The Farshgard Foundation, which had previously announced its full financial and moral support for the rally of Iranians against the Islamic Republic regime in Dusseldorf and had been promoted as the sole financial sponsor of this program, had so far remained silent about the process of planning for this event which was held in Dusseldorf on February 11th, 2023. In the interests of transparency, the Foundation now intends to provide more information about this event to the public.
A group of political activists in Europe, including the Association of Iranian Athletes for Freedom and the Association for the Promotion of Open Society (APOS), intended to hold an event against the Islamic Republic on February 11th and chose the city of Dusseldorf, Germany for this purpose. They contacted the Farshgard Foundation for financial support and sponsorship, and the Foundation provided them with full moral and financial support.
Mr. Abdolreza Ahmadi a member of the Iranian Liberal Student and Graduates as well as APOS and Mr. Majid Fallah from the Association of Iranian Athletes for Freedom formally designated Mr. Amir Hossein Tamizkar as the executive director and coordinator of this event to the Farshgard Foundation through a formal letter, and a contract was signed with Mr. Tamizkar in this regard. This contract specifically stipulated conditions on non-partisan nature of speakers and participants, in an attempt to prevent repeating the Berlin rally fiasco, where certain speakers were removed at the last moment to satisfy a political agenda. Unlike the October 22nd 2022 Berlin rally, the Foundation was determined to be the true voice of the Iranian people.
During the week leading up to the event, Mr. Abdolreza (Reza) Ahmadi falsely claimed to be the sole organizer and in secret promised censorship of the Farshgard Foundation, while receiving funds from the same Foundation.
One of the guests who was supposed to attend the Dusseldorf event in support of the Iranian people's revolution against the Islamic Republic was Mr. Charlie Weimers, a member of the European Parliament. However, as reported to us, just one day before the event, certain individuals close to Mr. Bashirtash (whose wife is a Belgian parliamentarian, Ms. Darya Safai) reportedly pressured the oragnizers with threats and accusations to remove Mr. Weimers, preventing his presence at this event and support for the Iranian people.
Two days before the event, in a meeting with the organizers, Mr. Hamed Fard (one of the invited musicians for the event) disparaged Ms. Mitra Jashni, the executive director of the Farshgard Foundation, opposed her presence in the event. In a group call with Mr. Tamizkar and Ms. Sara Arjmand and Mr. Ivar Farhadi, Mr. Fard made baseless accusations about the executive director of the Farshgard Foundation. But he later announced that he had made those remarks out of anger, which was accepted by Ms. Jashni. The Foundation was still hopeful that the program would proceed according to the plans and without tension.
According to Mr. Majid Fallah and Amirhossein Temizkar, on the last day and after the Farshgard Foundation had paid the fees for several services in advance, a person whose identity was kept hidden by Mr. Abdolreza Ahmadi and his assistant Mr. Vahid Davoudi, made the promise to cover the remaining expenses, on the condition that some groups and specifically the Farshgard Foundation were excluded from the event and Ms. Mitra Jashni be removed as a speaker. On February 10th, Mr. Ahmadi, without the knowledge of other organizers (including Mr. Amirhossein Temizkar, who was the executive manager of the organizing body), practically hijacked the event and removed Ms. Jashni from the list of speakers by publishing an unauthorized poster.
Upon learning of this unethical conduct and violation of the contract by these individuals just one day before the event, the Farshgard Foundation was left with no choice but to terminate the contract in accordance with its terms. However, a large portion of the expenses had already been paid in advance. Therefore, the Farshgard Foundation reserves the right to pursue all legal avenues to assert its rights and seek compensation from all parties involved.
If the program organizers did not wish to cooperate with the Farshgard Foundation for any reason, why did they request financial support from the Foundation several weeks before and sign a contract, and ask the Farshgard Foundation to pay the costs in advance? Why did they violate the contract, hijack the event, and remove certain speakers, just after finding a secret financial sponsor on the very last day?
The foundation chose not to raise these issues at the time in order to avoid any further division and rift among Iranian pro-democracy activists and event participants. However, the Iranian people have the right to know that some of the supposed opposition groups and activists against Islamic Republic are only concerned with promoting themselves and their personal agenda and garnering financial support and funding from foreign governments, at the expense of stoking division among the opposition and censoring the authentic voices of dissent. Ironically, such individuals always talk about unity among the opposition, but in practice, they seek to eliminate and discredit others and settle personal scores.
Postscript: The contract with the organizers and the receipt of all prepayments and all financial documents are available and can be viewed by interested parties upon request.