Mehdi Karroubi blames Khamenei for the current situation in Iran

In an open letter to Ali Khamenei, Mehdi Karroubi called for the Islamic Republic’s leader to be held accountable for his actions instead of talking about the “opposition’s position.” He held Khamenei responsible for the policies of the past decades and called for “structural reform of the system.”

Mehdi Karroubi, Secretary General of the National Trust Party and one of the leaders of the protests against the results of the 2009 presidential election, has written an open letter to Ali Khamenei, the Leader of the Islamic Republic, holding him responsible for the current situation in Iran.

In his letter, Karroubi wrote, among other things: "Given your level of presence and influence in the highest echelons of power in the system, you must accept that the country's current political, economic, cultural, and social situation is a direct result of your strategic and executive policies."

Turning experts into a “sub-unit of the leadership’s office”

In another part of his letter, Mehdi Karroubi accused the Leader of the Islamic Republic of having "in practice turned the Assembly of Experts into a sub-system of the leadership's office."

The founder of the National Trust Party added: “[…] The Guardian Council, which before the revision of the constitution did not even have the right to supervise the elections of the leadership experts, took over the life and death of this important pillar of the constitution that guarantees the republic and political legitimacy of the Islamic Republic system, and the result was a decree-making parliament whose only annual duty is to give a eulogy.”

Mehdi Karroubi has said that Ali Khamenei's appointment to the "leadership position" has been accompanied by the elimination of "an important part of the original forces of the revolution."

The "catastrophic outcome" of a policy

The leader of the protesters against the 2009 election results also criticized Khamenei for bringing the IRGC and Basij into “political and economic activities,” writing: “The catastrophic result is not hidden from anyone these days.” He then added about the consequences of such a policy: “In the political arena, the political behavior of a number of IRGC commanders and the organization and engineering of elections, with the use of Basij forces, have all resulted in nothing but political instability, the creation of an authoritarian atmosphere, the elimination of people’s sovereignty, and ultimately the negation of the republican system. In the economic arena, their monopolization, resulting from the elimination of public tenders and the illegal transfer of large and key industries in the country, has created historical corruption, the unfortunate details of which I will not mention.”

Mehdi Karroubi has also called for Ali Khamenei to be held accountable for the "regrettable outcome of the IRGC's interference" in political, cultural, security, and economic affairs.
In another part of his open letter, this protester in Hasr also discusses the presidential elections of 2005 and 2009 and speaks of the interference of Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of the Leader of the Islamic Republic, in the 2005 elections. According to him, “In the 2005 presidential elections, the IRGC and Basij, centered on your son, Agha Seyyed Mojtaba, intervened in favor of one of the candidates, and as a result of their violations and fraud in the three provinces of Isfahan, Tehran, and Qom, the person in question was sent to the second round by a coup-like move by the Guardian Council, even though I was first in 11 provinces of the country. Of course, this was realized in the shadow of the monopolization and inexperience of influential individuals within the reform movement, as well as the weakness of the Ministry of Interior in protecting the people’s votes.”

Mehdi Karroubi also refers to his letter to the Leader of the Islamic Republic in 2009 regarding Mojtaba Khamenei's "interference" in the elections and continues: "[…] I wanted you to stop this old man from interfering, but you didn't, and in 2009 you saw what disaster the electoral coup brought to the system and the revolution."
Karroubi added: "A few months before the 2009 elections, I gave a clear warning to the then Chief of the Joint Staff, Major General Firouzabadi, who had allowed himself to provide guidelines for identifying a suitable president in his military capacity. Of course, they did their job in June 2009 and saw the results, and I paid the price for my public opposition to illegal docks and the interference of the IRGC and Basij in politics and the economy."

"Obvious contradiction"

The Secretary General of the National Trust Party also referred to the "clumsy engineering" of the 2009 elections and wrote to Khamenei: "Wouldn't it have been better if you had paid attention to their wishes instead of resorting to violence and standing in the face of a wave of millions of people and saying that there is no possibility of violations and fraud in the system?"

Karroubi sees Ali Khamenei's words after the 2013 presidential election, stating that "election fraud is not appropriate for the Islamic Republic system and that officials should pursue these cases seriously," in "clear contradiction" with his behavior in 2009, and addresses the Leader of the Islamic Republic, saying that in 2009, "you stand in front of those who are the greatest assets of the revolution and the country, and you speak to them firmly, and you fundamentally rule out the possibility of fraud. But when your preferred candidate loses by a huge margin in the Guardian Council, with the full supervision and involvement of his supporters, you speak of the authorities' serious treatment of fraud."

Mehdi Karroubi also referred to the controversial disqualifications of the Guardian Council and wrote: "It is not the position of the Leader to one day disqualify the late Hashemi Rafsanjani from participating in the presidential elections and the next day to exclude the grandson of Imam Seyyed Hassan Khomeini, who teaches in Qom and whose ijtihad has been attested by several religious authorities, or to exclude a virtuous figure such as Agha Javad Hojjati-Kermani, a former member of the Assembly of Experts, with a revolutionary background and the sufferings of the struggle during which he was sentenced to 10 years in prison in just one case, from participating in the elections of the Assembly of Experts."

"Alarm bell" of street protests

Referring to the recent protests in various cities in Iran, Mehdi Karroubi called them protests “against oppression, corruption, and discrimination.” According to him, these protests are “a wake-up call that you must hear as soon as possible and pay attention to the people’s livelihood concerns.”

Karroubi wrote to the Leader of the Islamic Republic: "You know that the revolutionary foundations, whose purpose was to be established at the beginning of the revolution to take care of the deprived and eradicate poverty from the country, have in practice become economic cartels and the private lives of some individuals, over whom no supervision is applied. Some sympathizers say that more than 50 percent of the country's wealth is in the hands of a few governmental institutions over which no supervision is applied."

According to Karroubi, "In such circumstances, it is natural that the masses and lower classes of society, which were the main base of the Islamic Revolution, would become a powder keg."

Mehdi Karroubi continued by pointing out that " the system is on such a downward slope these days that it is fed up with the gathering of several thousand people and feels threatened by oppression and corruption, " and called on Ali Khamenei to issue an order to release "prisoners of the recent crisis" "before this wound deepens and more tragedies occur in prisons."

The "Head of the System" Speaking of the "Opposition's Position"

This leader, who protested the results of the 2009 elections, wrote in his letter to Ali Khamenei: "You have been at the head of the system for three decades and you still speak from the position of an opposition. In these three decades, you have sidelined a significant part of the original forces of the revolution in order to implement your desired policies, and today you are facing the results of those same policies. Accountability is the duty of all officials of the system, and Your Excellency, who have changed the functioning of institutions and organizations such as the IRGC, Basij, Guardian Council, revolutionary institutions, Friday imams, the Iranian Broadcasting Corporation, etc. in accordance with your desired attitude and policies, should pay more attention to this issue than others."

Karroubi continued: “I urge you to provide the basis for reform so that all elements of the country are practically accountable to the people and legal institutions, and that the law prevails in practice, not the rule of an individual or a specific group.” He then warned: “I also ask you, Your Excellency, to carefully study the political, economic, and international situation of the country, as well as review the policies of the past few decades, and to provide the basis for structural reform of the system before it is too late, so that the people, the same ones who, with their millions of people, brought us to power from the corners of prisons on 12 Bahman, can actually become the masters of their own destiny.”

Finally, Mehdi Karroubi raised another specific demand and wrote to the Leader of the Islamic Republic: “As you are aware, from the day after the 2009 elections until today, the supposedly national media and government newspapers such as Kayhan have continuously insulted me, Engineer Mousavi, and the protesting people. In this way, they considered any slander and lie permissible in order to distort public opinion towards us and the protesters. Recently, they have also produced a custom-made program titled “Out of Sight” in ten episodes, which presented a reading full of lies about the events of 2009. How long is this vile and dishonest method going to continue without recognizing the right to reply? After 8 years of insults, slander, and one-sided attacks, don’t you want to provide a free and lively debate between the parties to this dispute for once in the national media, which belongs to the country, not individuals? "I hereby declare my readiness to participate, along with my advisors, in any debate related to the 2009 elections and the events that followed."

Mehdi Karroubi, like Mir Hossein Mousavi and his wife Zahra Rahnavard, leaders of the protests against the announced results of the 2009 presidential election, has been under house arrest and under the surveillance of Ministry of Intelligence agents since February 2008.

Source: DW