On Saturday, October 25, 2025, an eight-hour international youth gathering titled “Free Iran 2025” brought together young supporters of the Iranian Resistance from across Europe, the United States, Canada, and Australia. The meeting, held in the presence of NCRI President-elect Maryam Rajavi on the eve of the anniversary of Iran’s November 2019 uprising, was linked live to simultaneous youth assemblies in Bonn, London, and Zurich. Political figures from several countries also joined online as observers.
Over the course of the event, speakers from 32 youth associations — athletes, engineers and technical specialists, lawyers and legal experts, doctors and medical staff, students, academics, researchers, families of slain activists, and young participants in the 2019 and 2022 protests inside Iran — took the floor. The message repeated throughout the day was that Iran’s younger generation sees itself not as an audience to politics, but as an organized force for change.
In her keynote address, Mrs. Maryam Rajavi declared that “the people of Iran and the Iranian Resistance have reached an extraordinary moment in history.” She said destiny now “knocks at the door, calling upon us to fulfill our great historic duty and rise up for freedom.” She saluted the “rebellious young generation” whose courage and organization would “bring down the tyrannical rule of the mullahs.” Mrs. Rajavi cited the November 2019 uprising that erupted in 200 cities, where protesters targeted more than 1,890 centers of repression and over 1,500 demonstrators were killed. She reiterated that the regime now faces its most decisive phase: “Either the continuation of this regime, or a democratic revolution — either the rule of the mullahs’ Supreme Leader or a republic founded on the people’s vote.”
Speakers repeatedly framed that alternative as a secular, democratic republic. A representative of young legal professionals, Mahan Taraj, said Iran’s current judiciary “is itself the embodiment of injustice,” accusing it of using religion to justify torture, executions, and censorship. He said the Iran they seek “will be neither a monarchy nor a religious dictatorship, but a pluralist republic based on the rule of law,” citing two points from Maryam Rajavi’s Ten-Point Plan: the abolition of the death penalty and the separation of religion and state. He warned that a “return to a powerful central executive without true separation of powers,” as proposed by backers of a revived monarchy, would reproduce authoritarianism.
The generational dimension — and the cost paid by families over decades — was one of the central themes.
Several speakers introduced themselves through the losses in their families.
Negar Safa, a 22-year-old medical student, spoke as part of the “Families of Martyrs” delegation. She described her uncle, arrested in 1981 for supporting the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) and later executed in 1988 in Gohardasht Prison. She recalled the mass executions of some 30,000 political prisoners in the summer of 1988 and said that even today there is “no grave” for many of them. “Even if you build a parking lot over their mass graves,” she said to the regime, “we will not forgive and we will not forget.”
Elham Sajedian, who holds a master’s degree in geology from Shiraz University and now lives in Switzerland, said her father, Mohammad Sajedian, was imprisoned under both the Shah and the clerical regime and executed at age 34. She said that even the youngest relatives of PMOI members are pressured and threatened. According to her account, authorities have tried to prevent families from even engraving names on headstones. She called the Iranian Resistance’s demand to abolish the death penalty “the cure for the wounds left on a whole generation that grew up without a father or mother.”
#FreeIranYouthCongress was like no other.
32 years ago, @Maryam_Rajavi shattered every glass ceiling by introducing the MEK Leadership Council — entirely composed of women. But she didn’t stop there. She took generations of women and girls under her wings and turned them into a… pic.twitter.com/14vbJ3DV1y— Zolal Habibi (@Ashrafi4ever) October 27, 2025
Young activists who said they had taken part in recent uprisings inside Iran described a society on edge and a regime “at the brink.”
Hassan Amani, known as Farzad, introduced himself as an activist in the 2022 uprising. He said that in his city, Kermanshah, he helped form a local pro-MEK network after discovering the group through satellite television in 2016. He described how his own children, both shot with plastic rounds during protests, joined him in anti-regime demonstrations. He testified that during mass arrests, detainees found with images of the exiled former crown prince were “released quickly,” while anyone suspected of supporting the PMOI faced prison, torture, or even execution. “That was when I understood,” he said, “that the Resistance Units are the nightmare of Khamenei.”
From Shiraz, Abdollah Bazrafkan described the street confrontations during November 2019 and again in 2022. He said crowds chanted “No Shah, no Supreme Leader” and “Death to the dictator” while teams of security forces “charged at even small groups of protesters.” According to his account, some neighborhoods managed to hold off authorities for hours. He said regime officials themselves admitted they had come “to the edge of collapse,” and he argued that “Iran is not the personal property of a turbaned or a crowned dictator.”
Youth on fire! This is what change looks like 💚🤍❤️ #FreeIranYouthCongress pic.twitter.com/jaD7dIQg0m
— Pegah Jahan (@pegahtron) October 27, 2025
The economic cost of repression and militarization was another focus.
Ali Bagheri, university researcher in Brussels, said that in a country he described as one of the world’s top holders of oil, gas, and mineral reserves, energy shortages and infrastructure breakdowns are not “mismanagement” but “a structural looting.” He accused the regime of diverting “2,000 billion dollars from people’s pockets” into nuclear activities and regional militias. He cited what he called basic performance figures: power plant efficiency “below 38 percent” compared with “above 45 percent” in international benchmarks; and roughly “20 percent” of the country’s gas production lost in transmission and waste. He said Iran has “300 sunny days a year,” but that less than one percent of the grid comes from solar energy, compared to “15 percent in Turkey.” For him, this shows that “the country’s resources are being spent on repression, not on the people.”
Medical professionals described a collapsing health system.
A young doctor, Samira Ardalan, said many Iranians are effectively locked out of healthcare due to “a 46 percent hike in service costs” and what she called a lack of national coverage. She pointed to an admission by a former senior official that around 700,000 people in Iran had died of COVID-19 by the end of the previous administration. She honored medical workers such as “Dr. Aida Rostami,” described as having been killed “for treating wounded protesters in 2022,” and pledged that “no citizen should be denied treatment, medicine, or basic care.”
Engineer Behrouz Maqsoudi, representing the delegation of Iranian engineers and professionals, condemned the regime’s systematic destruction of Iran’s economic and industrial capacity. He said that while Iranian engineers abroad are among the most skilled and innovative in Europe, the regime at home “jails inventors, executes the gifted, and turns a nation of builders into a nation of survivors.” Maqsoudi pointed to the plunder of Iran’s natural resources and the misuse of oil revenues for military repression instead of national development. He added that the future democratic Iran envisioned by the Resistance would prioritize investment in science, infrastructure, and renewable energy, harnessing the talents of the younger generation to rebuild the country.
Growing up under the leadership of @Maryam_Rajavi has truly transformed my mindset about the role of women and girls in the struggle for freedom. She has been an inspiring role model for countless girls around the world, showing that women are the driving force for change. Words… https://t.co/d6mj9PaOpE pic.twitter.com/wIkum2zmOy
— Asal (@rezapour_asal) October 28, 2025
Other speakers focused on what they called the deliberate suffocation of talent.
Hanifeh Kheyri, vice president of a Swedish research institute and an adviser on innovation policy for European institutions, said Iran is “not building a society, it is only trying to keep the regime alive.” She argued that instead of investing in researchers and specialists, the authorities “arrest the gifted, execute the brilliant, and hang talent from the gallows.” She said those who live abroad “have a responsibility to act as the voice” of the Resistance Units inside Iran and to “make their capacity visible and undeniable.”
The psychological cost for youth was addressed directly.
Sahar Sanai, a psychoanalyst working with adolescents, said she grew up in a culture that teaches “everyone for themselves,” while losing close family members — including her father, killed in Operation Eternal Light — to the armed conflict with the regime. She described treating children and teenagers who had watched parents beaten, sisters and mothers harassed in public, and classmates killed. She said that during the 2022 protests “teenagers were writing their wills before going into the streets,” and she cited witnesses who counted “at least 80 children” killed in the crackdown, adding that the number had been even higher in the November 2019 uprising. She called the readiness of teenagers to join Resistance Units evidence of a generation that “knows it has no future under this regime.”
Being part of the #FreeIranYouthCongress reminded me what real leadership and perseverance look like.
Under Maryam Rajavi’s fearless guidance, we’ve learned that freedom is fought for, not given.
She’s shown us that the strength of women and youth is the driving force of freedom,… pic.twitter.com/T1RtqRGeyV— Sara (@SaraSutudumaram) October 27, 2025
Elaheh Mossadegh, a pharmacy student in Sweden, said her generation had “risen from the ashes of repression” and now regarded resistance as “a responsibility, not merely a hope.” Citing imprisoned students inside Iran, she vowed that youth abroad would “not lay down the banner of freedom until Iran is free.”
From the North American and European youth associations, Sepideh Orafa told the gathering that the movement’s young supporters saw the struggle as “a promise to those inside Iran that their courage will not be in vain.” She praised “the young members of the PMOI who grew up in free societies yet chose sacrifice over privilege,” calling their choice “a living reminder that freedom for one Iranian means freedom for all.”
Ryan Salami, another delegate from the same network, described his engagement as a personal moral duty: “I see the PMOI not just as a movement, but as a living embodiment of hope and purpose,” he said, adding that he joined “because change will come only through our own unity and organized persistence.”
THIS IS WOMAN POWER! https://t.co/523hjJKKB9
— Tracy Edwards (@TracyEdwardsMBE) October 28, 2025
Kianoush Sadeghpour, speaking after him, addressed “the enemies of Iran’s freedom and independence,” declaring that the young generation would not allow “the revolution of the people or its sacrifices to be stolen again,” a reference to 1979. “We are the descendants of those who swept away the Shah,” he said, “and we will also remove the mullahs.”
The meeting concluded with the reading of the Final Youth Resolution by Soroush Aboutalebi and Arash Momeni, who jointly summarized nine key points demanding the overthrow of the clerical regime and the establishment of a democratic republic. Their text condemned “both monarchy and theocracy” and pledged to support the Resistance Units and the platform of Maryam Rajavi.
Finally, Saba Rezaei delivered the closing words, reiterating the rally’s theme: “We can, we are able, and we must.” Rejecting both hereditary rule and religious despotism, she said, “The crown will not free us; it serves only itself. No king, past or future, can bring the democracy our people deserve. Our fight is for a free Iran — free of Shah and mullah alike.”
On Saturday, 25 October 2025, young Iranians from across Europe, the United States, Canada, Australia and other countries took part in a major online and in-person Youth Convention for a Democratic Republic in Iran in support of Maryam Rajavi.#FreeIranYouthCongress pic.twitter.com/zYWqMxreYY
— Firouz Mahvi (@FirouzMahvi) October 28, 2025
Throughout the meeting, several speakers pointed to “Ashraf 3,” described from the stage as “a symbol of resistance, perseverance, and unwavering resolve,” and “home to 1,000 women described as heroines and 1,000 former political prisoners.” Participants presented it as proof that, after missile strikes on Camp Liberty a decade ago that killed 24 PMOI members, the movement could regroup and physically rebuild in a short time. The argument offered was that the same model of rapid reconstruction could be applied “the day after” change in Iran.
The event closed with the reading of a joint resolution by youth representatives. The text described Iran as being in one of the most critical periods of its modern history after “105 years of dictatorship under Shah and mullahs.” It cited mass unemployment, “runaway inflation,” poverty, corruption, water and electricity shortages, and crises in housing and education, and said there is “no prospect of reform” under absolute clerical rule.
The resolution declared that “the solution for Iran is the overthrow of this regime and the establishment of democracy and popular sovereignty,” and argued that for the first time both “an explosive society” and “an organized democratic alternative” are present. It named the PMOI, with “60 years of struggle against Shah and the mullahs,” and the National Council of Resistance of Iran, with “44 years of insisting on democratic and revolutionary principles,” as that alternative.
#FreeIranYouthCongress Iranian Youth Congress Supporting PMOI/MEK and NCRI for a Democratic Republic. Maryam Rajavi: “The decisive force in the battle and uprising is Iran’s young and rebellious generation, who organize and mobilize.”
The Iranian Youth Congress, held on… pic.twitter.com/iv3xC5hNEJ
— Pouya BMT (@BMT_FreeIran) October 27, 2025
It praised the “Resistance Units,” saying they have carried out “thousands of operations against the IRGC and other centers of repression,” and said their actions have spread a “culture of resistance” even among non-political prisoners. It referred to a recent “12-day war” and said this had once again shown that regime change in Iran will not come from foreign military intervention or diplomatic accommodation, but from “the people and their organized resistance” — a line described as Maryam Rajavi’s “third option: neither war nor appeasement.”
The resolution also rejected any return to monarchy, calling “the prince and the monarchists” the “de facto allies of the clerical regime,” and accusing them of working “in the mullahs’ favor and obstructing the path of overthrow.” The final slogans were explicit: “No Shah, no Supreme Leader,” and “Death to Khamenei.”
On the sidelines of the #FreeIran2025 Youth Convention on October 25, 2025, our reporter Ryan Salami asked @farbodmah about the efforts by the remnants of the Shah's regime to present themselves as an alternative to the current regime. Here is his answer!#FreeIran2025 pic.twitter.com/GbDhQwpEJq
— SIMAY AZADI TV (@en_simayazadi) October 28, 2025
The signatories — identifying themselves as young specialists, academics, engineers, doctors, and entrepreneurs from Europe, North America, and Australia — pledged “active political and practical support” for the Resistance Units, the PMOI, and what they called “the heart of the Resistance, Ashraf 3.” They said their task was also to “block the plots and deals of those who oppose Iran’s freedom and independence,” and to convince “all international parties” to recognize the Resistance Units’ struggle.
They committed to provide financial support to the movement and to place their skills at the service of rebuilding a “free and prosperous Iran” after the fall of the current regime, “without any personal expectation.” The statement concluded with an oath to pursue that mission “down to our last breath,” and closed with: “Long live Iran. Long live freedom. Death to Khamenei. Hail to Rajavi.”