525 UK Parliamentarians Show their Support for Iran People's Uprising

On June 13, a British parliamentary conference took place at the House of Lords. During this session, a joint statement was issued, garnering support from 525 members of Parliament, including peers from all political parties in the UK. The statement expressed solidarity with the Iranian people’s uprising and endorsed Maryam Rajavi’s ten-point plan for establishing a democratic republic based on the separation of religion and state.

The signatories of the joint statement include over 50 former ministers and deputy ministers from both Conservative and Labour cabinets. Notably, 15 bishops from the House of Lords, including three former Archbishops of Canterbury and Wales, have also lent their support.

Distinguished individuals such as former Deputy Prime Minister Lord John Prescott, 10 chairpersons of parliamentary committees, five deputy leaders of the Conservative Party, the deputy spokesperson of the House of Lords, as well as leaders of the Irish National Unity Party and the Welsh National Party, have endorsed the statement.

In their initiative, the 525 cross-party MPs and Peers including scores of former Cabinet, Government and FCDO ministers and former party leaders as well as current Committee Chairmen, stressed:

“We stand in solidarity with the people of Iran in their desire for a secular and democratic republic where no individual, regardless of religion or birth right, has any privilege over others. Through their slogans the Iranian people have made it clear that they reject all forms of dictatorship, be it the deposed Shah or the current theocratic regime and thus reject any association with either."

Co-President of the International Committee of Parliamentarians for a Democratic Iran (ICPDI), Bob Blackman MP, said:

“Our statement makes a clear case for a firm policy on Iran. This has moved our Government's position as it has on several occasions stated its intention of holding the regime to account.

“The threat from the regime stressed the need for our Government to get serious about countering the regime’s state terrorism by proscribing the IRGC and closing the diplomatic missions and Embassy of the regime in London, until Tehran verifiably abandons its state terrorism.”

Steve McCabe MP, Co-president of the BCFIF, said:

“Now is not the time for any kind of appeasement towards the mullahs. As many of my colleagues have said, now is the time to ban the IRGC and to break diplomatic relations with this evil regime. Now is the time to make it clear that we are no longer in the business of dealing with them.

Baroness Verma said:

“We know the decisive role women and girls of Iran should and will play in Iran’s future and their equal participation is a requirement if the country is to enjoy democracy and freedom.

“In contrast to the misogynist rulers in Iran who view women and girls as a serious threat to their grip on power, the Iranian Resistance movement (NCRI) sees women and girls as an asset and the guarantors for a free, democratic and secular republic.”

Other speakers at the conference included: Rt Hon Theresa Villiers MP; Rt Hon Sir Roger Gale MP; Rt Hon Sammy Wilson MP; Lord Hacking; Baroness Cox; Viscount Hanworth; Lord Kirkhope of Harrogate; Roger Lyons, Former TUC President; Tahar Boumedra, human rights lawyer, former senior UN Official and member of the advisory board of the Justice for Victims of the 1988 massacre in Iran; and Dr Jocelynne Scutt, Barrister and Human Rights Lawyer.