation in Iran: mass executions, structural corruption, propaganda and disinformation, but also the export of violence beyond Iran’s borders. He noted that 1,455 people have been executed this year, stressing that Iranians have gone from one dictatorship to another, each having left a bloody mark on the country’s contemporary history.
He also warned senators about the international operations of the Revolutionary Guards, involved in terrorist activities across Europe. He notably cited the attempted bomb attack on the large gathering of the Iranian opposition in Villepinte in 2018, which specifically targeted Maryam Rajavi, a figure of the Iranian resistance, at the cost of numerous collateral casualties — already revealing the criminal hand of the Iranian authorities and their methods, which combine terrorism, criminality and diplomacy.
Asked about Western diplomacy toward such a regime, Struan Stevenson expressed dismay at the European approach, calling it “naïve” and denouncing the illusion of sincere dialogue with a regime that uses negotiations — particularly on the nuclear issue — merely as a means of buying time and reducing international pressure, without ever honouring its commitments.
He also highlighted the inaction of certain European governments, giving the impression of a certain “complacency” toward the Iranian regime, and called for firmer measures, such as the expulsion of Iranian diplomatic agents involved in intelligence activities and the closure of embassies used for repressive purposes.
For more than an hour, Struan Stevenson engaged in a candid, no-holds-barred exchange with international media, the Iranian people, and the very regime that targets him, demonstrating an unshaken determination to put an end to the tyranny of the mullahs.
For him, no threat can silence those who fight for freedom, justice and fundamental rights.