Forty-third UN condemnation of clerical regime
-Rajavi urges countries to impose trade and diplomatic sanctions on mullahs

Commenting on the resolution adopted last night by the United Nations General Assembly condemning the serious violations of human rights in Iran, National Council of Resistance President Massoud Rajavi said: The adoption of this resolution by the highest international authority, 18 months after Khatami took office, confirms that no reform or change is conceivable within the velayat-e faqih regime (absolute supremacy of clerical rule). As far as the regime's rival factions are concerned, they share interests and work jointly to violate the most fundamental human rights of the people of Iran, Mr. Rajavi added.

Since Khatami took office, 270 persons have been hanged in public, eight stoned, and 29 dissidents assassinated abroad. In the past week alone, at least five men were hanged and one was stoned in public.

Emphasizing that the resolution does not reflect the true dimensions of the mullahs' anti-human crimes, Mr. Rajavi added: After being condemned 43 times by different bodies of the United Nations, the time has come to refer the case of human rights abuses in Iran to the UN Security Council to take binding decisions.

The Leader of the Iranian Resistance pointed to the unprecedented rise in the number of assassinations and disappearances of dissidents in Iran and abroad, and stressed: The declining state of human rights over the past months in Iran shows that the policy of many western countries to grant economic and political concessions to the mullahs will only embolden them in their anti-human methods in repressing the people of Iran, exporting terrorism and fundamentalism, and enmity to peace.

On the 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Mr. Rajavi called on all governments to recognize the Iranian people's just right to resist against a regime which has most brutally violated all the articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. He said: The murderers of the Iranian people should not be placated and diplomatic and trade sanctions must be imposed against this regime.

The General Assembly's resolution condemned "executions," "cases of torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, including sentences of stoning and amputation," "the lack of full and equal enjoyment by women of their human rights," and "discrimination in law and practice against women," "arbitrary closure of publications, widely reported cases of harassment and persecution of persons, including writers and members of the press," "failure to meet international standards in the administration of justice," the "sentencing to death and arrests" of and "discrimination against religious minorities."

Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran
December 10, 1998

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