London (AFP)

A new light on events that have changed the history of his country: the Iranian director Taghi Amirani highlights in his latest film the role of the United Kingdom in the overthrow of the Iranian Prime Minister in 1953.

His film, "Coup 53", screened last weekend at the London Film Festival, highlights new evidence proving the major role of a British spy in the fall of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh, a covert operation conducted with the help of the CIA.

The United States admitted their role in 2013 when the CIA archives were published, but the British never acknowledged their major role.

Amirani, a former physicist turned multi-award-winning director, has been living in London for 45 years. He claims that the discovery of evidence that a British intelligence agent, MI6, had coordinated the operation, represents "monumental lighting".

"In a way, it confirms what the Iranians say for decades," he told AFP at the festival, where his film is competing for the award for best documentary.

Acceding to the post of prime minister in 1952, Mossadegh quickly gained popularity, but aroused the ire of the British in wanting to take control of the Anglo-Iranian oil company, ancestor of the giant BP.

- Suspicions of government intervention -

He also angered Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi in ​​trying to limit his powers and the monarch had to leave a country beset by contestation a little later that year.

In August 1953, Mossadegh was arrested in a military coup. He spent three years in prison before being placed under house arrest until his death in 1967.

The Shah returned to Iran immediately after the ouster to rule for almost 30 years, before being overthrown during the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

With the Oscar-winning director Walter Murch, Amirani unveils unseen archive footage, interviews with speakers of the time and new elements to comb the events.

The duo stumbled across a 1980 British television documentary that identified and interviewed an MI6 veteran, Norman Darbyshire, who admitted to having imagined it.

Today deceased, the agent does not appear in the then released version of the documentary, leading to suspicions of government intervention.

But Amirani has gotten hold of a transcript of the interview, which the director had played by comedian Ralph Fiennes to play the former spy, who said: "On our side, the course of the coup d'état was up to my responsibility ".

In response, the British Foreign Office did not respond.

- "The story we ignore" -

For the 59-year-old filmmaker, making a film about the fall of Mossadegh was "a personal matter": "small, I grew up in the aftermath of the coup that brought the shah to life for 25 years".

His curiosity was piqued after seeing images of the fallen prime minister during a pro-democracy demonstration in Iran in 2009. The fact that things could have been radically different if Mossadegh had remained in power resonated in him.

"For many, including me, it represented the hopes and dreams of a democratic and secular Iran," says the director.

During the decade of documentary maturation, tensions between Iran and the West have increased significantly. Especially between Tehran and London about dual nationality prisoners and oil tankers from each country.

According to Amirani, the events of 1953 are "more enlightening than ever" and help to understand the current growing tensions between Iran, the United Kingdom and the United States. The story gives the impression of being repeated. "The further we went in the film, the more its relevance grew," he says.

In the eyes of the director, the film says nothing more than this quote from former US President Harry Truman: "What is said to be new in this world is the story we ignore."

© 2019 AFP