Reza Pahlavi Quotes

The world is facing a regime today that is totalitarian, racist, fascist, and yet what has been done about it?

My father voluntarily left the country to avoid bloodshed. He ordered the Army not to engage in skirmishes with the population. The transition happened rather peacefully. The difference now is the regime is calling on all possible coercive forces including civilian guns-for-hire. They are trying to hang on more violently as we go along. But despite the crackdown, you must admire the degree of discipline for people not to retaliate with violence. That's amazing.

My preoccupation is not running for office. We are trying to liberate our country first. Then I am ready to serve my compatriots in whatever capacity. If they want me to play a more important role, so be it.

The regime is not reformable. We tried it for 20 years. The central issue is to do away with the theocracy. A secular government is a prerequisite to democracy. It's in the best interest of the clerical establishment, too: the sanctity of religion has been most damaged by religious governance. The regime has been presenting everyone secular as anti-religion. The violence has been committed in the name of religion.

The regime has completely disregarded its own kind. The crackdown during Ashura, one of the holiest days in Shia Islam, was an unprecedented offense to people's deepest beliefs. So they cannot appeal to their own religious base. Even conservatives realize that by now.

Access to information has been very restricted by the regime, but we can affirm the discontent goes well beyond Tehran and the major cities.

As quoted by Christoph Lehermayr, Der Sohn des Schahs spricht exklusiv mit NEWS.at: "Ich bin bereit, Konig zu werden", NEWS.at, September 15, 2009.

I will leave it to history and historians to judge my father’s reign. But most of all it is up to all those Iranians who have the benefit of perspective and in the same way are in a position to compare things.

Let me remind you that Iran was not denied the right to have a civilian nuclear program before the clerical regime's appearance. In fact, the very same countries who are today imposing sanctions on Iran were competing with each other in selling our country nuclear technology and reactors. Actually, no foreign government has actually said that Iran does not have the sovereign right to the technology and peaceful civilian use of it. The problem lies with the nature of the regime and its dubious intentions. The world has good reason to distrust a regime that has sponsored terrorism abroad while repressing its own society for years. Troubling statements emanating from some key individuals in leadership positions have added more fuel to the fire. My position is simple: As a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, Iran has the sovereign right to develop its own civilian nuclear program. But future democratic governments will have to examine the scope and feasibility of such programs in the context of our energy needs, while ensuring the full trust of the international community.

Mr. Ahmadinejad cheats, lies, steals and stuffs the ballot box. Unafraid of the threats of the supreme leader to shut up and accept fraud, Mr. Mousavi shows the courage to reclaim the ballot box for a fair and impartial recount. Of course there is a huge difference between the two. But you must understand his delicate position. Right now, in order to ensure the survival of the popular struggle, he cannot just say or do whatever he wants.

Once Iran is liberated, and my fellow compatriots are free to elect their leaders and decide on their democratic political system of choice, my foreseeable mission will be accomplished. From that day on, my role will be determined by my compatriots. I will thus serve them in whatever capacity they see fit.

The regime's ban on coverage by international media, its treatment of reporters and draconian restrictions on their activities and maligning them as agents of imperialism is actually testimony to the effectiveness of these media.

It's now plain for the world to see how the supreme leader and his fellow power-hungry, mid-level clerics have been abusing the peoples' faith to maintain the big lie that they derive their legitimacy from Islam. Gone is the delusion that one man, Mr. Khamenei, can appropriate the powers of state in the name of God. So the supreme leader has lost his theocratic claim to legitimacy just as his favorite president has lost his claim to popular legitimacy. Because many in the armed forces and Revolutionary Guards are followers of religious leaders who question Mr. Khamenei, he cannot even count on presiding over a typical military dictatorship for long.

Government clerics who enter the holy city of Ghom and its seminaries backed by money and not-so-hidden coercive powers of the state are a thorn in the side of independent clerics who are more interested in faith and morality than power. In the younger, more popular days of this theocracy the schism was not obvious. Now, with masses of people on the streets, crushed by the orders of the head government cleric, the rift is wide open. The grand ayatollahs can no longer keep quiet about rape and torture in jails in the name of Islam. Unlike government mullahs, these senior clerics get their support from the people, so they can never be far away from popular feelings.

The current regime is, by any measure, the standard-bearer and global poster child for militancy, brute autocracy and corruption. If they are in fact students of my father, his ultimate act of refusing suppressive bloodshed in favor of exile should be their test.