Remove Iran’s opposition group from terror list, Italian lawmakers urge

Iran Focus: Rome, Apr. 20 – Italian lawmakers from both Houses of the Italian Parliament and legal experts today
called for the removal of the People’s Mojahedin Organisation of Iran (PMOI) from the European Union’s list of terrorist organisations and support for the “Third Option”, during a seminar in parliament.
Iran Focus

Rome, Apr. 20 – Italian lawmakers from both Houses of the Italian Parliament and legal experts today called for the removal of the People’s Mojahedin Organisation of Iran (PMOI) from the European Union’s list of terrorist organisations and support for the “Third Option”, during a seminar in parliament.

Italian Senator Paolo Guzzanti, from Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s ruling party Forzza Italia and a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said, “Today it is crystal clear that the policy of appeasement in the face of this terrorist an suppressive regime has failed and it is now time for Europe to support the Third Option introduced by Mrs. Maryam Rajavi in the European Parliament; No to appeasement, and no to a foreign military intervention but rather support for a democratic change at the hands of the Iranian people and their Resistance”.

“The Iranian Resistance which is working to bring about an end to the religious dictatorship and establish a democratic and secular government in Iran, has the strong support of the representatives of the people of Italy”, he added, while noting that the majority of the Italian parliament had signed a statement urging the removal of the terror-tag from the PMOI.

The PMOI is a member organisation of the National Council of Resistance of Iran and was listed as a terrorist organisation by the European Union in mid-2002, in what the European Union’s then-Spanish leadership called “a goodwill gesture to Tehran”.

Senator Guzzanti also announced the formation of the “Parliamentary Group for a Free Iran”.

Other panellists who defended the Iranian opposition and called for the immediate removal of the PMOI from the E.U.’s terrorist list included Senator Mario Cavallaio, the Mayor of the city of Gaglioli; Italian Deputy Luigi Giacco from the Democratic Left Party; Deputy Giovanni Russo-Spena, from the United Communists Party; Deputy Paolo Cento from the Greens Party; Deputy Lino Duilio, member of the Central Committee of the Margarita Party; Deputy Alfonso Gianni from the United Communists Party; and Deputies Gianni Vernetti and Giovanni Bianchi, from the Margarita Party.

Mohammad Mohaddessin, who chairs the foreign affairs committee of the NCRI, said that for those who were anxious to preserve peace and tranquillity in the region and beyond, time was running out for an effective policy option on Iran. The mullahs, he said, were determined to acquire nuclear bombs and would not relent for as long as they felt disunity and weakness in the ranks of Western governments.

Among the numerous legal experts present at the seminar, who added their support to the de-listing of the PMOI as terrorists, were Prof. Luigi Citarella, head of the government’s Interministerial Committee for Human Rights and a Permanent Member of the United Nations Committee for the Rights of the Child; Mario Lana, head of Italy’s Lawyers Union for Human Rights; and Emo Ecoli, head of the Europe-Arabian Parliamentary Group in Italy.

The seminar in Italy followed a similar symposium in the United Kingdom, where over 500 parliamentarians and legal experts denounced the labelling of the PMOI as terrorists and supported the call by Iranian opposition leader Maryam Rajavi for democratic change in Iran.