TEHRAN – Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Monday commemorated the anniversary of the 1953 coup in Iran, saying the Americans and the British orchestrated the coup following years of “maximum pressure” on Iranians, hinting at U.S. President Donald Trump’s “maximum pressure” policy against Iran.

“66 years ago today, a coup instigated by the US and the UK overthrew the democratically-elected Government of Iran. This atrocity followed years of ‘maximum pressure’ on Iranians,” Zarif said in a tweet.

“Our people put an end to such interference in 1979. Time for some to deal with this reality,” he added.

On 19 August 1953, a foreign-backed coup – known in Iran as the 28 Mordad coup d’état – was staged in Iran which saw the overthrow of the democratically elected government of Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh in favor of strengthening the monarchical rule of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

Named Operation Ajax by the CIA, the coup was carried out after an earlier coup attempt failed to overthrow Mosaddegh and install General Fazlollah Zahedi, the shah’s reliable ally, as prime minister. As a result, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the shah of Iran, had fled to Baghdad.

With the success of the second coup, however, Zahedi was installed as prime minister, and the shah returned to Iran and continued to rule more fiercely as monarch.

Mosaddegh was then arrested, tried and convicted of treason by the shah’s military court. He was sentenced to death, but on the Shah’s personal orders, his sentence was commuted to three years in solitary confinement in a military prison, followed by house arrest until his death.

The Shah ruled until 1979, when he was brought down during the Islamic Revolution, which led to the establishment of the Islamic Republic after a referendum.

Forty years on, Iran’s struggle to sustain its independence is still alive, but so is the foreign attempts aimed to undermine it. 

MH/