Is Iran Really Trying to Change Its Ways?

In the Opinion page article "Iran Through a Distorted Lens," March 2, the author writes:"During the 1980s, the US and the West exaggerated the Iranian threat and refused to recognize emerging changes in Iran."

The facts indicate otherwise. In his February 1992 report, Reynaldo Galindo Pohl, special representative of the United Nations Human Rights Commission (UNHRC), concluded that "Iran made no appreciable progress" concerning human rights. The UN official reported that the number of executions in 1991 had dramatically increased compared with the preceding year.

In March the UNHRC condemned the flagrant human-rights abuses by the ruling mullahs for the 11th time in 11 years. Earlier this month, the European Parliament denounced the "ethnic and sexist discrimination, particularly reflected in the marginalization of women" and deplored "the continuing increase in the Iranian regime's terrorist activities outside Iran."

The reality of Iran is so compelling and out of step with the global trend that substantive steps are required to rectify their international image. Alireza Jafarzadeh, Washington US Spokesman, People's Mojahedin of Iran

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