Was the collaboration of some slaves any different than the silence of some Iranians who stood by and did nothing as Savak thugs murdered and tortured opponents of the Shah? How could we judge other men until we had stood in their shoes?

Yugoslavia is, with Iran, the only country which under difficult, not to say agonising, circumstances stood up to Joseph Stalin. It was not easy to unite ethnic groups or to modernize a country like Yugoslavia, and it must be acknowledged that Marshal Tito achieved something extraordinary. May God grant that his successors be as capable as he.

My main mistake was to have made an ancient people advance by forced marches toward independence, health, culture, affluence, comfort.

Pride comes before a fall - although in [Henry Kissinger's] case it's more conceit than pride.

The great powers claim that whatever they possess is theirs by right, but whatever we, the smaller countries possess is negotiable.

I want the standard of living in Iran in ten years' time to be exactly on a level with that in Europe today. In twenty years' time we shall be ahead of the United States.

You approach the Mullahs as if they are normal people. They are not. You see them in your own image; you should not.