230 Iranian Activists and Civil Activists: The 25-Year Cooperation Document between Iran and China is Invalid and Inhumane
In a letter of protest to the Chinese President, more than 230 political and civil activists inside and outside Iran called the 25-year Iran-China cooperation document an "invalid" and "inhumane" agreement.
The letter, addressed to Xi Jinping, states that the comprehensive cooperation document between the two countries "reminds the Iranian people of the shameful Turkmenchay and Golestan agreements, so we expect you to prevent the pursuit of this agreement by recalling your Foreign Minister to Beijing."
The letter adds that the Islamic Republic "does not represent the Iranian nation" and signed this agreement solely with the aim of saving itself from overthrow and collapse.
Among the signatories are prominent political and civil figures such as Narges Mohammadi, Mohammad Nourizad, Kamal Jafari Yazdi, Hashem Khastar, Ghasem Sholeh Saadi, Hassan Shariatmadari, Javad Lal Mohammadi, Manouchehr Bakhtiari, and Mohammad Mahdavifar.
On April 27, the foreign ministers of Iran and China signed a comprehensive cooperation program document between the two countries in Tehran.
Other critics of the agreement, including the US State Department, compare it to the Treaty of Turkmenchay between Iran and Tsarist Russia, under which Iran lost control of large parts of its territory in the South Caucasus and ceded it to Russia.
Activists and civil society activists protesting this contract emphasize that "the 25-year strategic contract is in conflict with Iran's national interests and is morally, politically, legally, and humanly unacceptable."
Another part of this protest letter states: "The entire Iranian nation, and especially the political elite," many of whom are currently "under severe torture" in the prisons of the Islamic Republic or have been isolated or forced to leave their homeland in various ways, consider this agreement invalid and reserve the right to assert the rights of the nation and seek compensation for material and moral damages.
The number of signatories to this letter has reached more than 1,500 as of the time of writing this report.
Following increasing criticism of the failure to publish the text of the Iran-China cooperation document, Iran's Assistant Foreign Minister for Asia-Pacific Affairs tweeted on Sunday that "the Iran-China cooperation document is not in the nature of a contract or agreement" and that its publication "is not legally required."
These remarks come at a time when Iranian government officials have deemed these criticisms baseless and promised to make the text of the agreement public once it is finalized.
Furthermore, the publication of a roadmap document for cooperation between countries, which is usually a summary of the parties' interests in expanding relations, is considered quite common, and only the main text of the memorandum of understanding or the full provisions of the contract are confidential, and countries and companies refuse to make it public.
Source: Radio Farda
