1.
GV INTERIOR Roissy airport, France, with feminist delegation queueing at Air France Iran section (5 shots)
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2.
GV Sign reading "Comite des droits des femmes"
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3.
SV Women at ticket counter
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4.
SV American feminist Kate Millett arriving and being interviewed (2 shots)
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REPORTER: "What was your reaction when you were arrested?"



MILLETT: "I was terrified -- I've never been so afraid in my whole life, I hope I never am again."



REPORTER: "What actually happened -- did people with guns come to get you?"



MILLETT: "We were told to come downstairs in the hotel and this was after days -- we tried to enquire to the Ministry you know -- why would we be expelled, when would they wish us to leave? I was always going to leave, I'm a pacifist, what can I do if they want me to go? So they asked us to come downstairs and we did and they said it would just be two minutes and the they took us in a locked room and it's all over.... ... -- and they showed me my own audio tape cassette that they had confiscated and I knew they had been spying on me all along -- and they in fact had told us that the day before. The hotel manager, who isn't really managing that hotel, I mean he's really...."



REPORTER: "I'm sorry -- Ayatollah Khomeini said today that he plans to ask the Ministry of Labour in Iran to give equal rights to women -- d'you think that's because of your trip?"



MILLETT: "No, it's because of the enormous amount of spontaneous protest of the Iranian women. But it won't be implemented unless that protest continues and that probably can't continue unless there is as much international help as we can -- as all women can give -- because if the press were to be expelled of if the international feminists were to be expelled, then it would all close down again and we don't even know -- you see we are afraid for the feminists there. All the time we are afraid to give their names, we can't show their listens to the telephone and gets their telephone numbers."



During her impromptu new conference in Paris Ms. Millett also said she considered some aspects of the current situation in Iran to be a "return to barbarism" and -- "the re-institution of the most brutal and stupid remnants of the past, which really dishonour Islam and the whole civilisation of these people".




Initials BB/



Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: In Iran there are signs that the Ayatollah Khomeini's government is starting to take a harder line against what it sees as "foreign interference" in the Islamic revolution. According to French newspaper report, government spokesman Amir Entezam said last week that foreign journalists considered to be hostile to the revolution would not be allowed to stay in Iran and that news film would be examined by a "special government department" before being allowed out of the country. Already two American activists have been expelled. One of them, feminist Kate Millett, arrived in Paris on Monday, (19 March) shortly after a delegation representing the International Committee for Women's Rights left for Teheran.

SYNOPSIS: The delegation flew from Roissy airport, near Paris and included Italian writer Mari-Antonietta Matteoti and French publisher Claude Servan-Schreiber. A spokeswoman said they wanted to support the struggle of Iranian women for equality, but stressed they did not see their mission as being anti-Khomeini. Thousands of Iranian women have recently been resisting the re-introduction of traditional Shia Moslem rules governing their conduct and dress.