My dear brothers and sisters, we did not carry out a revolution so that one government would be replaced with another. This was not the case. Otherwise, why would have our people made so many sacrifices? Two parties would have merely competed against each other and one party would have gained control like what we see in other countries. The fact that one nation has entered the arena wholeheartedly, with all its power and money and the fact it has used everyone including young and old, means this movement has not been established only for the purpose of replacing one government with another. It means that this great movement has been based on Iran's national ideals.
Our Revolution has presented some ideals to the world. When our religious people compared these ideals with the ones in their religion they found out that those ideals were what they needed. As a result, they followed the path of realizing those ideals and they sacrificed their youth and their own lives in this way. They laid down their money for the sake of the revolution but they did not stop resisting tyranny. We want to achieve these ideals. What are these ideal? In brief, our most significant ideal is creating an Islamic society. We are moving forward to create an Islamic society.
An Islamic society is one in which justice is completely served and moral principles are firmly established among all people. In such a society, people have those virtues which the prophets were trying hard to emphasize. These virtues include being strong, being brave and being God's obedient servant while being prosperous. True freedom for a nation or an individual can be achieved if they utilize their power and their determination to find happiness. They should, however, find that happiness in serving God. We are pursuing this goal.
Today the big void in western liberal democracy comes from the absence of social justice. They have increased the number of factories and machines and they have broadened the scope of science but they have failed to serve social justice. Morality has declined and I am not the only person saying that. Is it possible to use international media to say something that goes against what people feel? This is what they themselves are saying.
Today western liberal democracy is faced with a moral crisis. Today countries which have astonished history with their developments are faced with sexual, social, moral and family crises. The happiness of human beings does not lie in their scientific development - science is merely a tool for happiness - but rather the happiness of human beings depends on peace of mind and soul, a life without strains and full of moral and economic security and finally the feeling that justice is served in the society. The west does not have these criteria. Not only are these criteria absent in western countries but also they are increasingly walking away from them. We chose those criteria so that we can portray them as our ideals to the world. Of course, God Almighty accomplished this goal. The Iranian nation followed this path due to its faith in this goal.
My dear brothers and sisters, dear people of Iran, to achieve these goals, we have to have self-confidence. We should constantly tell ourselves that we can as we have managed until today to accomplish goals which the national will is determined to accomplish. It was no small achievement to overthrow a regime in a country which was under the pressure of colonial powers and dominated by the global arrogance. Our people overthrew that regime while the east and the west saw their interests in the survival of that sinister regime. It was no small achievement to completely destroy the shaky foundation of the hereditary royal regime and create a government - in place of that autocratic regime - based on the votes and the sentiments of the people. The Iranian nation accomplished such an enormous task. Today Iran is peerless in regard to having a democratic government and paying attention to the sentiments of the people.
The Iranian nation managed to establish democracy - which is a secure foundation - with self-confidence. It was a religious democracy. Everywhere in the world democracies are established within a certain framework. There is not a single democratic government in the world which is not within a certain framework or not based on certain criteria. They are either based on different parties competing with one another to gain power, the judiciary system or systems other than the judiciary and the executive. But our democratic country is based on Islam because the people of Iran are Muslims and religious. This form of democracy is called religious democracy.
The reason why people of other countries hold the Iranian nation in high regard is firstly because the Iranian nation dared enter the arena and the government dared give people the opportunity. Secondly, the Iranian nation managed to introduce a kind of democracy to the world which was unknown and they carried the banner of democracy on their own.
Everywhere in the world, governments and nations are influenced by propaganda efforts of the enemies but the Iranian nation was not. Regarding religious democracy and on many other issues including the issue of women, its diplomacy in foreign affairs and its relations with world powers, the Iranian nation has never been influenced by propaganda efforts and it never changed its course. It will be the same in the future. I believe that the Iranian nation should preserve this self-confidence.
One of the signs of this self-confidence is that the Iranian nation has entered the arena of high-level scientific breakthroughs. The other sign is the issue of nuclear energy which everybody in our country has heard about. Our youth, our scientists and our prominent figures have participated in sensitive and new areas of knowledge and they have accomplished astonishing feats including on the issue of stem cells, discovering new medicines for chronic diseases - which was officially announced and by Allah's grace, they will discover more medicines - and in other areas. The Iranian people have utilized their talent in different arenas and they have shown so much self-confidence that they have made huge progress and they will continue to make progress. [Jan 2, 2008]
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