The invincible generation borne on June 20, 1981, will turn the page of Iran’s history. This is according to Maryam Rajavi, the NCRI President-elect, who addressed an international online conference on June 20, 2020, the 40th anniversary of the beginning of the Iranian people’s resistance against the mullahs’ religious dictatorship.
In parts of her speech to this virtual meeting connecting 2,000 locations around the world and in Ashraf 3 in Albania, she addressed the status of women in the Iranian Resistance and in future Iran. Excerpts of her speech follow:
Teenage girls set a new role model
The day after June 20, 1981, Khomeini’s Revolutionary Prosecutor published the photos of teenage girls supporting the PMOI/MEK who had been executed. He urged their families to go and identify the bodies of their children because they had not given their names, instead only identifying as “Mojaheds” (PMOI/MEK) and when asked. And they chanted, “long live freedom,” until the final moment before being shot by firing squads.
Publishing those photos in daily newspapers back then, revealed, before anything else, the cold heartedness and the ruthlessness of Khomeini and his Revolutionary Guards.
The passage of time, however, revealed a greater truth: Those young girls, those clenched fists, those cries of “long live freedom,” and their refusal to even tell their names to their executioners, created a new and admirable example in the context of revolutions; the new model of an unsung hero, innocent, but ready to make the ultimate sacrifice, something diametrically opposed to Khomeini. And, most importantly, they set an example for remaining firm on their beliefs, for being uncompromising and for persevering; in a historic sense, it can be summed up in one word: invincible.
They were the forerunners of a new generation who stepped onto the field of struggle and revolution. They broke through the barriers of the time, and rose up to resist against the most daunting reactionary force in Iran’s history… A new generation stepped in, intent on paying the price for freedom from the onset.
Executed couple leave infant daughter behind
My beloved Marjan who passed away earlier this month and whose art and commitment to struggle were praised by millions of our compatriots, said the following about her time in prison (in the early 1980s): “I met a young woman in prison, who was 24 or 25 years old. Her name was Shahin. She had been brought to the ward just after giving birth to her baby girl at Evin’s hospital. She named her daughter, Soulmaz, as her husband had asked before being executed. Soulmaz was his sister’s name who had been killed by the regime on September 27, 1981.”
Marjan added: “When the henchmen were taking Shahin for execution, she kissed little Soulmaz on the forehead. The baby was asleep and in the arms of her mother, she looked just like the drawing of Saint Mary by Michael Angelo. I could not take it anymore. I covered my face with my hands so that no one would hear me cry. I regained control over myself when Shahin caressed me on the head. For a moment, I gazed at her calm face and sombre smile. She placed little Soulmaz in my arms and walked away.”
Such scenes have been repeated thousands of times in the torture chambers of Khomeini and Khamenei….
The rebellious generation which has risen up in the current uprisings of the people of Iran, has blossomed out of the rightfulness of those sacrifices….
If it were not for the June 20, 1981 uprising, a democratic alternative could never have emerged against this regime… A revolutionary generation, particularly with thousands of combatant and rebellious women, would not have emerged to turn the page in Iran’s history as it has done today. There would have been no breakthroughs for women’s equality and emancipation….
Rights of women in tomorrow’s free Iran
The resolution signed by the majority of members in the U.S. House of Representatives, which has recognized the Iranian people’s right to the establishment of a democratic republic based on the separation of religion and state provides a credible model for all governments and the international community to follow regarding Iran and the Iranian people…
The spirit of this resolution can be summed up in supporting the right of the Iranian people to change the regime and to achieve a democratic republic. It states that the Iranian people have rejected the monarchical dictatorship and, as well, do not accept religious tyranny and oppose it. It also references and points to the Iranian Resistance’s Ten-Point Plan, which reflects the image of a free Iran:
- No to velayat-e faqih; Yes to people’s sovereignty in a pluralist republic based on universal suffrage;
- Freedom of speech, freedom of political parties and assemblies, freedom of the press and the internet; dissolution and disbanding of the IRGC, the terrorist Qods Force, plainclothes agents, the unpopular Bassij, the MOIS, Council of the Cultural Revolution, and all of the suppressive patrols and institutions in cities, villages, schools, universities, offices, and factories;
- Commitment to individual and social freedoms and rights in accordance with the Universal Declaration of Humans Rights; dissolution of all agencies in charge of censorship and inquisition; seeking justice for the massacred political prisoners, prohibition of torture, and abolishment of the death penalty;
- Separation of religion and state, and freedom of religions and faiths;
- Complete gender equality in political, social, cultural, and economic rights, and equal participation of women in political leadership; abolishment of any form of discrimination; the right to choose one’s clothing, and to marriage, divorce, education and employment; prohibition of all forms of exploitation against women under any pretext;
- Independent judiciary and legal system in accordance with international standards based on presumption of innocence, the right to defense, the right to appeal, and the right to be tried in a public court; full independence of judges; abolishment of the mullahs’ Sharia law and dissolution of revolutionary courts;
- Autonomy and removal of double injustices against Iranian nationalities and ethnicities in alignment with the NCRI’s plan for the autonomy of Iranian Kurdistan;
- Justice and equal opportunities in the realms of employment and entrepreneurship for all of the people in Iran in a free market economy; restoration of the rights of blue-color workers, farmers, nurses, white-color workers, teachers and retirees;
- Protection and restoration of the environment that has been massacred under the rule of the mullahs;
- A non-nuclear Iran that is devoid of weapons of mass destruction; peace, co-existence and international and regional cooperation.
As we mark the 40th year of the struggle against religious tyranny, the Iranian Resistance renews its commitment to the Iranian people and to the 120,000 martyrs for freedom…
