<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<article>
  <category>press-releases</category>
  <content>&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Brussels&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;, &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;em&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;25 March 2009&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Leading Iranian opposition figures will be meeting in &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Brussels&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;, &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Belgium&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt; for a two-day conference on&lt;strong&gt; 1-2 April 2009&lt;/strong&gt; to discuss the prospects for democratization and federalism in the Islamic Republic of Iran.&lt;span&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Entitled &lt;strong&gt;&amp;lsquo;Human Rights and the Question of Democratization and Federalism in &lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Iran&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;&amp;rsquo;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;, the conference panels will discuss federalism&amp;rsquo;s potential to accommodate &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Iran&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;&amp;rsquo;s patchwork of ethnicities. Discussion will dwell on the issues of autonomy, democratization, good governance, and press freedom before a final debate on the question of what the future may hold for &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Iran&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;The conference will be opened at &lt;/span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;9.00am&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt; in Room P4B001 of the European Parliament&amp;rsquo;s Paul-Henri Spaak building&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt; by &lt;strong&gt;Angelika Beer MEP&lt;/strong&gt;, member of the Greens/European Free Alliance Group and chairwoman of the European Parliament delegation for relations with &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Iran&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;.&lt;span&gt;&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;Opening speeches will also be made by the co-sponsor of the conference, &lt;strong&gt;Marco Cappato MEP&lt;/strong&gt;, vice-chairman of the delegation for relations with the Mashreq countries.&lt;span&gt;&amp;nbsp; &lt;/span&gt;Their remarks will be accompanied by contributions from &lt;strong&gt;Graham Watson MEP&lt;/strong&gt; (tbc), leader of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE) in the European Parliament, &lt;strong&gt;Baroness Nicholson of Winterbourne MEP&lt;/strong&gt;, member of the ALDE Group and chairwoman of the European Parliament&amp;rsquo;s delegation for relations with Iraq, &lt;strong&gt;Paulo Casaca MEP&lt;/strong&gt;, member of the Socialist Group and member of the delegation for relations with Iran, and &lt;strong&gt;Senator Marco Perduca&lt;/strong&gt; of the Italian Senate.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Commenting on the situation in &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Iran&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt; will be&lt;strong&gt; Nasser Boladai&lt;/strong&gt; of the Congress of Nationalities for a Federal Iran (CNFI) and &lt;strong&gt;Marino Busdachin&lt;/strong&gt;, General Secretary of the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO).&lt;span&gt; &lt;/span&gt;Representatives of &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Iran&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;&amp;rsquo;s &lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Ahwaz&lt;/span&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;, Azerbaijani, Baloch, and Kurdish organizations will also feature as key panelists.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;The conference is being organized by the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (&lt;a href="http://www.unpo.org/"&gt;http://www.unpo.org/&lt;/a&gt;) in partnership with the Congress of Nationalities for a Federal Iran (&lt;a href="http://www.cnfi.org/"&gt;http://www.cnfi.org/&lt;/a&gt;) and Members of the European Parliament from the Nonviolent Radical Party.&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt; Further details of the conference will be released on &lt;/span&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;27 March 2009&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;For media queries please contact:&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Andrew Swan +32 (0)472 577 518 aswan@unpo.org&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"&gt;&lt;span style="font-family: Candara;"&gt;Maggie Murphy +32 (0)479 868 186 mmurphy@unpo.org&lt;/span&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"&gt;-----------------------------------------------------------------------------&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"&gt;&lt;img title="unpo-logo_small.png" src="/images/383.png" alt="unpo-logo_small.png" width="77" height="86" /&gt; UNPO&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp;  &lt;img title="NRP_small.gif" src="/images/427.gif" alt="NRP_small.gif" width="71" height="72" /&gt;NRP &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;  &lt;img title="CNFI_small.gif" src="/images/423.gif" alt="CNFI_small.gif" width="86" height="77" /&gt;CNFI&amp;nbsp; &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;With the support of the Nonviolent Radical Party&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;Congress of Nationalities for a Federal Iran&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;</content>
  <created-at type="datetime">2009-03-26T13:12:48-06:00</created-at>
  <description>Leading Iranian opposition figures will be meeting in Brussels, Belgium for a two-day conference on 1-2 April 2009 to discuss the prospects for democratization and federalism in the Islamic Republic of Iran</description>
  <id type="integer">149</id>
  <published type="boolean">true</published>
  <published-at type="datetime">2009-03-26T13:12:48-06:00</published-at>
  <publisher>BPP</publisher>
  <source>UNPO</source>
  <title>European Parliament to Host Meeting of Leading Iranian Dissidents</title>
  <updated-at type="datetime">2010-03-08T01:42:03-07:00</updated-at>
  <viewcount type="integer">376</viewcount>
  <writer>UNPO</writer>
</article>
