Why Iranian anti-regime protesters are out on the streets of London now

Squally showers of rain fell as tourists gathered around the statues of Winston Churchill and Nelson Mandela in London’s Parliament Square. The scene could not have been further removed from the equivalent in Tehran, but here was a group of Iranian protesters literally regrouping in the wake of what US President Donald Trump dubbed the “12-day war” a few weeks ago.

Why marshal up for a protest now, on a mid-summer Sunday, when a strange interregnum between peace and war has settled into place?

The reasons for taking to the streets remain urgent. Organiser Ellie Borhan explains that the need for a new system is more pressing than ever. Under a new banner of the National Co-operation Campaign, the organisers would like to provide a bigger tent for the exiles opposed to the system headed by Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to push their agenda.

It is worth noting that sometimes these protests can turn violent. There were clashes outside the Iranian embassy in London less than a month ago, which led to arrests of both protesters and supporters of the current establishment in Tehran.

Teenagers and pensioners alike gathered on Sunday. There was even an Elvis-like singer who sang freedom songs. Many were royalists who would want the son of the Shah deposed in 1979 restored to power. Whether the people of Iran would come out for that remains a deeply controversial topic of conversation on these occasions.

To the question as to why come on to the streets now is a straightforward answer. Many of these people are enduring threats in the UK and facing family safety issues back home. Some have arrived in the UK in the past few years, while others have been here for decades.

Despite enjoying the protection of UK laws, and some police presence around their demonstrations, there is a potential cost to this assembly. But to keep the cause of change in Iran alive, these demonstrators emphasised the importance of amplifying the voices of Iranians still inside the system.

It is not long before talk turned to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the defender of the Iranian establishment, and how it has acted since the American and Israeli bombing raids on the country. For Ms Borhan, something has changed.

She has been campaigning in the UK for years. But when the war was on, the IRGC included her family in the round-up of those that it deemed suspicious. “Any person who is on the front of these protests, who is planning them or setting up events inside the Parliament, is raising awareness of what is happening inside Iran,” she said.

It is already taken for granted that many of the people who choose to take a public stand in the UK cannot do so without knowing that this means a cut-off from their homeland. If they return to Iran, they risk problems with the authorities and potential detention.

Tariq Ahmad, the former UK Middle East minister, spoke last week of how conscious he was while in office about the issue of prisoners and hostages when he was dealing with his Iranian counterparts. The fact that these people were in detention and facing dangers was something real to him, and it guided his diplomatic interactions with Tehran.

Iran is in intense discussions with the big three European powers over its nuclear programme in the wake of the American-Israeli bombings. The Europeans have threatened to use their powers to “snap back” UN sanctions on Tehran by the end of the summer, if these talks do not involve meaningful concessions. Yet, at the same time, France is appealing for three of its citizens, and the UK is working to secure the release of a married couple, who are being held in Iran. These are real factors, too, in diplomacy stemming from the system’s internal controls.

The IRGC’s raid on Ms Borhan’s family home led to a physical assault on her brother, as well as degrading and inhumane treatment, during the interrogation. She said the IRGC’s search for his connections to her dissent included a strategy of damaging his dignity. Once reunited with her mother, who was also held, the family convened a crisis meeting before deciding to leave their homeland.

For the opposition, there is a bitter coincidence of external weakness mixed with steelier internal repression coming out of recent events. They can see that Mr Khamenei was forced to shelter in a bunker during the spiral of events that not only saw bombs fall on the nuclear facilities, but assassinations of key figures associated with Iran’s nuclear programme and the IRGC itself.

Yet the propaganda and internal repression grow stronger. Exposed as lacking the capability to respond to aerial attacks or through its regional network of allies, the Iranian leadership is left with the tools it has to turn on its own people. Ms Borhan notes that this loss of prestige for the system has resulted in a bitter harvest inside Iran.

“They lost their pride,” she said. “They couldn’t even keep their own people safe in Iran. Everyone saw how much they have been weakened.”

Sunday’s protests, with more such meetings likely in the future, need to be viewed as keeping their movement alive.