Journalist and women’s rights activist Masih Alinejad delivered a powerful address at the United Nations during an emergency Security Council meeting on Iran, accusing the Islamic Republic of behaving like ISIS and condemning what she described as the UN’s silence amid ongoing violence against protesters. Alinejad also detailed alleged assassination and kidnapping plots against her, urging global leaders to act.
00:09Millions of unarmed Iranians, innocent and unarmed protesters have been silenced with
00:16bullets, mass arrest, prison and a total communications blackout.
00:23No internet, no cell phones and no landlines.
00:28They put Iran in a total darkness.
00:32I am here to bring their voices here in this room.
00:36I now give the floor to Ms. Masih Alinejad.
00:42Hello everyone.
00:51My name is Masih Alinejad.
00:53I am a woman from Iran.
00:55Mr. President, Excellency members of the Council, I am honored to be invited by the United
01:02States to testify before United Nations Security Council.
01:05I am here today to warn you.
01:09On behalf of millions of Iranians, what is needed now to bring justice to those who order massacre
01:15in Iran is real and concrete action against a regime that do not understand the language
01:22of diplomacy.
01:24The United Nations has failed to respond with the urgency this moment demands.
01:33The Secretary-General himself has not spoken publicly against the massacre unfolding in Iran.
01:42Only a written statement through his spokesperson, silence, at this moment sends a signal, send
01:49a message to the killers of young protesters alongside their family members.
01:55I strongly believe that the regime in Iran heard the clear message from the Secretary-General.
02:04I think the members of this body have forgotten the privilege and responsibility of sitting
02:11in this room.
02:13Secretary-General, I know you hear me.
02:15I want to directly talk to you.
02:19Why are you afraid of the Islamic Republic?
02:22Millions of unarmed Iranians, innocent and unarmed protesters, have been silenced with bullets,
02:30mass arrests, prison, and a total communications blackout.
02:35No internet, no cell phones, and no landlines.
02:41They put Iran in a total darkness.
02:44I am here to bring their voices here in this room.
02:47I am here to tell you that a brutal slaughter has taken place in my beloved homeland, Iran.
02:54And it will get much worse if the world do not take serious action.
03:01Iran is facing a nationwide uprising that cuts across Iran, across the society, with a clear
03:10demand to end the Islamic Republic.
03:14At the same time, a nationwide campaign by the Islamic Republic to erase it, to silence people.
03:20The protests start on December 28, sparked by the collapse of Iranian currency.
03:27But immediately, immediately, turned into what Iranian people call it, a revolution.
03:33A total rejection against 47 years of tyranny and oppression.
03:39The protests spread to more than 100 cities and involved every layer of the societies.
03:47Shopkeepers, workers, teachers, nurses, and those who wave the historic lion and sun flag.
03:58And those ethnic minorities, including Kurds, Baloch, all other minorities, men and women, shoulder to shoulder in the streets.
04:08When it comes to freeing Iran, I have to say that loud and clear that all Iranians are united.
04:18From Tehran, from Tehran to Tabriz, to Rash, to Ahwaz, from major cities to small towns and villages that we barely even heard the names of those small towns and villages in the media.
04:32They are in the streets.
04:33Millions of Iranians flooded into the streets demanding that their money stop being stolen and sending to Hamas, to Hezbollah, to Houthi the money of the workers.
04:47The money of innocent people who do not have now the capability of to buy a bread.
04:54The entire nation looking at freedom right now.
04:59What followed was regime using military weapons, AK-47, against innocent people.
05:05According to Iran International Media Broadcasting, the death toll has passed more than 12,000.
05:13Just a day later, CBS reported more than 20,000 people have been killed.
05:20And they are not the numbers. They are not the statistics.
05:23We don't even know the real numbers.
05:27Citizen journalists from inside Iran have sent videos showing piles and piles of body bags on the top of each other.
05:37Iranians exile. Because of the internet shutdown, they zoom in to make sure whether their relatives and their beloved ones are on the body bags or not.
05:50I myself have received urgent phone calls and phone messages from Iranians thanks to Starlink inside the country asking outside world for urgent help.
06:02They welcome when President Trump offered to rescue unarmed people being shot in their heart, in their chest, by the security forces inside Iran.
06:15One activist who cannot be named for his safety told me the streets are full of dead bodies.
06:23They are finishing, they are finishing, they are finishing off the injured in the street.
06:29They told me the security forces have stormed into hospitals and taking away the injured.
06:37I have also received multiple messages from families of victims who say the security forces forced them to pay money to take the dead body of their beloved one to bury them.
06:50On January 8th, 2026, the Islamic Republic shut down the internet and imposed a technical blackout.
07:01Not to stop protests, because people are fed up and they are in the streets anywhere, but to hide their crimes, their brutality.
07:10This was not a technical mistake or failure. It was deliberate.
07:14When a regime turns off the internet during mass killings, and at the same time, the leaders of the same regime using the privilege of freedom of speech on social media to mislead the rest of the world,
07:29it is not about restoring order. It is about destroying the evidence.
07:35If it was not for restarting inside Iran, we couldn't have been able to have even these informations.
07:44The Islamic Republic does not limit its crimes within its own borders.
07:49They kill their opponents at home and target those who expose their brutality abroad.
07:56Here, even here, on U.S. soil, and every corner of the world, in Europe, in Canada, in Australia, everywhere.
08:06And they are not alone.
08:09This is called transnational repression, and the Chinese government helping them,
08:14Venezuelan dictators are helping them, Russian mobsters being hired by the Islamic Republic to target their dissidents and opponents beyond their own borders.
08:21I now address the representative of the Islamic Republic directly.
08:29You have tried to kill me three times.
08:34I have seen my would-be assassin with my own eyes in front of my garden in my home in Brooklyn.
08:43In the United States of America, in the courthouse, I have seen my would-be assassin confessing that they have been hired,
08:51by the Revolutionary Guards, to end my life.
08:55My crime?
08:57Simply echoing the voice of innocent people that you killed them.
09:01Your leader, Ali Khamenei.
09:07He ordered my killing.
09:09He said that American agent, who compared compulsory to the job to the Berlin Wall, must be killed.
09:15I am that woman, and I am not the agent of America.
09:17I have agency, but I am thankful to the American government and the law enforcement to protect my life.
09:24And if it was not the protection of the law enforcement, I couldn't have been here to testify for millions of people who are facing the same killers,
09:35facing the same terrorist regime in my country.
09:38Yes, protection matters.
09:39Unfortunately, I live with survivor's guilt, because many Iranians do not have the same protection.
09:58The same IRGC with the same AK-47 killed them in front of the eyes of their family member.
10:06Two would-be assassins received a 25-year prison sentence here in New York,
10:12and I am going to face two other killers being hired by the Islamic Republic in March.
10:17And they are the ones who were assigned by the same IRGC member to assassinate President Trump.
10:24The Islamic Republic rules through fear.
10:28It makes people disappear from public life, from memory, from history.
10:34So today, I want to record the names of those who refuse to be afraid and erased.
10:43Setayesh Shafi'i, 20 years old.
10:47Before the Internet was cut, she wrote on her social media,
10:51They are cutting off my Internet, but I love you all.
10:56She was killed by the Islamic Republic IRGC.
11:03Rabin Moradi, 17 years old.
11:07Shot in the back.
11:09A young football player.
11:11He was killed by the same IRGC.
11:15Mehdi Zatparwar, a popular athlete.
11:19He wrote on his Instagram before going to the street.
11:24I know I may be killed, but I have no fear.
11:29I want my rights.
11:31He was killed by the same IRGC.
11:36Siavash Shirzad, 30 years old.
11:39His family begged him not to go to the streets because of his safety.
11:49He said to his family,
11:52I go to the street to celebrate the victory of our revolution
11:57because President Trump promised to rescue our lives.
12:03He was killed by the same Revolutionary Guards.
12:06Negin Qadimi, 20 years old.
12:10She died in her father's arms after being shot by the Revolutionary Guards member.
12:17I feel guilty that I don't name the rest.
12:31The list of names goes on and on.
12:34They knew they would face guns and bullets, but they wanted justice.
12:45So now let me name their killers.
12:48Ali Khamenei, who declared protesters would be put in their place.
12:53Judiciary Chief Ghulam Hussein Mohseni Ajayi and the IRGC commanders
13:00who publicly, publicly vowed punishment would be maximum.
13:06Ali La Rijani, who promised no mercy for those who questioned the regime
13:12while his own daughter, his own family, live here in the United States of America.
13:19They don't deserve to enjoy the privilege of freedom in America.
13:25Like the other children and relatives of the Ayatollahs saying death to America,
13:29their relatives live here in America.
13:33Three years ago, another Iranian human rights defender stood here in this room
13:38to warn you about another nationwide protest,
13:42women, life, freedom, after the murder of Mahsa, Gina, Amini,
13:47for the crime of simply showing a bit of her hair.
13:51How many women are sitting here?
13:54You could easily get killed simply for showing your hair.
13:58Mahsa got killed. That sparked a revolution.
14:02And women and men's shoulder-to-shoulder took to the street.
14:04More than 700 people got killed.
14:06We have seen this before.
14:10We have more names to remember.
14:12In 2009, Neda Agha Sultan,
14:16symbol of more than 100 people who got killed,
14:20they named President Obama to protect them.
14:23President Obama was looking to open the doors of diplomacy
14:29to a regime whose language of negotiating with its own people
14:33is guns and bullets.
14:36We have seen this in 2019
14:39with Pouya Bakhtiari,
14:42who was killed in front of the eyes of his mother,
14:46Nahid Chirpiche.
14:48At the same time, President Biden
14:50was trying to keep the doors of diplomacy open,
14:53handing out billions of dollars
14:55to the regime
14:56that forced the family members
14:59to give money to the regime
15:01to take the dead body of their beloved one back.
15:05Faced with the regime,
15:06using military weapons against civilians,
15:10the Iranian people are asking the world to help
15:13through actions,
15:14not back-to-back meetings and empty condemnation.
15:18We don't need empty wards.
15:21People of Iran are asking the Islamic Republic,
15:25are telling you,
15:26the Islamic Republic no longer can be reformed,
15:30and asking you that the Islamic Republic
15:32no longer be treated as a legitimate government.
15:36Today, the number of those killed
15:39is much higher than I told you.
15:43This regime, again and again,
15:46cannot be reformed.
15:48Let me be very clear,
15:49the Islamic Republic behave like ISIS,
15:53and the Islamic Republic must be treated like ISIS.
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