She has lived longer in exile than in Iran. But 84-year-old Farah Pahlavi has not lost hope of returning to her homeland. – Iranians want to take Iran back. If there’s one thing our thousand-year history has taught us, it’s that light overcomes darkness. Pahlavi says so in a rare interview with news. The statement comes as an echo after several demonstrations on the anniversary of the killing of Mahsa Amini on September 16, which last year started a popular uprising against the incumbent regime. “We are a great nation, we want to take Iran back” was one of the slogans Iranians shouted on the anniversary. – It shows how brave Iranian women and men are. Despite the regime’s brutality, they continue to fight for Iran’s liberation, she says from Paris. Visited Norway Pahlavi was empress of Iran from 1961 until the 1979 revolution transformed the Western-allied monarchy into an Islamic republic. Some associate her with reforms that gave women the right to vote, better access to education and more equality within marriage, says Iran specialist Marianne Hafnor Bøe. But one of her first tasks as empress was to visit Norway. – We visited Norway at the invitation of King Olav, who gave us a warm reception. I have fond memories of the visit and have a lot of admiration for Norway and its people, she recalls. In May 1961, two months after Farah became empress, she visited King Olav and Princess Astrid at the castle in Oslo with Emperor Muhammed Reza Pahlavi. There was a red carpet, flags and happy people under a cloudless sky when Empress Farah Pahlavi and Emperor Muhammed Reza Pahlavi visited Rjukan. Today, the empress has a high star among monarchists and older Iranians, says Bøe. For others, she represents an era where there was also a lack of democracy, she adds. After an alliance of Islamists and leftists overthrew the Pahlavi monarchy, millions of Iranians were forced to flee. Some fled for political reasons. Others to regain opportunities they lost in Iran. For the empress, it became important to showcase what Iranians achieve abroad. Last year she therefore met Nima Shahinian. He came to Norway as a refugee, joined the Armed Forces and served, among other things, in Afghanistan before he is now set to become Norway’s first astronaut. Met the Speaker of the Storting Around the anniversary of Mahsa Amini’s death, Pahlavi also met the Speaker of the Storting, Masud Gharahkhani. She believes that the meeting can motivate young Iranians who dream of the same democracy that the president of the Storting administers in Norway. He shares that belief. – My experience is that it means something to oppressed people that democratic leaders meet people who represent them. The response from people living in Iran has been predominantly positive, says Gharahkhani. The President of the Storting visited Pahlavi at her residence in Paris, where they talked about Iran’s future. Photo: Instagram / Privat The President of the Storting has previously met the Belarusian opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaja. He has also met Iranian opposition figures such as women’s rights campaigner Masih Alinejad and Nobel laureate Shirin Ebadi. He has also received some compensation for that. Gharahkhani, who herself has an Iranian-Kurdish background, received criticism from party colleague Dler Khurshidi for the meeting with the empress. Khurshidi recounted that the Pahlavi rule oppressed his grandfather who was a Kurdish separatist. But the meetings are positive for the development of a democratic culture among Iranians, believes doctoral candidate Joseph Salomonsen, who says that Iranians have been politically divided. – The people’s movement in Iran intends to move Iran in a democratic direction. It requires that the opposition puts aside political positioning, which Gharahkhani facilitates when he meets various opposition figures. As long as the opposition is divided, this is in favor of the regime, concludes Salomonsen.
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– Iranians want to take Iran back – news Urix – Foreign news and documentaries
