Page 199 – Nejat Society

Pompeo distanced the administration from the MEK

Scoop — Pompeo says admin opposes Iran military intervention

In a closed-door meeting with Iranian-American community leaders last Monday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the Trump administration is”not going to do a military exercise inside Iran”to expedite a regime change, according to three sources who were in the room, including one who took detailed contemporaneous notes and shared them with me.

Pompeo also sought to distance the Trump administration from a controversial Iranian resistance group that has welcomed John Bolton and Rudy Giuliani as speakers in a private capacity.

Behind the scenes: Pompeo met with around 15 Iranian-American community leaders on Monday morning in a conference room at the Renaissance Dallas Hotel. The secretary gave brief opening remarks and then spent most of the session listening and answering questions.

The most provocative question he fielded, according to the sources, was:”If regime change does not occur internally what is the endgame?”
Pompeo replied,”We’re careful not to use the language of regime change.”He then told the group that the administration would not intervene militarily in Iran.
Another participant asked,”Has the idea of a coup been considered?”Pompeo joked that”Even if we did, would I be telling you guys about it?”and the room broke out in laughter.

Pompeo used euphemisms and diplo-speak to describe the administration’s position on Iran.

“Our mission set is to give them the opportunity … capacity to create opportunity, create that and provide transitional support,”he said, per the notes.
“Our best interest is a non-revolutionary set of leaders leading Iran,”he added, according to the notes.

Between the lines: Pompeo said the Trump administration would have handled the 2009 Green Movement uprising against the regime very differently than the Obama administration did. But he did not say how.

Pompeo also said there is”no such thing as a moderate inside the Iranian regime anywhere today.”
And when asked how he could guarantee that the Trump administration’s tough new sanctions wouldn’t hurt the people of Iran, he replied:”There are no guarantees.”

Pompeo also distanced the administration from the People’s Mujahedin of Iran, or MEK (Mujahedin-e Khalq), an anti-regime group that the U.S. once designated as a foreign terrorist organization.

Several people in the room told Pompeo they worried about what message it sent for close Trump allies — National Security Adviser John Bolton and Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani among them — to appear friendly with the MEK, whom some in the room described as worse than the current regime.
“Let’s not beat around the bush,”Pompeo replied, according to one source’s notes.”Ambassador Bolton spoke at an MEK rally. President Trump and I have not.”

“He acknowledged that John Bolton and Rudy Giuliani had connections or ties, whatever you want to call it … with the MEK, but he did say that he and the president did not,”confirmed another person in the room, Texas attorney Michael Payma.

Why this matters: With Trump as president, Bolton as national security adviser and Pompeo as secretary of state — the American people have never had a government so hostile to the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Even though Pompeo made his comments in a relatively private setting — and therefore they cannot be set into stone — it’s significant for the secretary of state to tell members of the Iranian diaspora that the Trump administration won’t be intervening militarily to overthrow the regime in Tehran.
It’s also significant for Pompeo to distance the Trump administration from the MEK organization — given the group’s public association with high-profile Trumpworld figures like Giuliani and Bolton.
(The State Department did not respond to requests for comment when we gave them visibility of this reporting.)
Axios.com

April 22, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Saudi Backed MEK Terrorists Open New Front In Canada

New patronage resulted in a strategic shift for the MEK

After the fall of Saddam Hussain and the disappearance of Massoud Rajavi, leader of the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) terrorist cult, the group’s members were forcibly deported to Albania where the MEK regrouped under the now open support of the Israeli right wing and the regime change pundits of the USA. In Paris, Prince Turki al Faisal al Saud of Saudi Arabia presented himself at a public rally alongside of Maryam Rajavi, wife of the cult leader, to announce the death of Massoud Rajavi, to introduce himself as the new direct benefactor of Mojahedin Khalq (MEK) and to acknowledge Maryam Rajavi as the new head of the terrorist cult.
Under new management the MEK has undergone rapid change and the system of ‘Saddam – Massoud Rajavi’ has transformed into a system of ‘Turki – Maryam Rajavi’. The old system of ‘military-based direct terrorism’ changed rapidly to the new system of ‘intelligence based covert terrorism’. This, of course, was not surprising since Saddam and Massoud had always believed in a show of strength to push their agenda. They believed in achieving their political aims by murdering, threatening and terrorising their opponents. On the other hand, Prince Turki and Maryam favour intelligence-based covert operations to attack, discredit and weaken (and eliminate) their opponents.
Massoud would send terror groups to bomb targets in the streets of Tehran or participate in the massacre of Kurdish people in Iraq. Saddam used chemical weapons in an attempt to eradicate the inhabitants of vast parts of Iraq. Now Maryam hires paid showmen, uses rent-a-crowd to create the illusion of mass demonstrations in Western capitals, and cries wolf as victim while sending club wielders to silence human rights activists. And Prince Turki is, of course, the famous brain behind many setups against opponents of the house of Saud in the west although he is best known as the head of Saudi intelligence who resigned 10 days before 9/11 tragedy carried out by Saudis in New York, later paying lobbying companies to blame Iran for the atrocities.

Attempts to drive a wedge between Iran and EU
Many believe that the latest series of “convenient” incidents attributed to Iranian diplomats in Europe has been the brainchild of Prince Turki who used the MEK to hinder possible rapprochement between Iran and the EU, especially after the EU refused to fall in behind President Trump (Netanyahu and Mohammad Bin Salman) in jeopardising the nuclear deal, which they hoped would trigger another war in the Middle East to reverse their losses on the ground in Syria and Iraq.
However, that strategy has not yielded the best results and the EU remains at best ambivalent about being seen to take sides. So now the Turki-Maryam system has opened a new front, this time in Canada, which has also sometimes been perceived to be wavering in relation to Iran.

MEK renewing its attacks on Iranian Canadians
In Canada, the main focal point for Iranians is the Iranian Canadian Congress (ICC). The MEK has been trying to push its agents into this organisation for years. They have had some success with the backing and finance of the Israeli lobby in getting their agents into the ICC, but recently these agents with their extremist agendas have been voted out by the Iranian Canadians who are increasingly worried about their future as Canadians with an Iranian background. They see what is happening in neighbouring USA and they don’t want to be degraded to second-rate citizens just because Israel or Saudi rulers have grievances against Iran. Indeed, the Iran Canadian Congress has been successful, not only helping Iranian Canadians in recent years, but has now moved to higher levels in social and political circles, influencing the policies which concern them in Canada. In recent weeks they have achieved big victories for their membership including but not confined to:
1- Helping secure governmental funding in response to the flood in Iran
2- Petitioning the government to investigate and bring to justice Mahmood Reza Khavari and Maryam Sheikholeslami Aleagha, the two Iranian Canadian fugitives wanted by Interpol who, while serving at highest ranks of Iranian government, misused their position to steal hundreds of millions of dollars of public funds before running away to Canada. (Taking refuge behind their Canadian passports and thereby discrediting Iranian Canadians). The petition has quickly reached over 17,000 and is increasing.
Saudi Arabia MEK Maryam Rajavi terrorism in CanadaKhavari spotted at a Canadian casino
Activities aimed at silencing these Iranian Canadians indicates that the above achievements have rattled the house of Saud and their paid MEK agents. It looks like the failure to drive a wedge between the Iranians and Europeans who insist on saving the nuclear deal against the will of Trump has angered Netanyahu and Mohammad Bin Salman of Saudi Arabia.
The fingerprints of MEK activity are already being revealed. Infamous Persian speaking regime change proponents from the USA are invited to Toronto for propaganda meetings to promote their agenda. But this will only work if the voice of ordinary Iranian Canadians is silenced. This is why threats to the Iranian Canadian Congress alongside the IC Journal (an online Iranian Canadian magazine) have begun in earnest. Lawyer after lawyer threatens to take the individuals and organisations to court on a variety of charges. At the same time, agent after agent contacts these individuals (mostly volunteers who are students, working mothers, etc …) threatening to ruin their lives and livelihoods if they do not give up their work (such as justly asking for humanitarian aid to be sent to flood victims in Iran).
Hallmark MEK money laundry techniques
Two die-hard supporters of regime change, Shahram Tabe Mohammadi and Mehrdokht Hadi, who groups like MEK support – and who, by the way, failed repeatedly to infiltrate the ICC with the aim of derailing it from within – have apparently now been tasked to confront and silence the ICC so as to open the way for the Saudi backed lobbies engaged in stopping any dependable dialogue between Iran and Canada.
The authors of this agenda are more obvious when we observe hallmark MEK money laundry techniques being used to funnel money from the sponsors to the team of lawyers they have hired for threatening the volunteer workers and media.
At a time that the ICC volunteers are desperately working hard to raise money for the Canadian Red Cross to help the flood victims in Iran, Shahram Tabe Mohammadi shamelessly announced that he is collecting money to pay for six different lawyers he has proudly hired threatening to sue the Iranian Canadian Council (ICC) and the Iranian Canadian Journal (ICJ) for defamation. These kinds of announcement bear the hallmark of MEK money laundry; pretending to get money from ordinary people but in fact getting paid by their benefactors. The latest example of this was the funneling about a million dollars to a far-right anti-EU Spanish party (VOX) through Alejo Vidal-Quadra through a network of individuals and accounts across the globe.
Shahram Tabe Mohammadi names some of the people he is threatening with legal action as Mr Mohsen Khakiki, Mr Mehran Farazmand (IC journal), Mr Bijan Ahmandi, Mr Mehdi Samadian, Mr Parsa Beheshti (a high school student), Ms Elham Eslami, Mr Ehshan Hamidi, and Mr Pooria Zarasoed. Mohammadi also announced that he has hired a team of lawyers including but not limited to Anoosh Salahshoor, Phillip J. L. Trotter and Adam Wawrzkiewicz, (all from Lewis & Associates Immigration Lawyers) and has then asked for money (online through social media) to pay for these lawyers!
The targets of this legal attack have since reported receiving anonymous phone calls threatening that they will be forced to pay the full fees of all these lawyers plus compensation if they don’t back off and stop their activities.

If failure in Europe is replicated in Canada, what next?
Up to this point, this type of activity is perhaps not so new for those familiar with the modus operandi of the Saudi Secret services and the MEK in the west. What is worrying is what would be the next step if they fail to achieve their goal of silencing the Iranian Canadians and their media. The MEK has been on overdrive in recent years in Europe; their new tasks planned by Turki and carried out by MEK agents trained by Saddam Hussein’s Republican Guard. Although this activity failed to disrupt or derail relations between the EU and Iran to the extent the Saudis had hoped, still, people were killed. For example, Mohammad Reza Kolahi in the Netherlands and Malek Sharaee in Albania. Both these deaths should be investigated with Maryam Rajavi the prime suspect as someone with the means, motive and opportunity to assassinate.
If these threats don’t work on the Iranian Canadians (which they most certainly won’t), then an escalation to the next steps by the Saudi backed MEK in Canada must be prevented. This rests on the shoulders of the Canadian government. Whatever the push and pull that goes on, we don’t want another murder or attempted murder in Toronto.

By: Massoud Khodabandeh (Middle East Strategy Consultants), Iranian.com

April 20, 2019 0 comments

Iran Interlink Weekly Digest

Iran Interlink Weekly Digest – 257

++ In reaction to Trump’s designation of Iran’s IRGC as a terrorist entity, many scathingly commented ‘how come the IRGC – Iran’s army – is a terrorist entity, but the MEK isn’t?’ This shows how discredited the list is. Others commented on the reaction of Iranians in general – those who were not anti-American are now. Saber from Tabriz writes that the substance to this is that it is just about how to apply more sanctions. It’s just a rant. As a result, the MEK shouldn’t get too happy because they won’t get anything out of it.

++ Alongside this a lot people have been exposing the MEK’s false online claims about the floods. The MEK claimed – falsely – to be helping. Some said that they should have shown MEK wearing white helmets as well, it would have been fitting – terrorists in helmets! The MEK used photoshopped scenes and edited film to pretend Iranian rescue teams were suppressing the people. Fars News published a long report exposing the MEK’s online activities: photoshops and films which were circulated widely on western social media. Fars News went into detail about how they are created. Some were not even from inside Iran, some were in obscure, irrelevant places. People were paid to say things on camera. The piece also detailed how they hook people through social media – targeting porn sites, chat rooms and dating sites, etc.

++ A couple of Farsi sites have revealed that the MEK’s Arabic language outlets have all dropped the word Persian from ‘Persian Gulf’ when they write about it. This shows that the MEK’s masters are Saudis and this is where they have ended up. The MEK used to claim to be Iranian and anti-imperialist. Now they are the mercenaries of mercenaries.

++ Ali Akbar Kalateh died in the MEK camp in Albania this week. Maryam Rajavi was quick to announce him as a martyr. Tens of people who knew him have written saying this is a lie. They write that Kalateh never accepted the Ideological Revolution and only got stuck there as he was a POW and was delivered to the MEK by Saddam. He was afraid of coming out, but all the time he was inside MEK he was never with them. Mohammad Razaghi who knew and worked with him for years said that Kalateh famously used to say ‘I managed to get out of Saddam’s pot hole only to fall into Rajavi’s well’.

In English:

++ Daniel Larison in The American Conservative slates Tom Ridge for “resuming his discrediting advocacy” for the MEK. Larison scoffs that so many former government officials and retired officers “have embraced a totalitarian cult as the ‘alternative’ to another country’s government”, pointing out that the MEK is hated by almost all Iranians everywhere. Rajavi is a cult leader who fought against Iran for Saddam Hussein. “Every time that a prominent American shills for the MEK, it is an insult to the genuine Iranian opposition and another reminder that Iran hawks have nothing but contempt for the Iranian people.” Ridge also urges the Trump administration to be merciless in its application of sanctions because Iranians are already suffering now. Larison concluded that this suffering is caused by existing sanctions and that fanatics like Ridge are so obsessed with regime change “they don’t care how many millions of people have to be punished along the way.” The comments following this article show that the MEK is well-known to western public opinion.

++ As the MEK goes on overdrive to blame Iran’s government for the widespread flood damage and deaths, Nejat Blogger Mazda Parsi raises the question ‘who is MEK propaganda for?’ “Definitely not the Iranian nation” he says. Parsi quotes Michael Rubin who says the only thing that unites Iranians is their absolute hatred of the MEK. Instead, it is anti-Iran regime change pundits who hear what they want to hear in the MEK’s rants.

++ Iran Front Page reports that Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif has said Iran is ready to work with France to settle regional issues such as Libya and Sudan. In his remarks, Zarif criticised France for harbouring the MEK and described this as a “problem” between Tehran and Paris.

++ A blog by Massoud Khodabandeh says the murder of MEK operative Mohammad Reza Kolahi in the Netherlands need not be a mystery; motive, means and opportunity all point to Maryam Rajavi as the chief suspect. What is under question, however, is why the Netherlands investigators are so reluctant to even question her about Kolahi.

++ Writing from Tirana, Hassan Heyrani’s blog describes an incident inside the MEK camp in Manez. When one member asks ‘Sister Maryam, why are you lying to us’ he is attacked by some members, supported by others. This resulted in Rajavi’s critics being taken to isolation – called Quarantine in MEK jargon – to await ‘Virus Removal’ – MEK jargon for brainwashing. According to Heyrani, the whole issue of overthrow has become a joke inside the MEK. (A joke that obviously has very serious consequences for those who dare to tell it or laugh at it!)

++ Paul Pillar, published by Lobelog, provides clear reasoning why designating a country’s military as an FTO is not only wrong but dangerous.

++ In another blog piece for Nejat, Mazda Parsi this time takes aim at Maryam Rajavi’s ludicrous stance on Trump’s move to list the IRGC as a terrorist entity. Like Netanyahu, Parsi says it was expected that Rajavi would thank the US President. However, “she would not act the same as Netanyahu because she does not dare to openly contradict what her husband said at Camp Ashraf. Defectors of the MKO are ready to give testimonies that the group’s disappeared leader, Massoud Rajavi always claimed that being in the US list of terrorist organizations was an honor that the MKO members were supposed to be proud of. ‘We are proud of being in the US list otherwise we should doubt our cause,’ he regularly said in the meetings, in Iraq. Maryam Rajavi does not want to recall that her group’s objectives were originally anti-American and anti-Imperialism. Thus, she has to show her contentment of more pressure against Iranian nation, in some way.”

++ Iranian dot com published an informative piece by Massoud Khodabandeh which describes how the MEK is opening a new front in Canada. Khodabandeh says that after the failure of Saudi Arabia and the MEK to sow discord between the EU and Iran, they are now targeting Canada to prevent meaningful dialogue with Iran. Iranian Canadians who are working to promote dialogue and peaceful relations are being directly attacked by MEK agents. One agent in particular has threatened legal action against the mostly volunteer workers at the Iranian Canadian Congress and journalists with the online IC Journal. Khodabandeh’s questions is, if this also fails, will the KSA and MEK escalate their activities as they did in Europe to murder people in Toronto?
April 19, 2019

April 20, 2019 0 comments

The cult of Rajavi

MEK’s Virus Removal in Quarantine and the Overthrow Joke

In a recent meeting with cult members, Maryam Rajavi told them that ‘the regime is now ruined, we clearly see signs and symptoms of overthrow of the regime – with this situation and the conditions that the regime has been going through for up to a year and a half, we will see that the regime cannot continue and it’s over, over, over …’
After her speech, one of the members called Mohammad Ali Agahi stood up and asked, ‘Sister Maryam, why are you lying to us about this’. Many then attacked him, but more people came to support him and some minutes later the meeting was ended. Mohammad Ali and the other people who supported him were then sent to Quarantine. For those who don’t know, ‘Quarantine’ is a place of isolation where a person is kept alone until the commanders and leading members of the organization come to talk in a process of so-called ‘Virus Removal’.
The fact is that the slogans of the cult have changed so often – according to circumstances – that it has become another ideological joke in their meetings. One day overthrow is the slogan, next day it was our fault there is no overthrow, next day overthrow is not important only obeying the ideology matters. What a joke.
BY Hassan Heyrani,

April 17, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

The Corruption of the Terrorist Group List

The ineffectiveness and many of the costs of the Trump administration’s latest move in its anti-Iran campaign—its designation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO)—are readily apparent and have been ably analyzed by other commentators. The designation does not put any additional economic pressure on an already heavily sanctioned Iran and, among other drawbacks, only makes it harder for Iranian critics of the IRGC to speak up lest they be seen as stooges of the United States.
The Trump administration is running out of ways to demonstrate its hostility toward Iran. As it strives to contrive new ways, it compromises and undermines other U.S. interests and objectives. The latest move undermines the objective of counterterrorism by placing, for the first time ever, a governmental entity on a list that never was designed for that purpose.
Omnibus counterterrorist legislation known as the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act, which Congress enacted in 1996, created the FTO list. That act criminalized material support to terrorist groups, with material support defined broadly to include financial contributions, propagandizing, and almost any other form of cooperation or business dealings with a terrorist group. If support to a foreign terrorist organization was to be made a crime, then it was necessary for the law to specify what counted as a foreign terrorist organization. Hence the 1996 act created a formal list of such organizations, along with criteria for the executive branch to use in determining which groups should be placed on the list.
In short, the FTO list never was intended to be a means of condemning foreign entities that the United States doesn’t like. Instead, it is a tool for prosecutors to go after individuals who, for example, contribute money or facilitate the movement of guns or people on behalf of a terrorist group.

Sweeping Implications
Clearly none of this is designed to apply to an arm of a foreign government, whose operations depend on a governmental budget rather than on aid from prosecutable individuals. The attempt to apply the U.S. law in question to the IRGC—which is an entire branch of the Iranian armed forces—theoretically makes every Iranian taxpayer a potential criminal defendant. Or, if one did not want to apply the concept of material support quite that broadly, what about all those who currently serve in the IRGC (about 125,000) or its associated militias within Iran (an even larger number) or have ever served in the IRGC (another large number, because many Iranians perform their military service in the Guard)?
The broad range of activities that the IRGC performs on behalf of the Iranian state also means that the material support provision would apply as well to other foreign governments that do ordinary, decidedly non-terrorist, business with Iran. This is especially true of Iraq, which for this reason strongly opposed the U.S. designation of the IRGC. Iraqi officials deal with the IRGC not only on matters of Iraqi security but also on such mundane business as the regulation of cross-border commerce. The IRGC also has been involved in peace negotiations in Afghanistan, making other participants to that process subject to the material support provision as well.
The law hits even closer to home when considering a terrorism-relevant fact that the Trump administration refuses to acknowledge. Iran, including the IRGC, has actively opposed the terrorist threat that has mattered most in recent years, which is violent Sunni extremism of the al-Qaeda or Islamic State (ISIS or IS) variety. In Iraq, the IRGC and the militias it supported played the leading role in combating and defeating IS on the ground. The United States played a supporting role with air power. That means that the U.S. Air Force has provided material support to the IRGC and thus also is in violation of U.S. law, or at least would be the next time it is used to combat a similar terrorist threat that Iran also opposes. Of course, it sounds ridiculous to talk about the Air Force as a violator of U.S. criminal law, but this ridiculousness is only a reflection of how inapposite it is to designate the IRGC an FTO.
Putting foreign governments’ militaries or security services on the FTO list starts down a slope on which there is no stopping point other than the arbitrary and inconsistent one that the administration prefers. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s assertion that “the Iranian regime’s use of terrorism as a tool of statecraft makes it fundamentally different from any other government” is fundamentally incorrect. The public record alone shows that other governments use clandestine violence overseas, including in ways that fully qualify as international terrorism under the terms of the same U.S. law that created the FTO list. Pakistan does it. Russia does it. Israel has a long record of doing it, including nasty operations such as car bombs in urban streets that kill innocent passers-by as well as the intended target. One of the very Iran-supported operations that Pompeo mentioned in his bill of particulars against the IRGC was clearly an attempt to retaliate for serial Israeli assassinations of Iranian scientists. The original assassinations were international terrorism every bit as much as the attempted retaliation.
And, as a recent reminder, the murder of Jamal Khashoggi shows that Saudi Arabia does it, too.

Actual Objectives
The IRGC designation is one more indicator of how the administration’s campaign of unrelenting hostility against Iran has less to do with countering nefarious behavior than it does with pursuing other objectives. One of those objectives, as the timing of the designation announcement made obvious, was to bestow another gift on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and help him win re-election. Netanyahu publicly thanked President Trump for responding to the prime minister’s “request” to make the designation.
Another objective is to goad Iran into making some move that would provide a spark or an excuse for the war with Iran that National Security Advisor John Bolton has long wanted and that Pompeo evidently wants as well, as reflected in his refusal to acknowledge, in a recent exchange with Senator Rand Paul (R-KY), that the administration lacks congressional authority for such a war.
Pompeo clings to the notion that a post-9/11 authorization for the use of force is sufficient because Iran held some al-Qaeda members in some kind of house arrest rather than immediately expelling or prosecuting them. The notion ignores that Sunni extremists of the al-Qaeda sort are adversaries, not allies, of Iran. It also ignores what probably was Iran’s hope in holding the al-Qaeda members, which was to exchange them for members of the terrorist group/cult known as the Mojahedin e-Khalq (MEK), then under U.S. control in a camp in Iraq. As Michael Rubin’s review of that group’s record makes clear, the MEK richly deserved its place on the FTO list, even though money from its well-heeled backers bought enough lobbying to get it removed from the list a few years ago.

To all the other deleterious side-effects of the administration’s obsession with Iran—including the diplomatic isolation of the United States and the poisoning of U.S. alliances—add the damage to U.S. counterterrorist policy and to U.S. credibility in the fight against terrorism.
by Paul R. Pillar

April 17, 2019 0 comments

Iran

Iran: France is still harbouring MEK

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif says the Islamic Republic is prepared to join hands with the French government to resolve regional issues, especially those in Libya and Sudan.
Zarif made the comments in a Sunday meeting with the new ambassador of the French Republic to Tehran, Philippe Thiebaud, during which he presented a copy of his credentials at the beginning of his mission
In the meeting, FM Zarif referred to the historical and long-term relations between the two countries and the positive attitude of the people of Iran towards France, and called for the removal of the barriers in bilateral relations relying on the wisdom and prudence of the two states’ authorities.
Zarif pointed to the presence of the MKO terrorist group on French soil, and described it as a problem between Tehran and Paris.
The Iranian foreign minister also announced the Islamic Republic’s readiness to hold talks and have cooperation with the French officials to solve the problems of the region.
Pointing to the dangerous developments that recently unfolded in North Africa, including Libya and Sudan, FM Zarif noted they were the result of the intervention of some Arab countries in the region.
Elsewhere in his remarks, FM Zarif criticised the recent statement by the Group of Seven and the French ambassador to the United States regarding the peaceful nuclear activities of Iran, saying that such positions would destroy the 2015 deal between Iran and world powers.
For his part, the French ambassador referred to the recent talks between the presidents of Iran and France, underlining that Paris is willing to continue talks with Tehran on regional and international issues.
“The position of France, as underlined in the telephone conversation of the French president with President Rouhani, is to remain in the JCPOA and support and fulfil both sides’ obligations,” he noted.
Thiebaud referred to Iran’s fulfilment of its obligations under the JCPOA, and highlighted the efforts made by France and the role it played in the establishment and introduction of INSTEX, the European special purpose vehicle aimed at facilitating trade with Iran under the US sanctions.

Iran Front Page, IFPNews,

April 16, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization as a terrorist group

Massoud Rajavi was proud of being terrorist listed

The designation of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a foreign terrorist organization by the Trump administration was cheered up and praised by formerly terrorist designated entity, the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO, MEK, PMOI, Cult of Rajavi) and the hawks and warmongers such as Benjamin Netanyahu and John Bolton.

Two of them publicly gave credit to Trump’s move to list the IRGC. Netanyahu appreciated President Trump and claimed that the designation was made at his request. “Thank you, my dear friend, President Donald Trump,” he tweeted in Hebrew, “for answering another one of my important requests.”
Maryam Rajavi, the leader of the MKO also took credit for the new sanctions against the official Iranian military force. “The terrorist designation of the repressive Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has been the enduring and the righteous demand of the Iranian people and Resistance and an imperative for regional and global peace and security,” she claimed on her tweeter account.
In fact, Maryam Rajavi hesitates to thank President Trump directly the same way that Netanyahu did. Instead, she repeats her usual propaganda against the IRGC, although she has warm relations with US warmongers. American Iran hawks such as John Bolton, Tom Ridge and Rudy Giuliani frequently show up in the MKO gatherings where they are warmly welcome by Maryam Rajavi. She pays them hefty sums to support her group and to stop what she calls appeasement towards Islamic Republic and eventually to impose more sanctions on Iran. The MKO successfully lobbied to be removed from the proper official State Department list of FTOs with the help of these paid supporters, in 2012. Thus, with the listing of IRGC, Maryam Rajavi is normally expected to make her comment of appreciation to indicate that how grateful she is to the US administration.
However, she would not act the same as Netanyahu because she does not dare to openly contradict what her husband said at Camp Ashraf. Defectors of the MKO are ready to give testimonies that the group’s disappeared leader, Massoud Rajavi always claimed that being in the US list of terrorist organizations was an honor that the MKO members were supposed to be proud of. “We are proud of being in the US list otherwise we should doubt our cause,” he regularly said in the meetings, in Iraq.
Maryam Rajavi does not want to recall that her group’s objectives were originally anti-American and anti-Imperialism. Thus, she has to show her contentment of more pressure against Iranian nation, in some way.
By Mazda Parsi

April 16, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization as a terrorist group

The case of MEK operative Mohammad Reza Kolahi’s murder didn’t need to be a mystery

According to the media in the Netherlands, two Amsterdam criminals have been jailed for the 2015 murder of an Iranian, Mohammad Reza Kolahi Samadi, who lived in the Netherlands hiding behind the false name of Ali Motamed.

In July 2018 I wrote an article for the Balkans Post titled ‘MEK rebrands by assassinating unwanted members’ in which I brought up the case of Mohammad Reza Kolahi Samadi as one of many examples in which the Mojahedin Khalq have got rid of an affiliated disaffected operative to

1- Cleanse themselves of their terrorist history by eliminating the operatives;

2- Get rid of someone who has gone rogue and may potentially damage the MEK legally and socially if he decided to talk;

3- Make an excuse to attach yet another murder in the west to Iran.

In that article I wrote:

“In 2015, in the Netherlands, Mohamad Reza Kolahi was killed by a criminal gang on the order of MEK. Investigators confirmed that Kolahi was responsible for the 1981 bombing of the headquarters of the Islamic Republic Party in Tehran in which 72 high-ranking politicians and party members were killed.”

In January 2019 I wrote a short blog (in Persian) titled ‘Why is no one asking Maryam Rajavi about the fate of Kolahi?’, in which I begged the question, why have the investigators (and the relevant CIA connected Persian speaking media outlets in Prague and Washington) gone well out of their way to attach the murder to Iranian diplomats in Amsterdam and have repeatedly announced that the Iranian embassy in Amsterdam “is not giving a clear answer” as to the reasons behind this murder (as if they could or should). But why does not a single person want to investigate or even ask questions of Maryam Rajavi and her fugitive husband Massoud who was the leader of the Mojahedin Khalq Organisation at the time Mohammad Reza Kolahi carried out his terrorist act in 1981. Kolahi planted the bomb in the HQ of a political party (rivals of the MEK at that time) in the middle of Tehran which killed ten people.

I begged the question, is this because Maryam Rajavi had not told the Netherlands intelligence service of Kolahi’s whereabouts? Or did she tell them (presumably through her CIA contacts) but the Netherlands intelligence service did give him enough protection? Or is it that the Netherlands security service are too afraid of the CIA and Mossad to even question Maryam Rajavi? Or it is simply convenient for them to play the game and accuse Iran in the series of Iran bashing scenarios (presumably planned by Prince Turki bin Faisal Al Saud and carried out by MEK) that signal the change of direction for the MEK from Saddam-Massoud-military to Turki-Maryam-intelligence.

I knew Kolahi personally. I received him in Kurdistan when he ran away from Iran. (I had transferred a 10 KW radio transmitter and other American made transceivers from Munich to MEK bases just outside Sardasht city and was there to undertake the assembly and commissioning). He worked with me for the next two years (he was an undergraduate Electronics Engineering student) and was then moved to maintenance work at Rajavi’s Camp Ashraf (Saddam’s private army) near Baghdad.

I knew then that he was not a member of MEK or even remotely connected to their ideology when he came to me, and I knew later in Iraq that he could never accept the cultish teachings of Rajavi thereafter (the Ideological Revolution, divorces …), and would remain an outcast with nowhere to go. And this is what happened. Whether he was fooled by MEK to carry out this terrorist act, or whether he was pushed directly by other intelligence agencies which pulled MEK wires in Tehran at that time is a mystery to me. But what is clear is that although he was not a person close to MEK, the task of taking him out of Iran and saving him (and at the same time confining him) was the job assigned to the MEK.

It is inconceivable that Kolahi, with the information that he had, and the danger he could pose to the MEK and their variety of masters if brought in front of a camera, would go to the Netherlands, get married, get a job and start a new life without the help and the blessing of the MEK (Maryam Rajavi). It is also inconceivable that the MEK (or their masters) would have not have a 24/7 control of every aspect of his life (including every telephone conversation) and simply let him go unmonitored.

I am not an investigator but even I can see that all the elements of “means, motive and opportunity” are pointing directly at the Mojahedin Khalq and Maryam Rajavi in person for his murder. What I can’t see is what is it that prevents European judiciary and law enforcement agencies from even approaching the idea of considering Maryam Rajavi as a material witness never mind, God forbid, a suspect.

Massoud Khodabandeh, Middle East Strategy Consultants

April 15, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

The Iran Hawks’ Creepy Embrace of the MEK

Former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge resumes his discrediting advocacy for the Mujahideen-e Khalq:

Which is why I include myself among an incredible cadre of men and women from across every spectrum of life and political affiliation, in Europe and here in America, who have decided to embrace publicly the viable alternative to the clerical regime, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), and the 10-point Plan advocated by the NCRI’s leader, Maryam Rajavi.

It is rather incredible that so many former government officials and retired officers have embraced a totalitarian cult as the “alternative” to another country’s government, but it has been going on for the better part of a decade now. All of the MEK’s American boosters have proven that they have such extraordinary bad judgment that they should have no business talking about Iran policy (or any other foreign policy issue), and their continued advocacy on behalf of this awful organization is proof of how easily corrupted our foreign policy debates are. The MEK probably does still engage in terrorism, since its members were reportedly the ones responsible for murdering Iranian scientists a few years back, but there is absolutely no question that they are not and never could be a “viable alternative” to the current government. It is an indictment of Ridge and others like him, including the National Security Advisor, that they are so gullible or so obsessed with regime change that they are willing to make such ridiculous claims in public.

Ridge unsurprisingly doesn’t mention that almost all Iranians everywhere hate the MEK and want nothing to do with it. They certainly don’t want them to take over Iran, and I think it’s safe to assume that any attempt to force this group on the people would be met with overwhelming resistance. So much for being “viable.” It is a reflection of many Iran hawks’ ignorance of the country and its people that they think this could possibly work. He omits that Rajavi is a cultish leader who used to fight on the side of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war, and he leaves out the group’s long history of abusing its members that continues to this day in their creepy compound in Albania. Every time that a prominent American shills for the MEK, it is an insult to the genuine Iranian opposition and another reminder that Iran hawks have nothing but contempt for the Iranian people.

In addition to shilling for the cult, Ridge urges the Trump administration to be merciless in its application of sanctions in order to strangle Iran’s economy even more than it already has:

President Trump’s views on Iran are both clear and appropriate, but frankly, I would like to see zero exports of energy. Some say that means the Iranian people will suffer, but they are suffering now. Inflation is at 40 percent, unemployment at 50 percent. The rial has lost 70 percent of its value. And the recent devastating floods engulfing 27 out of 31 provinces are a damning indictment of the mullahs for their 40 years of mismanagement, incompetence and the looting of Iran’s national wealth. We must encourage the president, the administration and Congress to sustain the pressure.

Existing sanctions are responsible for causing much of the suffering that Iranians are already experiencing, and Ridge’s answer to that is to cause even more harm in the vain hope that this will lead to regime change. Toppling the government in Tehran seems to be the only thing that matters to these fanatics, and they don’t care how many millions of people have to be punished along the way.

By Daniel Larison ,

April 15, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

Flood of MEK’s propaganda against Iran

Following the continuous floods in Iran that started in March claiming 70 lives, destroying infrastructures and displacing thousands of people across Iran, the opportunists such as the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ Cult of Rajavi) have made efforts to fish in troubled waters.

The MKO’s propaganda media is flooded with the news of floods in Iran particularly claims of the authorities’ mismanagement to manage the disastrous rain showers and moreover the suppressive attitude of governmental forces against victims of the flood!

Actually the very question is that who cares for the MKO news websites? Definitely not the Iranian nation. The fact was once more repeated by the American prominent journalist a few weeks ago. Michael Rubin has always been a criticizer to the American support for the MKO although he is a significant critic of the Islamic Republic government. In his recent article he asserts that the decisions of the Trump administration “to defy long-held conventional wisdom on U.S. foreign policy” may not be so harmful but “when it comes to the Mojahedin e-Khalq (MEK), an Iranian opposition group, any cooperation and coordination—let alone support—from the United States would be disastrous.”

The main reason that he states for his argument is that there is “only one item that united Iranians inside Iran: absolute hatred of the Mojahedin e-Khalq (MEK).”

Rubin truly suggests, “What really broke any remaining popular support for the MEK among ordinary Iranians, however, was their embrace of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein’s regime against the backdrop of the Iran-Iraq War”. As he accurately states, for most Iranians, the MEK-Saddam relationship is unforgivable.

He frankly puts: “The Mojahedin e-Khalq are a bad bet”

In his opinion, the MKO is a bad bet because the US should not trust a group that is hated among its own country fellowmen and eventually has turned into a political prostitute. “Unable to win any support from Iranians inside Iran, the MEK has turned to the gullible and greedy: they are political chameleons. When in Iran, they were a combination between Islamists and social justice warriors,” Rubin writes.

“In Iraq, they were secularists, basically Baathists without the Arab identity. And while in France, they are Ademocrats. In reality, their behavior resembles a cult, right down to dictating where members live, whom they should marry and divorce, and the rent-a-mobs who populate their rallies.”

Thus, the MKO’s propaganda on the recent flood in Iran has no Iranian audience but it surely has certain listeners among paid Western politicians like Rudy Giuliani and John Bolton. Stephanie Baker of Bloomberg website titles her recent article asking “where Rudy Giuliani’s money comes from”. She suggests that Giuliani has “made millions of dollars while acting as Trump’s unpaid consigliere” including the MKO as one of the main sources of Giuliani’s deep pockets.

“Giuliani told me he’s worked with the MEK since 2008,” Stephanie Baker writes.

“At the time, the U.S. Department of State designated the group a foreign terrorist organization, describing it as “cultlike” and saying members were forced to take a vow of “eternal divorce” and participate in weekly “ideological cleansings.” When the State Department revoked the designation in 2012, it nevertheless expressed serious concerns about the organization, “particularly with regard to allegations of abuse committed against its members.”

However, as Rubin states, the biggest problem is treating the MEK as anything more than a pariah because Iranians hate the group for its history, previous actions, and past allegiances.

According to Dr. Emile Nakhleh former senior intelligence service officer and director of the Political Islam Strategic Analysis Program in the Directorate of Intelligence at the Central Intelligence Agency,

“The MEK, , is a terrorist cult that has received funding from all sorts of dubious sources and is often used as a tool by outside groups, states, and organizations, including intelligence services of regional and international state actors, to further an anti-Iran agenda.”

By Mazda Parsi

April 14, 2019 0 comments

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