“I have spent six years in prison, the last six years. Even if I was outside the prison, how much actual space was there for an investigative journalist to do his work in Iran?”

The situation began to change, revolutionary conditions was created…we simply wanted to change the regime.

You cannot bring democracy to a country by attacking it.

Well-to-do classes are using all kinds of obvious and not-so-obvious benefits that this regime has created for it.

The modern infrastructures that exists in the world all contribute to the advancement of human rights and democracy.

When I was on my hunger strike, and I was in a hospital, the guards who inflicted all manner of injustice against me, and all manner of hardship…

There are varieties of theories of revolution. According to one of these theories, only one of these theories, revolutions occur when there is an explosion of rising expectation.

The most important dichotomy that I make for a society is between those who support democracy and human rights, and those who oppose it.

Three of our provinces have seen mass uprisings. The three provinces are Khuzestan, Azerbaijan, and Kurdistan.

Negotiation talks are the best way to solve anything. We must replace wars and weapons with negotiations and talks.

Why did the regime put me in prison in the first place? I was put in prison for six years and it has been all illegal.

Religion is the private affair of an individual…be present in the public domain, but state has to be clearly separated from religion.

I, too, am against the dismantlement of Iran.

The Shah’s regime was an incorrigible regime and after a while, when the revolution happened.

They obviously collected a lot of votes, but these monies could not solve the structural problems that these people face. But the only result, the only consequence, was that a big sum from the budget was wasted this way.

When I say that I am opposed to this budget, everyone says, “Well, what do you think the United States should do?” My response is, “Why should the United States do anything?”

We must struggle for creating a democratic system that is dedicated to democracy and human rights.

Gay people don’t actually try to convert people. That’s Jehovah’s Witnesses you’re thinking of.

People think one-point and two-point perspective is how the world actually looks, but of course, it isn’t. It’s a convention.

You can only actually help someone who wants to be helped.

If you actually look at the etymology of the word ‘hallucination’, what it’s come to mean in English is a delusion. But what it really means in the original language is to wander in the mind. That’s the meaning of ‘hallucination’, to wander in the mind.

The things that I have apparently parodied I actually admire.

To realize that all of the last hundred years of economic progress was actually a shell game to create billionaires, while the great masses of people saw their standard of living eroded and destroyed.

So I like the work he’s doing, and I support it, and I realise that he’s one of very few political leaders around the world that actually has early-childhood development strategise at the top of his agenda.

Tories never actually talk about getting rid of their leader, then suddenly there us a flash of steel between he shoulder-blades and rigormortis sets in.