Jailed reformists have joined with former interior ministry chief Mostafa Tajzadeh to publish another letter from Evin Prison that urges Tajzadeh’s peers to give their firm support in the quest for free elections.
The Kaleme website quotes Tajzadeh’s latest letter as saying: “In effect, free elections is the strategy of Iranian reformists, and as the Green Movement took shape through the elections, its victory is tied to free elections, and in such a case, whoever really wins the majority vote would naturally gain the respect of all.”
The prominent reformist writes: “In the recent fanfare, we must not fear and we must stand firm with integrity for free elections, because in Iran we can either have free elections or, God forbid, an ignominious one.”
Tajzadeh stresses once more that the key to the country’s survival is free elections, adding: “If I were on the outside, I would launch the biggest campaign for the defence of free elections, which is a legal and legitimate concern.”
In recent weeks, after a number of top reformists called for commitment to free elections, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei snapped back at their statements, saying that to insinuate that the elections are anything but free is to fall in line with the country’s enemies. He stressed that talk of free elections should be considered as the “new code of sedition.”
Mostafa Tajzadeh went on to add in his letter: “I urge any individual who is concerned about Iran’s independence, territorial integrity and security, and who does not want our country to end up with the fate of Libya, Yemen or Syria, to work hard for free elections in Iran, and that is not only in the coming election but for all elections to come.”
Tajzadeh was arrested after the 2009 election, when reformist allegations of vote fraud were followed by mass street protests.
The establishment chose to crack down violently on challengers of the election results and labelled election protesters as “seditious elements.”
