‘Dad, these people are really heroes’

Thank you to our brothers and sisters in Tirana who are watching us tonight. I am here particularly this year to congratulate you, and thank you and thank Madame Rajavi for the freedom and the life-saving gift that 3,000 of your brothers and sisters have received and are enjoying tonight for the first time.

I visited them a few months ago, and I brought with me my oldest son. And what struck me immediately was their spirit and their strength My son talked to a lot of your colleagues and friends, I talked to a lot of our brothers and sisters And when we left, my son said, “Dad, these people are really heroes.”

And you are all heroes and most importantly, your leader, Madame Rajavi, is a great hero. Through the darkest days, — and I was thinking about several years ago during the different attacks in Ashraf and then later at Liberty — Madame Rajavi stood so strong and so true and made very, very difficult life-and-death decisions moving to Liberty, what to do once we got to Liberty, negotiating the safe passage and resettlement. Madame Rajavi, you not only embody the democratic principles of a free Iran, but you are a wonderful and charismatic leader in crisis. So this year, you are closer than ever to achieving your goal.

In many ways, the heroism and the survival of the freedom-loving brothers and sisters in Liberty and Ashraf have given the movement now the opportunity to reach its final goal. So, we thank them for their survival and their heroism…

Now we are poised to achieve the final outcome. And the final outcome is what all of this has been about — the suffering, the death, the destruction — to find a free Iran and to have a democratic alternative to the regime in Tehran. You are that democratic alternative . And you will prevail because you never, never have given up and the end is in sight.

• Former U.S. District Judge Louis J. Freeh served as FBI Director under President Bill Clinton. This excerpt is taken from his remarks at the July 1 rally in Paris.