Speaking for "Children in Need" at the UNESCO Gala
At left is Mrs. Ute Ohoven, UNESCO's Special Ambassador
-------------

Address by Her Majesty The Shahbanou at the "UNESCO  Benefit-Gala, Children In Need"
held in Neuss - Germany, November 10, 2001

Ladies and Gentlemen:
Dear Friends of Children in Need:

It is a great pleasure for me to be present tonight and to join this distinguished audience. The solidarity demonstrated here tonight is a tribute to UNESCO and indeed to all of you who have so generously stepped forward in the universal support of children in need.

I salute UNESCO's Special Ambassador Ute Ohoven whose tireless efforts have resulted in saving thousands of children-in-need worldwide. Tonight is a marvelous example of her perseverance and commitment to this work.

This year, particular attention should be paid to all refugee children especially those in Afghanistan. These are innocent children exposed to the most frightening and harshest of conditions.

We must act now, we will yet again lose another innocent generation to the trauma brought about by the absence of peace and the break up of families.

For the better part of my life, the cause of children has been close and dear to my heart. As an advocate of women and children’s rights, I have experienced the development and implementation of social welfare programs.

I believe that an investment in the children of the world is the only guarantee of hope for a brighter, kinder, more tolerant and peaceful future.

This millennium brings with it new and dramatic challenges. There are still far too many undeveloped regions in the world, far too many children suffering from poverty, exploitation, malnutrition, ill health, drug addiction and wars. There are far too many women whose basic rights have been denied and who suffer from so much injustice.

We as well as future generations, have the compelling task to reach out and help those in need. We must assist them to make better lives for themselves. The answer to human misery is hope and opportunity. This can only be achieved through knowledge and education. In closing, I will share with you the profound words of Saadi, our great 13^th century poet:

"All Adam’s race are members of one frame,
Since all at first from the same essence came.

When by hard fortune one limb is oppressed
The other members lose their wanted rest.

If thou feel’st not for others’ misery,
A son of Adam is no name for thee".

Thank you very much for your attention.

_____________________________

An article in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
By Anke Schipp

November 5, 2001

BADEN-BADEN. "Early in the morning when the alarm clock rings, Farah Diba gets up and bathes. Then she wakes the emperor, who sleeps until nine. She says 'Good morning' and gives her husband, the Shah, a smacker of a kiss."

In May 1967, all was still well with the world -- or so it seemed -- and not just to the Munich fourth-grader who wrote these words in a school essay, describing how he imagined the life of the Shah of Iran and his wife, the Shahbanu.

That month, Germany was preparing for what it expected to be a normal state visit. It was not to follow any special script, just the usual succession of parades, visits, hand shaking and banquets. A smiling Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlevi and his wife, Farah, completed their one-week schedule.

News coverage concentrated on the young empress. She was both a modern and a fairy-tale figure, a model for many young women in Germany. They wore their hair Farah-Diba-style, combed back and pinned together. They admired the lemon-yellow dress she wore for the gala reception at Augustusburg Palace in Brühl, near Bonn.

But what seemed like a fairy tale on the outside was already showing signs of serious rifts: The police were out in force, road blocks were set up, and demonstrators were protesting torture in Iran. And the short, ugly scenes were irritatingly superimposed on the glamorous state visit.

Then came the explosion: On June 2, 1967, a student, Benno Ohnesorg, was shot and killed during street fighting between the police, students and supporters of the Shah in Berlin. The Shah and his wife flew home in dismay, amid a wave of student unrest in Germany.

Last Saturday, over 34 years later, the Shahbanu paid Germany a second visit. It was not a state visit, even though it resembled one in some respects. She landed in the southwestern city of Baden-Baden in a private plane and was driven to a select hotel in a limousine with shaded windows. Saturday evening, she appeared on Frank Elstner's TV talk show Menschen der Woche (People of the Week).

It was tempting to read into her face the time that had elapsed since her first visit to Germany. She has long ceased to be the empress of Iran even though she still lays claim to the title. She has been living in exile for 22 years, moving between Cairo, France and the United States. She has been a widow for 21 of those years. Five months ago her daughter Leila committed suicide.

From her life as the Shahbanu, she seems to have learned how to conceal the extent of her emotional suffering, helped no doubt by the largely fashionable life she leads. That is why she still behaves like an empress amid the operetta-like high society of Baden-Baden.

At Brenner's Park Hotel, reality failed to pass through the main entrance's heavy swing-door. Elderly ladies sat on furniture with old rose covers and conversed as a pianist played suitable music. Newspapers in the lobby were a little upsetting with their reports of unpleasant goings-on in the world, such as anthrax scares.

The Shahbanu took her seat in the Iffezheim Room alongside society hostess Ute Ohoven, who had succeeded in persuading the shy Iranian woman to serve as a patron of a Unesco benefit gala in Neuss, near Düsseldorf.

The former empress wore black, and her face wore a veil of distance as the camera lights flashed. She looked almost as if she was not involved, and only when the photographers asked for a little smile did her lips move enough to form a reluctant smile that took several attempts before it crossed her face. But it failed to reach her eyes, which lay like dark caverns beneath eyelids made up in gray.

Farah Diba, to use her maiden name, was 20 when the Shah, who was nearly twice her age, was introduced to her.

"The Shah nodded to me and smiled. He said it was most unusual for me as a woman to be studying architecture. His eyes looked sad," she wrote in her diary. Months later they saw each other again and married in December 1959.

When Ms. Pahlevi, now 63, talks about those days she seems almost exuberant, and her eyes sparkle, though for only a moment. Or is it just the observer's imagination?

When Mr. Elstner mentioned her daughter's death, her voice sounded rough and husky: "Life is a struggle, you know. But I would sooner not sound bitter even though I have truly lost something," she said, after clearing her throat.

Maybe that is why she never sought contact with a woman whose fate moved the world even after her death on Oct. 25: Soraya, the Shah's second wife, whom he divorced because they had no children. The link between the two women springs to mind: a fairy-tale life followed by years of loneliness.

As if it were an Iranian curse, Soraya, too, came to be known as the "woman with the sad eyes."

"I only ever saw her from a distance," said the former empress of her predecessor, "but she was part of our family. I am very sad by her death." Shortly afterward, she left the TV studio to fly back to Paris, after less than three hours in Germany.

On her way to the limousine, all the signs of emotion drained from her face as if they had been switched off, vanishing as if she felt they had provided more than enough reading material over the past few hours.

1973 was "Back to the Future" - A photo with Iranian children in Mashad's "Baghe Malek Abad"
The young lady standing next to me with a red blouse and Polka Dot dress e-mailed me this picture
from Iran on Nov. 16, 2001 and I am grateful for this joyous remembrance.

Back to Media