Speech at the plenary session in the debate on Iran
Mr President, why so many gallows? Why had been 250 hangings in Iran by the beginning of the summer? Why is this military theocracy continuing to kill at such a rate? This regime is afraid. It has every reason to be afraid, because for 26 years, ever since a reformer, Mohammad Khatami, was elected President of the Republic, dissent has never ceased in this country. Repression has never prevented Iranians from taking to the streets again, tirelessly.
But now, for the first time, the mobilisation has lasted for more than a year. Women continue to come out bareheaded, and they are supported and applauded. The social base of this regime is melting away. This dictatorship’s only hope now is to conclude a truce with the Gulf monarchies. It no longer even pretends to bring about a revolution in Islam. It has simply become the most worm-eaten pillar of the great conservative alliance, the one that unites it in blood with Moscow and Beijing.
