Paris, February 22, 2025 – Speaking at the NCRI conference on the eve of International Women’s Day, former Colombian Senator Ingrid Betancourt delivered a powerful speech, declaring that “Love will free Iran.” She emphasized that a free Iran, led by women, would bring change to the world and urged unity in the fight against dictatorship.
Betancourt condemned both the Shah’s regime and the current clerical rule, calling them two sides of the same coin in their oppression of women. She pointed out the irony of how Iranian women were once punished for wearing the headscarf under the monarchial dictatorship and are now punished for refusing it under clerical rule, highlighting the regime’s continued control over women’s choices.
She praised Maryam Rajavi’s leadership, noting how she has built an organization where women lead at all levels and men embrace equality, rather than competition. She highlighted the sense of sisterhood and respect within the PMOI, where women uplift each other instead of competing—a model she believes should be embraced worldwide.
Excerpts of Ingrid Betancourt’s speech follow:
Il n’y a aucun endroit au monde où je voudrais célébrer le jour de la femme ailleurs qu’ici.
Et si vous me permettez, je vais je vais continuer en anglais. Parce que nous sommes dans un contexte international et j’ai beaucoup d’amis, ma très chère amie de de l’équateur et je voudrais qu’on puisse se comprendre.
Yes, there’s no place on earth I would like to celebrate Women’s Day, than here. Because here we are at the core of women’s rights fighters. The women of the Iranian Resistance have been fighters for women’s rights for a lifetime.
For life, since they were kids. I remember when I when I asked Maryam some years ago, why they used the scarves. And she explained to me, she said, you know, when I was very young, we were under the Shah tyranny. And the Shah tyranny decided that women in Iran couldn’t wear a scarf. And we were against the Shah and his tyranny, so we decided that no, he wouldn’t impose on us his law and that we were going to use the scarf.
How strange, don’t you think, that years after a woman is killed like Mahsa Amini because she doesn’t want to wear a scarf? Two tyrannies working against women. Against the right for women to be who they are. To live their culture, to live their soul, and to have the right to express themselves as they want to do.
And, I wanted to thank Maryam for the incredible speech she rendered to us today. Because I think at the core of her reflection is what it means to go against women in the world.
What does that mean? What is to be misogynistic today? Well, today, as yesterday, it’s the open door for tyranny.
So strange, for example, that the Shah, which is misogynistic, is also the one that is talking about the revolution, the resurgent revolution for Iran, and that finds no other better way than to exclude all parties, all political expression in order to rule all by himself. His Prime Minister was at the same time the Secretary General of his own party. It was like in-house things.
The country was his possession, and it’s exactly the same behavior that we find in the ayatollahs today. So, I’m reminded of an article I read in in in in in an Iranian state-controlled, newspaper.
And it was interesting because they were bragging that finally, having the opposition today of the monarchists was very good because in fact, well, the monarchists would never be able to conquer power again, but they were so useful to divide the opposition in Iran.
Well, you know what? The opposition is not divided. Because monarchists are the same thing as the Ayatollahs. They are in the same bunch, and the resistance is a resistance of human rights, of the 10 points of Maryam that she has been repeating for years, for decades. And it’s exactly what we women of the world, all here, we’re not Iranian, some of us, some other Iranians, but we are all fighting for the same things all over the world.
But I think that we have to recall what Maryam told us today because I think it speaks about what is the difference. Why does being here in the Iranian resistance mean so much to all of us?
Well, it’s because it’s the first organization in the whole world, in the history of the world. I think except the myth of the Amazonian women, but it’s the only organization where women are at the core of leadership.
We women are always, whoever has done politics here, we know that we are always like looked as a second-best choice. We have to fight our way through in order to be able to sit at the table. Well, here, women are sitting at the table.
Why? Because there is this leader, Maryam Rajavi, who has decided… Well, I’m going to say something. I know that Maryam thinks that she’s not exceptional. But I want to tell you that you are exceptional. Because you didn’t arrive at the position you have, to be the leader of this resistance, just because of destiny. Because you had to assume it. No.
You have done what nobody could do, which was to think about how to confront, not the Iranian regime of tyranny, but the whole system of tyranny that has been up in Iran for decades. The Shah, and the Ayatollahs for so long how to confront it.
And you gave the opportunity to the women of your organization to prepare themselves for leadership, to be able to understand and learn and learn how to manage, how to administrate, how to do these organizations, these venues. I mean, I have been coming to these rallies for years.
It’s always pristine. I mean, the schedule, the transportation of everyone. When we have, I’m talking now, not because I go first of any of you, but it’s because I have a train to catch. And they know, and so they are pushing me so that I can be here and then go to the other place I have commitments with. And this is for all of us, all the time, 100%. This is what women do. They coordinate. They organize.
They make things happen. They make things happen. And what is beautiful in this organization is not only that women are leaders at all stages of the hierarchy, but that men are leaders too, and that men are not competing. They don’t feel bad because women are making decisions. They feel motivated. They feel it’s another type of gender relationship, and that’s what I want for the world.
So, when we think about your words, you were talking about confronting narcissism, confronting ego-centric pulses in potions. Well, we have plenty of those right now in the world. Wow. We need women. We need women right now to the top of to take decisions in this world right now.
.@IBetancourtCol: What’s beautiful in this organization is that women lead at all levels, and men lead too—without competition or resentment. They are motivated by a new kind of gender relationship, one that should be a model for the world. #IWD2025https://t.co/AY2TAIZG6r
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) February 22, 2025
But I think this is something that is so important to understand that what we bring is the soul, that we bring spirituality to politics, that we bring another way of relating to making decisions and, for example, when I think of Maryam and I think, how did she know what is the key of her success?
I’ve been observing you for so long. And I think there are things like, for example, respect. I have always seen her respecting all the other people in her organization, especially women. Because you know that women with women, we tend to be a little nasty sometimes. Right?
Yeah. So here, no. Here we have a sisterhood. That’s so important to build on sisterhood, to be respectful, to have a sense of justice, to give to whoever made it better than you to just say it.
You were better. You were good. You were so much. You impressed me. I mean, to be able to construct solidarity and empathy. And that’s what I think is love.
And just to leave you with all my love, with all my love, I want to say that through you, through you all, but through you, because you’re embodying all this Resistance, Love will free Iran. Love will free Iran.
And because that’s how it works, and I really believe that if we take care of Iran, we take care of many things in the world. I think that the day we see this free run that we’re expecting, but free with the input of women, the world will change. Iran will make the world change.
So, my dear sisters, friends, of my heart, all of you, let’s rise to change together as women with men.
Thank you.