Your Excellency, Archbishop of Tirana-Durrës, George Anthony Frendo,
I, Edward Termado, am an Iranian and Armenian Christian, who now lives with his family in Germany. In 1980, when the Iran-Iraq War began, I was a soldier in the Iranian army in the fight in Iraq where I was wounded and captured by the Iraqi troops. Until the end of the wa
r I was in captivity in Iraq.
After the armistice between Iran and Iraq, I unfortunately decided not to return to my country, because I thought I could use other means for the freedom of the people and democracy, and I joined the PMOI (Peoples Mojahedin of Iran) . For 12 years, I was in the grip of this sectarian organization, but fifteen years ago I managed to escape the pressure of this organization and live in the free world again today.
In its propaganda, the PMOI had always expressed its opinion on freedom and democracy for the Iranian people, calling on equal rights for women all over the world. The call for freedom, equality and religious freedom was very loud in their propaganda. With their slogans, the PMOI has deceived many Iranian war prisoners in Iraq and lured them into their catches. They also deceived me.
But when I was a member of the PMOI for a while, Massoud Rajavi, the leader of the Mujahideen, who lives in a hiding-place since the fall of the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, has given the unbelievable order to compel all marriages with the Mujahideen. All the families who have lived in Camp Ahsraf under many restrictions have been torn apart and the children have been torn from their parents on the pretext that the situation in Iraq is too dangerous for them.
These approximately 800 children were sent to Europe and America by the PMOI. At first sight this seemed to be a humanitarian act, but when the children grew older after a few years, and were engaged in schooling, education or studying, they returned to Camp Ashraf, on the pretext of meeting their parents again In Iraq. There they were denied to return to Europe or the USA. Some were subjected to brainwashing and later sent to military operations in Iran, where they were killed.
Your Excellency:
Last week I learned, that in March 2017 you participated in the Organizations Nowruz Festival in Albania. So I have the concern that you too can be blinded by the propaganda allies of the PMOI and I would like to warn you not to get pressed into service by the Mojaheddin without knowing their true face.
The MKO presents itself as “the Iranian resistance” or the “opposition in exile”, but it is pursuing its own objectives independently of all opposition movements in Iran itself. They suggest to advocate democracy, equality of the sexes and separation of church and state. However, they use other institutions to spread their propaganda. But as a former MKO-member, I know better:
As early as August 2009, the TAZ reported that the MKO had tried, under the pretext of engaging in persecuted Christians, to harness the church for its propaganda. In the Heilig-Kreuz church in Berlin, the MKO activists had to leave the church after a short while, after they had abused the church asylum for a hunger strike for Camp Ahsraf. Pastor Dagmar Apel decided: “… we cannot support this radical means of protest in which people endanger their health.”
Behind the wall, the MKO is a cultish organization with no support among the most Iranians (exiles as well as those living in Iran). The majority of the Iranians despise the MKO for their alliance with Saddam Hussein in the 80s and for their position against the nuclear program (by most of the Iranian population the program is seen as a legitimate right).
At least there is the occult and even messianic image, which has been arranged to Maryam Rajavi “President-elect” and “Sun of the Revolution” and the cultish structure of the organization, which raises questions of democracy within the organization itself because Maryam Rajavi remainedthe President of the organization since her “election” in 1993 without any sign of political pluralism.
Several officials, who had to deal more closely with the MKO, have also recognized this:
The former chairman of the Working Group on Human Rights and Humanitarian Aid of the CDU / CSU Bundestag Fraction, Erika Steinbach, has described MKO as follows: “The organization (MEK / MKO / PMOI) is not trustworthy against the background of its history and its actions against dropouts and critics. The MEK is a sect-like, repressive movement with a distinct person cult around the leaders, without great credibility in the Iranian population. “
A speaker of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs told in June 27th 2014: “France has no contact with the “People’s Mujahedin Organization of Iran” which is known for its use of violence. It has no legal existence in France as an organization. Its violent and undemocratic Ideology has been exposed by several human rights organizations, such as Amnesty International who have reported on the organization’s cultic practices and its refusal to formally renounce violence. We also warn about the intense campaign of disinformation and influence it leads”.
Daniel Benjamin, the former U.S. State Department’s counterterror coordinator,,told the FP-Website 2015: “Being delisted as a Foreign Terrorist Organization — a decision I took part in — doesn’t mean that this group … has suddenly … become trustworthy or worthy of engagement.”
It was not until December 2016 that CIA Director John Brennan warned Tirana of the potentially great danger that the terrorist group Mojahedin Khalq (MEK) represents for Albania by their presence in the capital.
Your Excellency:
As an Armenian Christian, who lost 12 years of his life through the false slogans of the Mujahideen, I would like to describe to you in a short meeting, which I have seen and experienced during the period of the organization of the People’s Mojahedin.
Good luck to you and best wishes for peace in the
Edward Termado, Aawa Association, Germany,