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List of political parties in Iran

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Political parties in Iran lists political parties in Iran. Iran is a state with regular presidential and parliamentary elections. The system as a whole is presently is a republic based on Islamic fundamentalists. Local elections have taken place in 1999 and 2003. A limited number of opposition parties are allowed, but are widely considered to have no real chance of gaining power.

[edit] The parties

It is quite difficult to get a clear view on Iranian political parties. The major Political Parties based in Iran seem to be the following:

Minor parties based in Iran include:

[edit] Opposition parties active in exile :

There are roughly 40 "parties" outside Iran which can be divided between 5 ideological branches :

- the Communists

- the Social-Democrats

- the Muslim-Democrats

- the Republican Nationalists

- the Monarchist Nationalists


What is important is that a lot of Iranians don't know the majority of these 40 exiled political parties. The parties known by all Iranians are People's Mujahedin of Iran, the Monarchists, the National Front, the Fadayan-e Khalq and the Tudeh Party (considered by many to be the "true" Communist Party). For example, few Iranians are aware of the existence of the Hekmatist Party although the latter is well active outside Iran. Only 5 parties out of the 40 could be considered powerful, in order :

- the People's Mujahedin of Iran of Maryam Rajavi, (Conservative)

- the Constitutionalist Party of Iran of Reza Pahlavi, (Democrat-Liberal)

- the United Republicans of Iran, (Social-Democratic) linked with the the Organisation of Iranian People's Fedaian (Majority), (Socialist)

- the National Front of Iran, (Center-Left)

- the Hekmatist Party of Koorosh Modaressi (Communist).


Only a union of the five parties cited above could be considered representative of the whole exiled Opposition Parties. There are important individuals with no parties who are also important : Ali Afshari, Amir Abbas Fakhravar or Manucher Mohammadi from the student segment, Mohsen Sazegara, a founder of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, Roya Tolouee, a woman activist, Hassan Shariatmadari, son of the late Grand Ayatollah Shariatmadari, etc.


The rest of the Opposition is insignificant, for example the "Labor Party", or the "Green Party", or the "Liberal Democratic Party", etc, are more very little associations than politial parties. But some are bigger to other ones:

- The Tudeh Party and the Komalah, which were important parties in the past, exist in a very anemic state.

- The National Movement of Iranian Resistance of Shahpour Bakhtiar and the PDKI of Abdul Rahman Qasimlo, although prominent parties in the past, have almost been destroyed with the killings of their charismatic leaders by the Islamic Republic.

- The new Marze Por Gohar Party is still too small, too localized and unknown.


There are news that since September 2005 some of these exiled parties who used to be very divided (even among groups of similar philosophies) have begun to unite.

A lot of parties tried to unite in the past and failed. Very few succeeded like the National Council of Resistance of Iran and the Workers Left Unity - Iran but they were (and are) only a union of two parties : the conservative People's Mujahedin of Iran and the marxist Organisation of Iranian People Fadee Guerillas for the first one and the Iranian fedaian communist league and the Organisation of Revolutionary Workers of Iran (Rahe Kargar) for the latter.

Since 2003 the pro-republican and leftist activists did what no others had done in the past : they created the United Republicans of Iran, a huge federation of leftist parties : [[1]].

But more importantly, a huge gathering of all important iranian parties and activists (including the monarchists and rightist parties like the Pan-Iranist Party) called "Neshaste Landan" took place in London for the first time in June 2006.

Before, some discussions had been held in Paris (Neshaste Paris) and later in Berlin (Neshaste Berlin). Since that time, cooperation and dialogue between them has accelerated. For the first time, a Republican (the spokesman of the National Front of Iran) Parviz Varjavand wrote in an article in August 2006 [[2]] that Democracy is compatible with both a Constitutional Monarchy and a Republic and that the issue is not between Constitutional Monarchy and Republic. The Green Party of Iran led by Kayvan Koboli said the same thing months before Parviz Varjavand : [[3]]. Recently, Heshmat Raeisi, ex-member of the Central Committee of both the Fedai and the Tudeh Party [[4]], participated in the sixth Congress of the Constitutionalist Party of Iran in November 2006 and gave a speech : [[5]]

This "Neshaste Landan" has been considered "historical" in the history of the Iranian Opposition by all political tendencies and has a special site : http://neshastelondon.info

But it hasn't produced any results until now. And the name of all the parties which took part in this gathering is not known.


Here are the names and the programs of all known iranian political parties based in exile (Europe, USA, Canada, Australia, and sometimes Turkey, Iraq, Dubai, Israel) :


1) the Communists

There are 16 iranian communist parties. However only three out of them could be considered active, namely the Hekmatist Party, the Organisation of Iranian People's Fedaian (Majority) and the Komalah.


---> The well-known Communist Party which used to be very powerful. No longer very active.

http://www.tudehpartyiran.org/


---> The two splits of the communists who follow the teachings of Mansour Hekmat :

http://www.wpiran.org

http://www.hekmatist.com


---> The 6 splits of the Fadaian Party :

http://www.fadai.org/

http://www.fadaian-minority.org/

http://www.siahkal.com/

http://www.fadaian.org/

http://www.etehadefedaian.org/

http://fedayi.org/


---> And the others :

http://www.cpiran.org/

  • Komalah Communist Party totally composed by kurdish Iranians led by Secretary General Abdollah Mohtadi. Spokesman : Ebrahim Alizadeh

http://www.komalah.org or http://www.komala.org

http://www.sarbedaran.org/

  • Toufan Labor Party of Iran (supporting Enver Hoxha's communism).

http://www.toufan.org/

http://www.ranjbaran.org/

http://www.jonbesh-iran.com/

http://www.rahekargar.net/


2) The Social-Democrats

Only the United Republicans of Iran could be considered as active. It should be noted that the "United Republicans" is not a party but a federation of socialist parties and leftist individuals without party aimed at bringing the dispersed and often antagonistic Iranians together : several veteran Iranian political dinosaurs like Mehdi Khanbaba Tehrani, one of the leaders of a former Maoist group, Babak Amirkhosravi, the ex-leader of the Tudeh Party, Manoochehr Sabetian, a founder of now defunct Confederation of Iranian Students and Rahmat Khosravi.


http://www.jomhouri.com/

http://www.iran-e-sabz.org/

http://www.iran-jommelli.com/

http://www.spiran.com/

http://www.irandp.org



3) The Muslim-Democrats (Conservatives)

Neither secular nor islamist, whereas they claim to be secular. They are against the application of the Sharia but at the same time oppose everything opposed to the main principles of Islam. Note : they believe in the equality between men and women. Recently opposed terrorism. Used to have an "army" in Iraq. Considered to be the best organized opposition group of Iran.

http://www.mojahedin.org/



4) The Republican Nationalists

Among them, the National Front and the Marze Por Gohar are the most active. The Republican Nationalists have many contacts inside Iran and can be divided between two factions : the historical "Mossadeghists" and the new-born Liberals.


> The "Mossadeghists", united in an organization called "Melliun" [[6]]. They have the particularity of being the only opposition parties to be openly present in Iran (with the Pan-Iranist Party):

http://www.jebhemelli.net/ or http://www.jebhemelli.org/ or http://www.jebhe.org/

http://www.melliun.org/hezbeir02.htm or http://www.hezbeiran.persianblog.com/

http://www.melliun.org/hezbemel02.htm or https://hezbemellateiran.com/

> The Liberals : (they were created after the 1979 Revolution and thus were not present during the Mossadegh era)

???

http://www.marzeporgohar.org

http://www.iranliberal.com/ linked with http://www.liberaldemocrat-ir.net/

http://www.azadeganiran.com/



5) The Monarchist Nationalists

Only the Constitutionalist Party of Iran is active. Except the Pan-Iranist Party, all the others are considered as almost dead. Some people say the Iranian Motherland Party no longer exists although it has been denied.


http://irancpi.net/

http://www.cmi-fl.com/

http://www.derafsh.org/

http://www.hezbemihan.org/

http://www.paniranist.org/ or http://www.paniranism.org/ or http://www.paniranist.com/

http://www.melliun.org/nehzatm.htm or http://impact.users.netlink.co.uk/namir/namirm.html


6) Kurdish Parties

http://www.pdki.org/

http://www.pjak.com/

[edit] See also

This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.
fa:احزاب سیاسی ایران

fr:Liste de partis politiques en Iran

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