Democracy and stability in Iran can come only from within
The international community can support regime change efforts by recognizing those fighting the religious dictatorship
Washington Times July 14, 2025 by Maryam Rajavi
The solution to the Iranian crisis that has influenced the Middle East and the world for nearly half a century lies in regime change and organized resistance by the Iranian people. This is the “third option” I articulated 21 years ago in the European Parliament and have reiterated countless times since: Neither foreign war nor appeasement will win against this regime. The only thing that will do so is change by the people and the resistance.
I have repeatedly warned that if appeasement with Tehran continues, war in the region is destined, an unfortunate reality we have witnessed recently. The mullahs’ dictatorship survives by exporting terrorism, relentlessly pursuing nuclear weapons and relying on brutal repression.
Since 1981, the Iranian resistance has exposed these realities, especially in 2002 when the National Council of Resistance of Iran revealed secret nuclear sites in Natanz and Arak, alerting the world to the regime’s nuclear bomb-making program. If not for the NCRI, the program might have succeeded unnoticed.
U.S. leaders, including President Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, validated these disclosures, but the international response fell short. Instead of punishing the regime in Iran for its international lawlessness, Western powers chose negotiation and appeasement and even blacklisted as terrorist the very movement that had exposed the regime’s nuclear threat until European courts in 2009 and U.S. courts in 2012 overturned the decision. This grave error has only emboldened the regime.
Today, Tehran’s nuclear ambitions and regional warmongering threaten global security, recalling the bitter lessons of Munich, this time with the specter of mullahs armed with nuclear weapons. The regime’s leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, knows that abandoning the nuclear bomb-making program would lead to his downfall, so he pushes Iran toward conflict, desperately hoping to preserve his fragile power.
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Photo Exhibition on Iran Human Rights Violations, U.S. National Mall, June 20, 2025
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