July 11, 2014
Reza Pahlavi has led the first general meeting of his new opposition coalition, the Iranian National Council, a loosely based umbrella group of 36 opposition organizations that was created in Paris last year.
The general meeting was held in May in Toronto with the stated goal of nurturing pro-democracy forces inside Iran – doling out funds, technology and advice to opponents of the regime and fomenting dissent within the country.
The coalition says it represents “the broadest array of individuals and nascent political organizations” spanning the ideological spectrum, including not just the usual monarchists, but also republicans and religious and ethnic minorities.
Pahlavi, 54, no longer presents himself as Reza Shah II. His website simply refers to him as “Reza Pahlavi.”
“It remains unclear whether he can actually deliver what he’s promised,” Saeed Rahnema, a professor of political science at York University in Ontario, told the Globe and Mail of Canada.
“The opposition is still highly diversified. None of these groups are collaborating with each other. Mr. Pahlavi may hope that his council will become an alternative to the regime, but nobody in the opposition – including him – is in that position yet.”
At the first general meeting of his Iranian National Council, several hundred people of Iranian descent gathered in a Toronto hotel to hear his appeal for support.
Nazanin Afshin-Jam, an Iranian-Canadian human-rights activist and wife of Canadian Justice Minister Peter Mackay, sent a video greeting to the council’s meeting.
Pahlavi said, “The Iranian people have not been considered what they are: the ultimate weapon.”
Hamid Ghahremani, a 57-year-old Toronto businessman who left Iran in 1982, told the Globe and Mail, “He is our leader.” Standing on the sidelines of the event collecting envelopes of cash and checks, Ghahremani said that despite the smallish crowd at the Toronto meeting, many expats are eager to financially back Pahlavi’s cause.
Pahlavi said his council seeks money and “technology” from individuals and corporations for its work inside Iran. “Certain companies have been willing to do that,” he said, declining to name any.
Pahlavi said he believes Western governments should redirect their efforts away from negotiating with the Islamic Republic and toward linkups with the opposition.
The Canadian government appears to be pursuing just that strategy. It recently launched an effort to reach Iranians through the Internet and social media, and last year sponsored an online dialogue with dissidents and activists in Iran that bypassed Iranian Internet restrictions.
Pahlavi said the mass demonstrations after the 2009 presidential elections ultimately fizzled because the international community failed to support them. “How many times do you expect defenseless people under brutal regimes to rise and take their chances, only to be abandoned in midair?” he asked.
Pahlavi announced the formation of his Iranian National Council in May of last year. He said he had united 36 Iranian political groups and societies to lead the opposition to the Islamic Republic.
Most of the groups are little known and may be little more than letterhead organizations with limited membership. That was true of the many organizations the Mojahedin-e Khalq said it united years ago to form the National Council of Resistance that it portrays as leading the opposition to the regime.
Pahlavi promoted his new group by giving interviews to publicize the council.
He told the Bahraini daily Al-Bilad that the Islamic Republic clings to its right to acquire nuclear science not because it wants to strike at Israel but in order to impose a Shiite imamate.
Pahlavi told the AP his council was “calling for a major boycott” of Iran’s presidential elections. But that got little attention in Iran and no major boycott was seen once former Presidents Rafsanjani and Khatami jointly endorsed the candidacy of Hassan Rohani.
Pahlavi insisted the council is not a vehicle to promote a particular political system after the demise of the Islamic Republic. “We’re not here to debate a form of regime. That’s not our job,” he said, adding that his organization transcends party politics and stands for a secular regime.
“We demand our right to have free elections in Iran, and so this council has the responsibility to help orchestrate this campaign, with the help of our activists at home and the support of the diaspora abroad,” he told the AP.
Pahlavi said world powers today are mainly focusing on suspicions that Tehran is secretly working on atomic arms. For Pahlavi, the world is seeking a “change of behavior” by Iran, while he and other regime opponents are seeking regime change.
The list of 36 political parties and other organizations forming his council includes a few groups with a long history such as the Pan-Iranist Party and the Constitutional Party of Iran. But it includes many other names that are not exactly household words, such as the Movement of the Children of Rostam in Sistan va Baluchestan Province, the Kouroush Movement, the Center for Iranian Elites, and the United Front of the Green Movement, which is not the opposition Green Movement within Iran of former Prime Minister Mir-Hossain Musavi.