Iran Document: Mousavi on the Green Movement's Strategy and Goals (22 April)

Khordaad 88 translates the Rah-e-Sabz report of Mir Hossein Mousavi's meeting with the National Religious Front on Thursday:

In a meeting...with a group of religious-nationalist activists, Mousavi said: “To achieve our national interests and a desired society, there is no solution other than insisting on Green Movement. This is a process that needs patience, perseverance and call for great endurance against the hardships and challenges ahead.”

The Latest from Iran (24 April): Speaking of Rights

Mousavi expressed that the Green Movement sets and follows up on goals that are originated in the values and demands of the Iranian people. He said: “We must create a coherent civil society using all the available resources in the country.” He then expressed how necessary it is to create “people’s green institutions” in different affairs of the country to push forward for gradual creation of the desired civil society. He added: “What happened in the 25th of Khordaad last year in Tehran with that heavy and kind presence of people together accompanied by an environment of peace, endurance, perseverance and kinship along with their reaction as civil dissidents is a perfect example of a desired civil society.”


He further insisted on the “necessity to live with political goals and value” and said: “Our task is challenging, and the road ahead of the Green Movement is long and full of twists and turns. Although it is possible that the Green Movement would reach its goals much earlier than what many expect, however, we must be patience and maintain our perseverance. To continue the Green Movement, we must live with the Green Movement.”

Being patience, and maintain perseverance is costly

In this meeting Mousavi said: “Of course it is costly to remain patience and maintain perseverance on the goals of the Green Movement. There is no escaping that. Hardships, challenges, constrain, pressures, clampdown, and prisons are there, but we have no way other than going through these costs and hardships.” He alluded to discussions on how parties tend to orient themselves to gain power and added: “That is not a flaw for parties, but in the green movement the goal of acquiring power is only something on the side relative to the main goals of the Green Movement. The purpose of the Green Movement is to revolutionize the society to achieve a civil society that Iranians deserve. This approach that insists on sidelining the acquiring of power can bring us calm. If we can somehow expand this view in the society, it will be very beneficial and affective for us.”

Change is brought about through new Ideas

Mousavi insisted that “raising awareness is to be a very important priority” and said: “Change would be possible through birth of new ideas. In our case, it seems that the idea has been born already. The more we expand it, the more we can expand the range and possibilities of the Green Movement.” He added: “More than ever, we must try to raise awareness among the citizens living in the ‘gray area’ who neither accompany the Green Movement nor advocate the authorities. We must tell them about the ‘lucid area’, and attract them to the Green Movement.” He further added: “Those who hold the power are most wary about the increase in awareness. In fact, they are so worried that they are react extremely harshly to raising awareness on the number of martyrs in the movement, the realities of what happened in the clampdowns, clarifications of the movement goal, or publishing news of inhumane behaviour towards the detainees."

Press and media are critical issues for us

Mousavi said: “Press and media are critical issues for the movement but unfortunately, for different reasons, we lagging behind on these fronts [Press, media, and raising awareness in the society]. He went on: “We are still not fully utilizing the Internet and the Cyberspace.”

In another part of his talks, he emphasized: “We must all be together, stand by each other. We must agree on some of the minimums, and choose aims and slogans that are capable putting the most of together. Just as all dissident citizens have realized the Green color as a minimum common point, we must find minimum requirements that we can all share and push together to expand the Green Movement.”

We are concerned with National Interests

In this meeting Mousavi said: “It must be clear to all that we are only concerned about national interests. There is not self interest here. We do not want to stand behind oppression and the oppressor. We stand behind the oppressed. I must add though that the Green Movement is in favour of talks and negotiating to settle somewhere. We must all participate in a dialogue, put our thoughts together with all the groups who care about Iran and follow up on our national interests so that we can continue on this long and challenging path ahead.”

Advocates of Compassionate Religion

He emphasized that “we are advocates of a compassionate reading of religion, a reading that necessitates the maximal tolerance for differences of opinion.” He added: “Promoting such compassionate readings is a difficult task, but the Green Movement can feel it weigh on its shoulders. I feel a danger lurking in how our new generations are getting away from religion, and religious values. Harsh reactions, violence, clampdowns under the name of Islamic Governance could possibly push away many of the youth from any religion.”

Mousavi also alluded to recent changes and the point that “instead of sticking to one way of governance, we must be more flexible [to switch to other forms that would meet our needs better.]” He explained: “Modern artists have two approaches. A group of them put what they have seen or imagined into the painting. The other group, start without any vision of what the final piece would look like, and gradually give birth to images that create the painting. What is going on in the Green Movement could be characterised as the latter.”

Comments

[Kipu Nerek]

I think this is a great post. One thing that I find the most helpful is number five. Sometimes when I write, I just let the flow of the words and information come out so much that I loose the purpose. It’s only after editing when I realize what I’ve done. There’s defiantly a lot of great tips here I’m going to try to be more aware of.