Page 293 – Nejat Society

MKO member defect the Cult in Albania

Mr. Shahab Forouzandeh left the Cult of Rajavi in Tirana, Albania.

Shahab’s family several times traveled to Iraq to visit their beloved son, however the MKO Cult leaders denied to let them meet Shahab.

The Forouzandeh family staged rally in front of MKO Camp Ashraf along with other family members, yet the Cult leaders deprived them of their certain right which was to be able to meet their family members taken as hostages in MKO Camps.

After years of efforts by the US, UNAMI as well as the Iraqi government the Mujahedin-e Khalq removed from Iraq and took refuge in Albania.

In Albania tens of MKO members have left the group and stepped the free world, reports say.

October 9, 2016 0 comments

Iran Interlink Weekly Digest

Iran Interlink Weekly Digest – 164

++ MEK internal critic Iraj Mesdaghi is known as a prolific internet ranter. In the midst of his outpourings this week, he published pictures which he claims show Massoud Khodabandeh talking with somebody and using obscene language. Mesdaghi claims that Khodabandeh, the MEK and the Iranian government have all collaborated to work against him. Khodabandeh answered, saying that although he would not usually engage with such rants it has been necessary to apply an analytic response in this case. He says the accusations are clearly fabricated since he never met with any such person and would never use such bad language. What is relevant is that Mesdaghi’s situation is rendered pretty sad by this. Whether he faked the images and speech himself or it was fed to him by the MEK or others, it is clearly exploiting his known weaknesses in order to discredit him and thus undermine the evidence and documents he brings to the 1988 prison executions investigation. Mesdaghi was part of this event and exposing him now as a liar and cheat brings discredit to his evidence. As the Persian proverb says, he is throwing a mouse into the stew (Ash) of other cooks.

++ In Iran the Association of Graduates of Sharif University published a booklet of former graduates. Maryam Rajavi’s picture is there too. There have been mixed reactions, with people asking, ‘was this deliberate?’ Many reminded us of the time that the MEK would place ads for shampoo in Iranian newspapers using Massoud Rajavi’s picture, or place an announcement in the small ads with a picture of Maryam Rajavi saying, ‘we are waiting for you my beloveds’. It is more likely, however, that this has happened because nobody knows her. The younger generations have no idea who she is. For them she is just an old woman, past retirement age who used to go to their university.

++ Muharram has started and it is nearly Ashura. Every year the MEK changes its mind as to whether it should mark the event or ignore it depending on their circumstances. This time they are trying to create an anti-Shia image of themselves to suit what the Saudis need. Commentators point out that Saddam was anti-Iranian, the Saudis are anti-Shia and Israel is anti-both of them. But interestingly, the MEK – claiming to be both Iranian and Shia – manage to have kept their place among them and mark Ashura as well.

++ A book has been published in Iran called ‘My life with the Mojahedin’. It is written by a former MEK member who had originally been a POW. He describes how the MEK made him suffer until he submitted to going with them rather than remain in Saddam’s prison. After escaping the MEK after 2003 he took refuge with the American army before getting to Germany. He has now returned home to Iran and to his family.

In English:

++ IRNA – “Iran took the complaints of families of victims of terrorist operations carried by Mujahedeen Khalq Organization to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva. During the 33rd session of the Human Rights Council, the Association for Defending Victims of Terrorism (ADVT) called for the realization of human rights of victims of terrorism. ADVT said that cultural campaign must be initiated to uproot terrorism in the world.”

++ A report by the Congressional Research Service, headed by Kenneth Katzman, and titled ‘Iran: Politics, Persian Gulf Security, and U.S. Policy’ devotes a page at the end to describing the MEK. In spite of strange contradictions which are probably a result of energetic ‘copy and paste’ and too little ‘read and edit’, the passage makes interesting reading.

October 07, 2016

October 9, 2016 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Flow of speaking and writing fees to the MKO’s paid sponsors

Speaking is not cheap and neither is writing, particularly if you have to speak or write on behalf of a formerly designated terrorist group that fails to enjoy any popular base. That’s why, the speakers at the rallies of the Mujahedin Khalq receive up to 25000 $ for a ten-minute speech. They are paid to say what the group has dictated to them regardless of the genuineness of what they are told to write or say. Every now and then, certain politicians are paid to write pieces in certain media to express their support for the group. The Hill is usually one of the main bases for the MKO-paid propaganda in the US media.

Certain paid sponsors of the MKO have made big pockets with the MKO money. Former Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-RI) is an ardent advocate of the MKO who has been on the group’s payroll for the speeches and the articles on behalf of the group.

He so passionately showed off his empathy in one of the group’s rallies, “One of the greatest moments was when my uncle, President [John F.] Kennedy, stood in Berlin and uttered the immortal words ‘Ich bin ein Berliner,’. Today, I’m honored to repeat my uncle’s words, by saying [translated from Farsi] ‘I am an Iranian,’ ‘I am an Ashrafi.”

Following the above mentioned rally in August 2011, Ali Gharib and Zaid Jilani of Think Progress reported that Patrick Kennedy (D-RI) told them he was paid $25,000 to speak at a rally to remove a controversial Iranian exiled opposition group from the U.S. terrorist rolls after previously not saying if he was paid.

However, Think Progress correspondents who published a comprehensive report on the event noted the fact that Kennedy wouldn’t tell Foreign Policy’s Josh Rogin whether or not he was paid to speak at the rally to remove the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK) from the State Department list of foreign terror organizations. But asked by Think Progress, Kennedy replied that he had been paid $25,000 and that he wouldn’t accept the money if he didn’t believe in the cause. Kennedy was part of the huge campaign to delist the MKO in 2012.

Supposing that Kennedy does believe in the cause of the MKO, it is worth to ask him what the group’s cause is. As Kennedy and his comrades claim, the MKO spouses a democratic and secular Iran. But, they do not define that how they want to bring about democracy in Iran using the MKO.

Definitely, democracy takes evolution of grassroots. The seeds for any changes in any society must be sowed by its people and the Iranian people themselves are practicing democracy in their everyday life. Iranians are sure that the democratic society they look for does not exist in the MKO. Whenever you seek opinion of the people about the MKO you hear nothing but resentment and treachery.

Josh Rogin’s account on the MKO’s rally in Foreign Policy well indicates the unpopularity of the MKO among Iranian diaspora. “In a crowd made up of people who were mostly of Middle Eastern origin, a group of African-American attendees wearing MEK gear stood out”, He describes the MKO’s rented crowd.

Think Progress also describes Kennedy’s audience, “Speaking before a large crowd outside the State Department that included attendees bused-in from afar on all-expenses-paid trips, Kennedy cited one such attack — in April, which reportedly killed 34 Ashraf residents — as having spurred his support for the group.”

Following the resettlement of the MKO in Albania, the group’s propaganda made efforts to use an idiotic fallacy calling the relocation as a victory! Eventually, paid writers of the group repeated the same misjudgment in their writings.

“Always well-financed with laundered funds from hazy sources (including Saddam Hussein, and more recently the Saudis and the U.S. among others), for years the MEK spread money around like honey in Washington, Paris and other power centers,” writes Farid Khavari of the InvestmentWatchBlog.

Kennedy tries to convince the audience that the MKO relocation in Europe as a step forward to have “closer contact with European governments and the world community, where they can tell their stories and continue their activism in favor of regime change in Tehran.” He seems to be so manipulated by the group’s propaganda and money that he cannot understand that the notorious MKO cult will never be that viable force to bring regime change except with military intervention of the West. “Iranians would never vote for this government, and it could only be installed by U.S. military action,” Farid Khavari writes.

The paid advocacy campaign for the MKO should notice Farid’s clear advice: “This regime [established by the MKO] would be a worse threat to the region including Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Israel. It would also spark a civil war making Iran the next Syria.”

“The MEK owes its perceived legitimacy to the ignorance, innocent or not, of politicians and respected leaders in the free world. Let us hope their purchase of influence over U.S. policy does not lead to perpetual war”, he warns paid politicians.

Moreover, MKO is absolutely a cult-like group with an undeniable history of violence and human rights violation. It is considered a destructive cult of personality around the Rajavis. The “closer” it is to the European citizens, the more they are exposed to the threat of the destructive Cult of Rajavi.

By Mazda Parsi

October 8, 2016 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization

Iran: Politics, Persian Gulf Security, and US Policy; Congressional Research Service

Iran: Politics, (Persian) Gulf Security, and U.S. Policy

Extract:

Opposition Group: People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (MEK, PMOI)

The best-known exiled opposition group is the Mojahedin-e-Khalq Organization (MEK), also known as the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI). Secular and left-leaning, it was formed in the 1960s to try to overthrow the Shah of Iran and has been characterized by U.S. reports as attempting to blend several ideologies, including Marxism, feminism, and Islam, although the organization denies that it ever advocated Marxism. It allied with pro-Khomeini forces during the Islamic revolution and, according to State Department reports, supported the November 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. The group was driven into exile after it unsuccessfully rose up against the Khomeini regime in September 1981. It has been led for decades by spouses Maryam and Massoud Rajavi but in 2011 Ms. Zohreh Akhyani was elected as MEK Secretary-General. Maryam Rajavi is based in France but the whereabouts of Massoud Rajavi are unknown.

The State Department designated the PMOI as an FTO in October 1997—during the presidency of the relatively moderate Mohammad Khatemi. The NCR was named as an alias of the PMOI in October 1999, and in August 2003, the Department of the Treasury ordered the groups’ offices in the United States closed. State Department reports on international terrorism for the years until 2011 asserted that the members of the organization were responsible for: the alleged killing of seven American military personnel and contract advisers to the former Shah during 1973-1976; bombings at U.S. government facilities in Tehran in 1972 as a protest of the visit to Iran of then-President Richard Nixon; and bombings of U.S. corporate offices in Iran to protest the visit of then Secretary of State Kissinger.

The reports also listed as terrorism several attacks by the group against regime targets (including 1981 bombings that killed high ranking officials), attacks on Iranian government facilities, and attacks on Iranian security officials. However, the reports did not assert that any of these attacks purposely targeted civilians. The group’s alliance with Saddam Hussein’s regime in contributed to the designation, even though Saddam was a U.S. ally during 1980-90.

The PMOI challenged the FTO listing in the U.S. court system and, in June 2012, the Appeals Court gave the State Department until October 1, 2012, to decide on the FTO designation, without prescribing an outcome. On September 28, 2012, maintaining there had not been confirmed acts of PMOI terrorism for more than a decade and that it had cooperated on the Camp Ashraf issue (below), the group was removed from the FTO list as well as from the designation as a terrorism supporter under Executive Order 13224. However, State Department officials, in a background briefing that day, said “We do not see the [PMOI] as a viable or democratic opposition movement…. “

The NCR-I reopened its offices in Washington, DC, in April 2013. The State Department has been meeting with the MEK since its removal from the FTO list, including in Iraq.

Camp Ashraf Issue

The de-listing of the group has not resolved the situation of PMOI members in Iraq. U.S. forces attacked PMOI military installations in Iraq during Operation Iraqi Freedom (March 2003) and negotiated a ceasefire with PMOI elements in Iraq, according to which the approximately 3,400 PMOI members consolidated at Camp Ashraf, near the border with Iran. Its weaponry was placed in storage, guarded first by U.S. and now by Iraqi personnel. In July 2004, the United States granted the Ashraf detainees “protected persons” status under the 4th Geneva Convention, although that designation lapsed when Iraq resumed full sovereignty in June 2004. The Iraqi government’s pledges to adhere to all international obligations with respect to the PMOI in Iraq has come into question on several occasions: on July 28, 2009, Iraq used force to overcome resident resistance to setting up a police post in the camp, killing 13 n residents of the camp. On April 8, 2011, Iraq Security Forces killed 36 Ashraf residents; the State Department issued a statement attributing the deaths to the actions of Iraq and its military.

In December 2011, the Iraqi government and the United Nations agreed to relocate Ashraf residents to the former U.S. military base Camp Liberty, near Baghdad’s main airport. The relocation was completed by September 17, 2012, leaving a residual group of 101 PMOI persons at Ashraf. The group asserted that conditions at Liberty are poor and the facility is unsafe. On February 9, 2013, the camp was attacked by rockets, killing eight PMOI members; the Shiite militia group Kata’ib Hezbollah (KAH) claimed responsibility. A rocket attack on the camp took place on June 15, 2013. On September 1, 2013, 52 of the residual Ashraf residents were killed by gunmen that appeared to have assistance from Iraqi forces. Seven went missing. All survivors of the attack were moved to Camp Liberty, and Ashraf has been taken over by Iran-backed Shiite militias. An October 29, 2015, rocket attack on the Camp killed 24 residents and a rocket attack on July 4, 2016, did not kill any residents, but wounded some. The FY2016 National Defense Authorization Act (P.L. 114-92) calls for “prompt and appropriate steps” to promote the protection of Camp residents.

Since 2011, the U.N. High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) has sought to resettle PMOI members outside Iraq. About 600 have been resettled so far: 450 to Albania; 95 to Germany; 95 to Italy; 15 to Norway; and 2 to Finland. The United States reportedly might resettle 100 or more, but the U.S. requirement that those resettled disavow the group has apparently held up implementation of that program. About 200 have returned to Iran; a few of them reportedly have been imprisoned and/or mistreated.

[…]

Kenneth Katzman
Specialist in Middle Eastern Affairs
August 19, 2016
Congressional Research Service
7-5700
www.crs.gov
RL32048

October 6, 2016 0 comments

Former members of the MEK

Pictorial- MEK Defectors denounce the cult in Germany

Former members who actively denounce the MKO destructive cult held a protest gathering in Koln, Germany on Saturday, September 3rd, 2016

Holding brochures and photos of the MKO Cult’s high-ranking members in Germany and France and also giving some information on their clandestine activities, former members sought to reveal the true face of the MKO destructive cult to the audiences.

MKO ex-members denounce the cult in Germany

October 5, 2016 0 comments

Former members of the MEK

MKO ex-members denounce the cult in Germany

Former members who actively denounce the MKO destructive cult held a protest gathering in Koln, Germany on Saturday, September 3rd, 2016

Hundreds of brochures handed out to the visitors. The brochures included compendious reports on the terrorist activities of the MKO Cult, smuggling terrorists to Europe by fake identities, self-immolation of the Cult members in 2003, … .

MKO ex-members denounce the cult in Germany

October 5, 2016 0 comments

Former members of the MEK

Ex-cult members gather to review the MKO’s last three decade life

Mujahedin-e Khalq former members gathered together to discuss the activities and achievements of the group during the last thirty years.

Members of Yaran-e Iran association analyzed the MKO’s function since the group’s moving to Iraq, its relocation from Camp Ashraf to Camp Liberty and then its expulsion from the country.

Participants who have spent long years of their lives within the Cult affairs, criticized the group’s leader efforts to pretend the forced relocation to Tirana as “A Great Victory”.

Mr. Ghafour Fatahian referred to Maryam Rajavi’s last year remarks demanding the US to rearm the group and her efforts to change Camp Liberty from a Temporary Transit Location to a Refugee Camp and said the group was forced to leave the Iraqi territory, so there is no victory for the group.

Yaran-e Iran published a video file of the meeting on their website: http://www.yaraniran.com/

October 4, 2016 0 comments

Former members of the MEK

MKO ex-members’ protest gathering in Koln

Participants at the rally declared their support for the MKO hostages’ families’ certain right of visiting their loved ones. Sympathizing with the suffering families, they urged the human rights bodies to facilitate their visit with their beloved family members.

They also warned Europe about the threat of the MKO destructive cult entry and spread through their states.

The MKO destructive cult is spreading throughout Europe as its members who are under severe Cult manipulations are entering Europe, ex-members reiterated.

Protest gathering in Koln

October 3, 2016 0 comments

Former members of the MEK

MKO Cult critics gathered to gether in Germany

On Saturday, September 17th the Rajavis’ Cult critics gathered together in Cologne, Germany to review the 30 – year life of MKO in Iraq and eventually its expelling from the Iraqi soil, Iran-Zanan Website reported.

Ms. Batoul soltani, Ms. Zahra Moeini, Mr. Ali Akbar Rastgoo, Mr. Davoud Baghervand and Mr. Nader Keshtkar participated the panel.

The participants who had all spent many years within the Cult affairs, shared their experiences.

They analyzed Massoud Rajavi’s three decade of wrong policies and analysis in Iraq.

They also reviewed the MKO Cult’s expulsion from Iraq, relocation in Albania and its consequences and how the Cult leaders deal with this issue.

The MKO critics denounced the Cult’s efforts to deceive the public opinion into considering this strategic”great defeat”as a”great victory”.

The participants also examined the bright horizons ahead of MKO dissatisfied members in Albania who are awaiting an opportunity to leave the group.

Panel of Mujahedin-e Khalq Cult critics

October 3, 2016 0 comments

Iran

Iran takes complaints of terror victims to UN Human Rights Council

Iran took the complaints of families of victims of terrorist operations carried by Mujahedeen Khalq Organization to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva.

During the 33rd session of the Human Rights Council, the Association for Defending Victims of Terrorism (ADVT) called for the realization of human rights of victims of terrorism.

ADVT said that cultural campaign must be initiated to uproot terrorism in the world.

The Iranian Association for Defending Victims of Terrorism raised the slogan of ‘The terror victims, the biggest impressive potential to fight terrorism’ in a series of meetings with senior officials of the United Nations, Non-Governmental organizations (NGO) and the governments’ representatives in the Human Rights Council.

The ADVT delegation held a panel on the subject of UN responsibility to curb terrorism; recommendations for more efficiency in which human rights experts and activists considered major role of the UN must unertake in the international campaign against terrorism.

According to the Association for Defending Victims of Terrorism, the major proposals raised during the panel were the UN must prevent granting asylum to terrorists, the UN’s clear reaction to condemn terrorist acts and take the criminals involved in terrorism to the courts of justice by the governments of the UN member states.

The 33rd session of the Human Rights Council is underway in Geneva, Switzerland.

October 2, 2016 0 comments

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