madam president i will not repeat what was said already regarding the ruthless iranian theocratic regime
i agree with those positions but i want to approach the subject from an angle similar to that used by my fellow mep mr mayer who has just left
iran a country with thousands of years of civilisation and culture is today in a sorry state of affairs as far as democracy civil rights and justice are concerned
some of our countries in the west are not free from blame for this situation
let us not forget that governments such as those of the usa and britain have for years supported armed and kept in power the well-known monstrous dictatorship of the shah of iran
it was inevitable that when the shah was finally overthrown by popular uprising islamic extremists would find fertile ground to root themselves in power and cultivate feelings of hate towards the west
then came the excessively aggressive behaviour of successive us administrations and the position of drastic sanctions which only caused further suffering to ordinary iranian people and further aggravated their hostile feelings towards the west
hopefully the new president of the usa mr obama who has shown signs that he prefers to fight with his brain rather than with his fists as the previous president mr bush so unsuccessfully did will give new hope for the improvement of the likes of the iranian people and the betterment of relations with the west
such an approach will help ordinary iranian citizens understand that the west wants to be their friend not their enemy and eventually the people of iran will themselves overthrow the islamic fundamentalist regime that so undemocratically controls their lives and causes them so much suffering as in the case at the centre of our debate here today
