Page 393 – Nejat Society

Mujahedin Khalq Organization members' families

Nejat families letter to António Guterres

Letter to António Guterres UNHCR from Nejat Society families of Yazd Province, Iran

Honorable António Guterres ,

We, the signatories to the following letter are the families whose beloved ones are captured in the Liberty Camp, Iraq. We would be pleased to inform the authorities of the United Nations of the following issues and pass on our previous calls for aid.

Removing the cultish and organizational limitations is regarded as the basis for the freedom of the captured members of the Mojahedin Khalq Organization of Iran in Iraq; An organization which according to the UNAMI has changed into a sect and established the dictatorial relations.

By imposing the mental and physical limitations and violating the basic rights of the Camp residents in Iraq and outside Iraq, the organization has disconnected the communication between the members and their families, not allowing them to think, make a decision about their own fate. And according to the report issued by UNAMI in early 2013, it is stated that:

UNAMI has continuing concerns about human rights abuses committed by the PMOI leadership against Camp Hurriyah residents. By its hierarchical and authoritarian structure ,the Organization imposes severe restrictions on the residents’ rights, including the right of freedom of movement within the Camp and the right to leave the organization, the free right of association, along with restrictions on contacts with family members (including those residing in Camp Hurriya), on access to basic communications, and on access to medical care and treatment.

Your Excellency

This is the request of elderly mothers and fathers who look forward to visit their children. Their hope in life is to see their beloveds once again.

Your Excellency

We are deeply concerned for the fate of our children. We are entitled to see our children and we are sorry that the international human rights bodies haven’t paid the least attention to us.

We totally support the evacuation of Camp Liberty and transfer of the residents from Iraq where they are under the threat because of terrorist attacks and sectarian conflicts. We support the Camp Liberty residents’ transfer to other countries, especially the ailing or injured ones and those who own the visa of the US and European Countries. We urge you to take action and confront the leaders of the organization who obstruct the process of relocation of camp Liberty residents. We entreat to accelerate their evacuation.

We, together with all other families all over Iran, ask the international organizations, especially the United Nations High Commissioner to encourage other countries to accept their admission and resettlement.

We greatly appreciate every effort you have already made in order to make the families aware of the fate of their children and families in the Liberty Camp.

Sincerely Yours,

Signatories:

Mohammad Soltani Gerdfaramarzi (the father of Ms. Tahereh Soltani Gerdfaramarzi),

Jafar Soltani Gerdfaramarzi –

Mohammad Ghafouri (the brother of Abolghasem Ghafouri)

Hassan Zarezadeh Baghdadabad (the brother of Mohammad Zarezadeh

Baghdadabad),

Aliasghar Ramazani Zadeh, the son-in-law of the Zarezadeh,

Saeid Paydar, the brother of Paydar,

Ahmad Haeri and Ms. Mahini, the father and mother of Shahin Haeri,

Robabeh Razavizadeh Bahabadi, the sister of Seyedhossein Razavizadeh Bahabadi,

Kazem Beheshtizadeh, sin-in-law of Mohammadali Masih, (the captives: Nahid and Tayebeh Masih) Robabeh Karbalaei Sabagh, the sister of Alireza Karbalaei Sabagh,

Ahmad Karbalaei Sabagh, the brother of Alireza Karbalaei Sabagh,

Hassan Dehghanpour, the brother of Pouran Dehghanpour,

May 21, 2014 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

How did a false Iran nuclear narrative come to dominate global politics?

(Dr Gareth Porter is an investigative journalist and historian specialising in US national security policy)

Some misconceptions about Iran’s nuclear programme are based on false evidence, argues Porter [AP]

As the crucial phase of the nuclear negotiations between the P5+1 and Iran began in Vienna recently, the fate of the agreement hangs by a thread. A wide chasm separates the declared positions of the two sides in regard to the enrichment capabilities that Iran would be permitted to keep, as has been widely reported.

What has gone unnoticed, however, is that the US negotiating demand for a deep cut in Iran’s enrichment capabilities has been shaped by Obama administration’s firm belief that Iran has been deceiving the world by hiding its firm determination to obtain nuclear weapons. That view of Iranian nuclear policy has come to dominate the international politics of the Iran nuclear issue over the past decade. But it has not emerged as a result of straightforward evidence.

As documented in my book, Manufactured Crisis: The Untold Story of the Iran Nuclear Scare, the narrative of a secret Iranian nuclear weapons programme is the net result of a combination of strong political predisposition in US administrations and the intelligence community to believe it and a falsified intelligence dossier that has been foisted on the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) – and on world opinion.

The wrong kind of missile

The false Iran nuclear narrative began when the CIA set up a new centre for WMD proliferation in 1991 staffed by specialists on the subject who were pointed toward Iran as a target state threatening to proliferate. Not surprisingly that centre responded by judging repeatedly over the next decade that Iran’s efforts to obtain uranium enrichment technology beginning in the latter half of the 1980s was aimed at creating a “nuclear weapons capability”.

What the CIA’s weapons and proliferation experts never mentioned, however, was that Iran had responding to a crude political intervention by the Reagan administration beginning in 1983 to pressure the governments of France and Germany to refuse to cooperate with Iran’s nuclear programme. The effect of that intervention, which was not justified by any claim of evidence that Iran was trying to obtain nuclear weapons, was to prevent Iran from relying on a French-based company to provide the enriched uranium fuel for Iran’s Bushehr reactor. Not surprisingly, when confronted with the choice of abandoning its nuclear programme entirely or obtaining an independent enrichment capability Iran chose the latter.

By 2004, the news media and political atmosphere were already thoroughly saturated by the false Iran nuclear narrative. At that point a major political manoeuvre quietly unfolded that would ensure that the accusation of a secret Iranian nuclear programme would dominate the international politics of the issue for the next decade.

In August 2004, a set of intelligence documents said to have come from the laptop computer of a participant in a purported Iranian nuclear weapons research project fell into the hands of Western intelligence. The documents included drawings of apparent efforts to redesign the reentry vehicle of Iran’s Shahab-3 missile to accommodate a nuclear warhead, which the Bush administration portrayed as “smoking gun” evidence of an Iranian nuclear weapons programme.

IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei and other senior officials of the agency had serious doubts about their authenticity. But Safeguards Department chief Olli Heinonen collaborated with Washington in 2008-09 and pushed the position in IAEA reports in 2008-09 that the documents were “credible” and that Iran was refusing to cooperate with the IAEA “investigation” of the documents. That position made it virtually impossible to question the authenticity of the documents.

It is now clear that ElBaradei’s skepticism about the documents was justified. The former coordinator of US-German relations in the German foreign office, Karsten Voigt, revealed in an interview with this writer last year that senior officials of Germany’s intelligence agency, the BND, had told him in November 2004 that those documents had been provided by a sometime BND source who was a member of the Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), the Iranian exile group allied first with Saddam and later with Israel that was listed as terrorist organisation by the US. The BND officials told Voigt that the MEK source was considered “doubtful”.

They were unhappy, because Secretary of State Colin Powell had just commented publicly on information – obviously from the same documents – about alleged Iranian work on mating their Shahab-3 missile with a nuclear weapon. They could hardly have forgotten that in early 2003, the Bush administration had relied on information from another BND source named “Curveball” to justify the US invasion of Iraq, despite having been warned by BND Chief August Hanning not to rely on the source.

There were other reasons to doubt the authenticity of the documents. As was confirmed to this writer by former IAEA Deputy Director General Olli Heinonen, the missile shown in the drawings of efforts to redesign a missile reentry vehicle to accommodate a nuclear weapon was the Shahab-3. But Iran’s defence ministry had decided to replace with a much-improved missile and reentry vehicle as early as 2000, and the earliest drawings are dated mid-2002. Whoever ordered those drawings done was obviously unaware of the switch to the new missile design, which means that they were done by an outside intelligence agency – not by the Iranian military or defence ministry.

Influencing perceptions

Israel is the only country in the world that had actually created an office in its foreign intelligence agency responsible for influencing foreign perceptions of the Iranian nuclear programme, as revealed by the book The Nuclear Jihadist, by Douglas Frantz and Catherine Collins.

Furthermore, as ElBaradei observed in his own memoirs, Israel had openly provided the IAEA an entirely new series of intelligence reports and purported documents on alleged Iranian nuclear weapons work while ElBaradei was still Director General. The dossier that the IAEA published in November 2011 was based entirely on those documents, although the source was never mentioned by the agency.

The story from the IAEA dossier that made news headlines around the world was that Iran had installed a cylinder at its Parchin military facility in 2000 for nuclear-related testing. But no real evidence was ever produced by the IAEA to support that claim – only a reference to a scholarly publication by a Ukrainian scientist who had helped Iran’s work on nuclear weapons, according to the agency. And the publication actually described – and included a drawing of – a cylinder for nanodiamonds production the physical characteristics of which were quite different from those a weapons-related cylinder.

The IAEA has also expunged from the published record the fact – virtually unknown to the outside world – that Iran agreed not just once but twice in 1995 to allow the agency to inspect any five sites of its choice in one of the four quadrants of Parchin and to take environmental samples. It is inconceivable, of course, that a state would allow such freedom for international inspection at a military base where it was concealing an incriminating nuclear testing facility.

The Obama administration, blissfully ignorant of the real history of the Iranian nuclear programme, has accepted the false narrative of Iran’s supposed determination to obtain nuclear weapons. Its negotiating position in the nuclear talks is based on the thesis that Iran must be prevented from having anything less than a six-month “breakout” period, on the spurious notion that Iran is poised to race for a bomb and must be shorn of the bulk of its enrichment capability.

Perhaps US diplomats will find a way to avoid letting the false logic that governs its posture sink the negotiations. If the talks fail, however, it will be the result of the toxic combination of wilful US self-deception and deliberate falsification of intelligence by the Israelis.

Gareth Porter, Aljazeera

May 20, 2014 0 comments

Canada

Why Canada is getting it wrong on Iran

As west moves towards reconciliation with Tehran, Ottawa is making a big mistake by pursuing a wrong policy which isolates Iran and hurts its people.

Ever since Canada broke off diplomatic relations with Tehran, Ottawa has toughtened its stance on Iran, taking a similar approach to that of Israel.

As the west seizes upon the opportunity to engage with the moderate president, Hassan Rouhani, Canada just seems to be going in the opposite direction, ignoring not only calls for dialogue by the international community but also from the very Iranian dissident voices Ottawa claims to be defending. Instead, Canada is siding with radicals – dodgy exiled groups and rightwing Israelis – and moving away from the realities on the ground.

In 2012, Canada’s foreign affairs minister, John Baird, described Iran as “the most significant threat to global peace and security in the world today” as it announced a unilateral decision to shut down his country’s embassy in Tehran and expel Iranian diplomats from the Canadian soil.

Within a year, as Rouhani travelled to New York to revamp Iran’s relations with the west backed by strong popular support at home, Baird warned “kind words, a smile and a charm offensive are not a substitute for real action.”

Later, as Iran and six world powers including Britain and the US, reached a historic nuclear agreement in Geneva, trying to defuse the threats of yet another war in the Middle East, Canada injected deep scepticism.

Canada’s big excuse is human rights. [..]

But Ottawa’s policy of isolating Tehran, at the time Rouhani is under pressure from internal hawks and fudamentalists, is doing a disservice both to the future of peace in the world and the wellbeing of Iranians themselves. By rejecting engagement with Iran, Canada is also turning a blind eye to repeated calls by leading Iranian opposition figures, for the unique opportunity created because of Rouhani’s election.

This week’s Iran human rights event at Canada’s parliament embodied what is wrong with Ottawa’s approach. A key speaker at a programme studying violations of human rights in Iran was Maryam Rajavi, the leader of the radical exiled group MEK, which was listed as terrorist organisation by the US and the UK until recently. The MEK, charactrised by many observers as a cult-like group, has been repeatedly slammed by the United Nation because of mistreating its own members.

The MEK appearance at the programme reportedly made the UN special rapporteur for human rights in Iran, Ahmed Shaheed, to withdraw from the event, the Nation’s Ali Gharib reported on Wednesday. To much criticism by the Iranian authorities, Shaheed has extensively reported on the violations of rights in Iran, including mistreatment of prisoners, some of whom are in fact in jail in Iran for having links to the MEK.

“If you want to improve human rights in Iran, don’t invite MEK leader, a group accused of serious human rights violations, as a speaker,” tweeted Golnaz Esfandiari, who blogs on Iran. The MEK remains extremely unpopular in Iran because of its support for the former Iraqi leader, Saddam Hussein, during the eight-year war between Iran and Iraq. MEK fought against their countrymen at the time.

Earlier this month, Lobelog’s Eldar Mamedov detailed how the MEK is using human rights as its casus belli to mix up the complexities of politics inside Iran for an outsider eye and derail the process of Iran-west rapproachment. It looks as Canada is repeating a mistake the US and some European countries did decades ago by relying on radical groups such as MEK, or some Iranian monarchists, to keep itself updated about the complicated bigger picture of today’s Iran.

Moreover, Canada often berates Iran in the excuse of defending human rights activists and opposition figures who have been imprisoned in Iran. But when the very same people, including 50 prominent political prisoners, reached to US president Barack Obama asking him to end “crippling” economic sanctions hurting ordinary people in Iran and seize “the last chance” for dialogue with Tehran under Rouhani, Canada seemed to have sealed its ears.

Instead, it should listen to more reasonable voices, such as it own former ambassador to Tehran, John Mundy, who has stated it was wrong for Ottawa to cut diplomatic ties.

Let’s be clear, no one is denying the gross abuses of human rights in Iran or the challenges ahead in finding a permanent nuclear settlement with the Islamic republic. But human rights in Iran can only be improved by the ways of dialogue and engagement. This is why the recent visit to Iran by the EU’s foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton, who visited a number of leading women rights’ activists, was more effective than Canada’s many human rights statements.

Canada has had a very frosty relations with Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution. It became more restrained in 2003 when an Iranian-Canadian photographer, Zahra Kazemi, died while in jail in Iran under torture because of a skull fracture. But if Ottawa is genuine about the wellbeing of Iranian citizens, including those persecuted in the country, it should reconsider its Iran policy. But for now, Canada is just getting it wrong on Iran.

Saeed Kamali Dehghan,

May 19, 2014 0 comments

Iran

Iran’s Judiciary Chief Calls for Extradition of MKO Members for Fair Trial

Iranian Judiciary Chief Sadeq Amoli Larijani in a meeting with his Iraqi counterpart Medhat Al-Mahmoud called on Baghdad to extradite the members of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO, also known as MEK, PMOI and NCR) to stand a fair tribunal in Tehran.

"Most of these (MKO) people have admitted to their crimes and we expect the friendly and brotherly country of Iraq to extradite them to Iran within a legal framework to undergo a fair trial," Amoli Larijani said during the meeting.

He reminded that based on proof and evidence, the MKO members are responsible for the assassination of more than 17,000 Iranian citizens.

Also after the meeting with the Iraqi judiciary chief, Amoli Larijani told reporters that he has rigidly asked the Al-Mahmoud to prepare the grounds for the extradition of the MKO members to Iran to account for their crimes against the Iranians.

During their meeting on Sunday, the Iranian and Iraqi judiciary chiefs also explored avenues for bolstering and reinvigorating their bilateral ties.

The Iranian judiciary chief pointed to the status quo of Iran-Iraq relations, and said, "Tehran and Baghdad have signed four judicial agreements and we emphasized implementation of these agreements during Al-Mahmoud’s visit."

The Iraqi judiciary chief arrived in Tehran on Saturday and he is due to confer with other high ranking officials, including President Hassan Rouhani and Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani, as well.

In mid-April, Iranian Justice Minister Mostafa Pour Mohammadi and his Iraqi counterpart Hassan al-Shammari in a meeting in Baghdad explored avenues for bolstering and reinvigorating mutual cooperation.

During the meeting, the Iranian and Iraqi justice ministers signed a memorandum of understating (MoU) on extradition of prisoners. According to the agreement, the Iranian and Iraqi justice ministries would set up a joint committee at the earliest to examine the situation of the prisoners and prepare the ground for their extradition.

Many of the MKO members have abandoned the terrorist organization while most of those still remaining in the grouplet are said to be willing to quit but are under pressure and torture not to do so.

A recent Human Rights Watch report accused the MKO of running prison camps in Iraq and committing human rights violations.

According to the Human Rights Watch report, the outlawed group puts defectors under torture and jail terms.

The MKO, founded in the 1960s, blended elements of Islamism and Stalinism and participated in the overthrow of the US-backed Shah of Iran in 1979. Ahead of the revolution, the MKO conducted attacks and assassinations against both Iranian and Western targets.

The group started assassination of the citizens and officials after the revolution in a bid to take control of the newly-established Islamic Republic. It killed several of Iran’s new leaders in the early years after the revolution, including the then President, Mohammad Ali Rajayee, Prime Minister, Mohammad Javad Bahonar and the Judiciary Chief, Mohammad Hossein Beheshti who was killed in bomb attacks by MKO members in 1981.

The group fled to Iraq in 1986, where it was protected by Saddam Hussein and where it helped the Iraqi dictator suppress Shiite and Kurd uprisings in the country.

The terrorist group joined Saddam’s army during the Iraqi imposed war on Iran (1980-1988) and helped Saddam and killed thousands of Iranian civilians and soldiers during the US-backed Iraqi imposed war on Iran.

Since the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, the group, which now adheres to a pro-free-market philosophy, has been strongly backed by neo-conservatives in the United States, who argued for the MKO to be taken off the US terror list.

In September 2012, the last groups of the MKO terrorists left Camp Ashraf, their main training center in Iraq’s Diyala province. They have been transferred to Camp Liberty transient facility near Baghdad.

May 19, 2014 0 comments

Massoud Rajavi

The MKO and the mirage of Alternative for IRI

The likely successful nuclear negotiations between Iran and the West have pushed the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO) to face more challenges in order to impede a normalized Iran-West relationship. The group’s heavy scale well-funded lobbying campaign to derail diplomacy with Iran has come up with new dimensions.

For years, the MKO’s propaganda had focused on the Iranian nuclear program, spreading misinformation about it but once the nuclear talks started in Geneva, the group found itself empty handed. While the Cult of Rajavi has always claimed to be the alternative to the Iranian Government, the ongoing diplomacy process between Iran and the West has wiped out its slightest hope for achieving power in Iran. Furthermore, today the MKO is more concerned for its own survival, let alone governing Iran –Where it hardly ever enjoys public support.

That’s why the MKO is awfully nervous about the recent visits to Iran by the European politicians. For instance, the group, denounced a trip last month to Tehran by Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz. The denunciation came two weeks after the so-called Friends of Free Iran (FoFi), an informal network of members of the European Parliament (MEPs) closely allied to the NCRI, organized a conference calling for regime change in Iran and lauding the NCRI-MEK as the democratic alternative, according to Edar Mamedov who is a political adviser for the social-democrats in the Foreign Affairs Committee of the European Parliament (EP) and is in charge of the delegation for inter-parliamentary relations between the EP and Iran. [1]

After the election of Rouhani as the Iranian president, the significant progress in the Nuclear negotiations pushed the MKO propaganda to actively run the new agenda of Human Rights. As an official who witnesses the MKO’s lobbying efforts in the European Parliament, Mamedov suggests, “So, the MEK, which detests the notion of rapprochement between Iran and the West, has shifted gears and chosen human rights as its casus belli against the Iranian regime.”[2]

Although Mamedov does not disregard “the capacity of the MEK to poison the present atmosphere of European-Iranian relations”, he clarifies, “The good news is that MEK lobbying efforts against diplomacy with Iran are unlikely to succeed.” [3]

“Even with the extravagant funds the MEK has spent on endorsements by political elites, the group’s prominence in the EU is confined only to one part of the EP,” writes Mamedov.” The foreign policy decision-making bodies of the EU — the Council of the EU and the External Action Service (EEAS) — do not consider the MEK a serious alternative to the current government in Tehran, as it has virtually no support among the Iranian population. ” [4]

Among the few European parliament members who favor Maryam Rajavi and her cult-like organization, Alejo Vidal-Quadras the Spanish EU Parliament member is “the key man in Spanish political relations with the Iranian People’s Mujahedeen”, according to Elsa S. Vejo of the Spanish News Website Esterella Digital. [] The Spanish journalist criticizes their 13-years working politician for the “astonishing” cause of the MKO. According to official versions, the MEK was “voluntarily disarmed”.” According to the unofficial version, the CIA and the Israeli Mossad is training the Mojahedin for their own benefit,” He writes. “So much so, that in January 2012, Ilan Mizrahi, former head of the secret Israeli intelligence service, disclosed the involvement of the Mojahedin in the “secret war” against Iran that had already cost the lives of four Iranian nuclear scientists.” [5]

In addition, the support for the group in the US Congress is not so noteworthy. There are also a few retired American officials who embrace the MKO in response to large amounts of donation the group pays them. Rudy Guiliani former New York mayor is one of the well-paid ardent sponsors of the group whose “warm embrace of the MEK terrorist organization is shocking and deplorable.”

Hamid Babaei counselor and head of Press Office for the Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations in New York wrote a response to an op-ed by Rudolph Giuliani , “Team Obama keeps miscalculating Iran — ‘change’ under Rouhani is a mirage” that appeared in Fox News Opinion. Babaei states, ” Journalists and think tanks across the world have sounded the alarm regarding the “cult-like” practices of the MEK, such as forcing members to give up their children in order to dedicate more time to the cause, and their decades long reign of terror and brutality has been well established by many including the U.S. Department of State when it designated it as terrorist organization in 1997 while describing it as a “repressive cult despised by most Iranians and Iraqis.” Babaei also refers to the 2009 report by the Rand Corp. in which the authors denounce the MKO for its “cultic practices and its deceptive recruitment and public relations strategies”.[6]

The MKO’s large-scale effort to gain the West’s support does not seem to be efficient. “The dominant EU line now clearly favors diplomacy with Iran, which will, hopefully, lead to a final deal over Tehran’s controversial nuclear program,” suggests Mamedov.” The more the chances of success for diplomacy increase, the more irrelevant the MEK will become.” [7]

By Mazda Parsi

Sources:

[] Mamedov, Eldar, The MEK’s Influence in EU Politics Matters, Loblog FP, May 10, 2014

[]ibid

[5] S. Vejo, Elsa , SPAINISH POLITICIAN’S DANGEROUS RELATION, Esterella Digital, May 6, 2014 (Translated by Iran Interlink)

[6] Babaei, Hamid, Embrace of Mojahedin Khalq shocking, deplorable, Fox News, May 7, 2014

[7] Mamedov, Eldar, The MEK’s Influence in EU Politics Matters, Loblog FP, May 10, 2014

May 18, 2014 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization

Controversial Iranian Exile Shakes up Canadian Parliament’s HR Program

A weeklong series of events in Canadian parliament on Iran’s human rights record caused worry among some human rights advocates who fear that the activities could harm their efforts. The controversy centers around Iran Accountability Week, a program of hearings at the Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on International Human Rights and other events organized by members of parliament from the three major parties, with Liberal MP Irwin Cotler taking the lead. The program runs through Thursday.

A human rights lawyer and pro-Israel figure, Cotler has organized three Iran Accountability Weeks. In the past, the events included testimonies highlighting Iranian political prisoners and other victims of Iranian human rights abuses. This year’s lineup, however, was different: Maryam Rajavi, the leader of a controversial exiled Iranian opposition group called the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), appeared in the program along with a UN rights official and pundits from a hawkish American think-tank.

One human rights advocate working on Iran, who asked not to be named, raised the issue of other advocates sharing a platform with the head of the MEK, which the activist called “toxic and irrelevant”—a view widely held among Iranians of all political stripes, save members of the MEK itself.

The MEK, which until two years ago was listed as terrorist organization by the United States and Canada, has a tortuous history that carried it from its founding in the mid-1960s as an Islamo-Marxist anti-Shah group to its current position as a vocal opponent of the Islamic Republic. Many critics say the group exhibits cult-like behavior. In addition to its history of violence, the MEK has, notably, been accused of its own human rights abuses.

In a phone interview, Cotler, the Canadian MP whose office spearheaded the multiparty Iran Accountability Week, said the invitation to Rajavi was only to give “issue-specific testimony”—specifically the alleged killings of MEK members by Iraqi security forces.

The MEK moved its operations to Iraq in the 1980s, to fight alongside Saddam Hussein in the bloody Iran-Iraq war, taking up in a desert military base called Camp Ashraf. In September 2012, nine years after the fighters had been disarmed following the US invasion, Iraqi forces evacuated Ashraf. Those MEK members and fighters who remained in country moved into Camp Liberty—an erstwhile American military installation. At various points since Hussein’s overthrow, both Liberty and Ashraf had come under attack, mostly by Iraqi security forces, and disarmed MEK members have been killed.

When asked why a notice for the event sent around by his office, obtained by The Nation, said Rajavi would discuss more broad “violations of the rights of the Iranian people”—a category that expands beyond the Ashraf/Liberty incidents—Cotler repeated that the invitation was “issue-specific,” though he noted Rajavi may speak on or be asked about other matters. (In 2012, Colter reportedly joined a campaign to get the MEK removed from terror rolls in the United States and Canada.)

The association with the MEK, however, raised red flags for another participant, Dr. Ahmed Shaheed, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran. Since 2011, when his mandate was initiated, the Maldivian diplomat has been a main address for credible information about Iran’s alleged human rights abuses. Shaheed was scheduled to address the subcommittee on Thursday, May 8 by video link in an open hearing.

According to his office, however, Shaheed requested to withdraw from the official Iran Accountability Week proceedings. He agreed, an assistant said, to brief lawmakers “in a different context than Accountability Week.” Asked why, Shaheed’s representative responded, “He just didn’t think it was appropriate.”

The assistant explained that Shaheed felt the event’s framing “made it feel less like a briefing and more of something that encroached upon what he believes is his independence on the issue” of human rights in Iran.

Cotler confirmed that, fifty minutes before he was set to go on, Shaheed phoned and requested his testimony be delivered on camera, or in a closed-door session. But the Canadian parliamentarian denied Shaheed withdrew from Iran Accountability Week: “He was not taken off the program. His appearance was in camera,” Cotler said, adding that Shaheed did not request in their phone call to withdraw.

Divining whether Shaheed was indeed withdrawn from the program proved difficult. Cotler’s office referred The Nation to the bureaucrats who run the subcommittee, but none would comment on whether Shaheed remained part of Iran Accountability Week. Asked if Shaheed was on the public program, Miriam Burke, the subcommittee clerk, said, “I can’t tell you.” Shaheed’s name did not appear in a May 8 press release on Cotler’s official website.

Several sources said the MEK’s involvement spurred Shaheed’s request to be removed from the program. One source with knowledge of the decision said several human rights groups reached out to Shaheed’s office, “and it didn’t take long for them to make this decision.” Two other sources confirmed the account. “From our understanding he was unaware he was part of this broader program,” said a rights activist. “Once it was discovered, the MEK issue was a critical concern.”

The issue is particularly fraught because Shaheed has, over the years of his UN mandate, attempted to negotiate with the Iranian government for access to the country. The Islamic Republic rejected Shaheed’s latest report in March. One Iranian MP remarked that “the intelligence sources for Ahmed Shaheed’s reports are the hypocrites”—the way Iran refers to the MEK—”and the Islamic Republic of Iran’s opposition.”

Cotler said he would explicitly renounce any connections made between various witnesses at hearings in a press conference marking Iran Accountability Week’s closing. “We will not make any association between Dr. Shaheed and the MEK,” he said. “The last thing any of us would want to do would be to hurt Dr. Shaheed’s work or testimony. Not that [the Iranians] need any excuse to do that.”

May 17, 2014 0 comments

Iran Interlink Weekly Digest

Iran Interlink Weekly Digest – 52

++ Iraj Shokri, a famous writer who left the MEK some time ago, has blogged to reject some of the quotes used by the MEK when they wrote about Kamal Rafatsafai (a poet who recently died who also left the MEK and became very critical over their human rights record). Shokri says that although he doesn’t usually answer the MEK, this time they sneakily used his name and he has had to refute their misuse of his quotes.

++ Nejat Association reports about the situation inside Camp Liberty. Apparently, runaways have become a serious problem for the MEK and they have added more sentry posts around the residential blocks in an attempt to prevent this. The MEK says its last hope is its commanders keeping control of the rank and file. Also, the MEK have expressed disappointment with the Iraqi election result. They had already acknowledged that if the elections in Iraq don’t work out for them with the return of some Baathists they are finished.

++ Reports from Albania show pictures of around eight people who were among the children evacuated from Camp Ashraf in 1991 to Europe, before being sent back to Iraq again for military training. Because they all have residential history in European countries, the reports say, the MEK have deliberately sent them to Albania in order to delay their arrival in these European countries and to prevent them from talking. To keep them quiet in Albania, the MEK henchmen Ismael Mortezai and Hassan Nayebagha from Paris, are threatening them from one side – we will kill you if you act without our approval – and on the other side promising that if they get refugee status from the UNHCR in Tirana the MEK itself will transfer them elsewhere in Europe.

++ Mohammad Alavi on Aryia Iran website has written an article titled: ‘One thousand Ashraf camps in Europe and toppling the regime with photoshop’. He says everyone is aware the MEK are busy touring refugee camps to buy people for their 30 June event to celebrate the start of their armed struggle. This year the event is to be held on 27 June in Villepinte in north Paris. Alavi details the history of these events over the last few years and provides links to coverage in Le Monde, France 24 and Radio Farda which have all exposed the pretence. The article also has links to other media items in which people have admitted they were paid either to speak or to attend. Some other ex members write on same subject revealing that the MEK visit travel agencies as well as refugee camps and offer free trips to Paris and a hand-out of money in exchange for two hours attendance in their meeting. They reveal that this year the meeting will include performances of singing and dancing as well as speeches in order to attract people and fool them about the true nature of the event.

++ The Iraqi election is finished and the official result will be out next week, and it is already clear that Maliki’s coalition has come out on top and is widely supported. There will now follow negotiations between the various factions to agree roles and responsibilities. But it is clear the new government, whatever its configuration, contains many fewer Saddamists, Danesh and other MEK sympathisers.

++ Homayoun Kohzadi has published a short note in Yaran Association website saying that several people who have escaped from Camp Liberty have contacted him. They say that Massoud Rajavi has again made an announcement declaring that these are the last days of the Iranian regime. He has ordered an alert to be ready. Rajavi says, while Maryam is doing the last bits of toppling by creating one thousand Camp Ashrafs in Europe, the combatants in Camp Liberty have to be ready for the last attack toward Iran. Kohzadi begs the question, ‘why does Rajavi not look at himself in the mirror?’ “Your audience” he tells Rajavi, “has no weaponry, the government of Iraq is in charge so you won’t even get to border. But putting even these obstacles aside, how can these old and sick people go to war? They would die on the way.” He finishes by saying, “Rajavi has gone mad.”

++ Mojahadin.com reported a meeting at the University of Semnan in which Ebrahim Khodabandeh gave a speech to the students and staff about cults. Khodabandeh said, “I have been in the MEK’s camps and I have been in Evin prison. With reference to the problems in Section 350, one thing I am certain of is that the amount of contact the Evin prisoners have with the outside world is not comparable with the contact MEK members have with the outside because the MEK have none!” He also announced that through research he can now say that the number of ex members is well over the number of current MEK members. He concluded that although we don’t have the power to rescue the people who have fallen into this trap, my friends and I will make sure they can’t drag new people into their trap.

++ Mohammad Karami from Paris and some others have responded to an article in Iran Global written under pseudonyms. The writers claim they are a group working with the Intelligence Service of the Netherlands who are responsible for trapping ex MEK member Behzad Alishahi through various sting scenarios so that he would be arrested under national security laws. The group uses this article to threaten every other critic of the MEK that “if you don’t stop this criticism of the MEK we have the power to deal with you the same way we did Alishahi”. This threat follows previous reports, particularly from Albania where MEK henchmen carry Pentagon ID cards, of MEK intimidation and threats in the West. Karami and others have exposed this ‘group’ as a man called Amrollah Ebrahimi, an ex member from TIPF who was bought by the MEK and who is working directly under the supervision of Hadi Roshanravan (a commanders in the MEK’s Intelligence Section who has been highly trained by Saddam’s Mokhaberat). Karami and other writers question what is behind publishing this on Iran Global website in particular, and conclude that since the MEK has been exposed to be behind the intimidation of ex members through their own websites, they have outsourced this to Iran Global so it doesn’t look like the MEK are behind it.

++ Razieh Kermanshahi has died from a heart attack in Albania. She was 57. Rajavi has been quick to add her to the list of martyrs from the Leadership Council. But many who knew her say that she had heart problems for many years which the MEK deliberately neglected. Essentially they sent her to Albania to die. In this respect Javad FIrouzmand wrote an article for Aryia Iran naming several other people who suffered neglect or have been denied medical attention by the MEK. He reveals how they have been eliminated in this way from the time of Saddam up until the present.

++ This week Maryam Rajavi has put on a show for internal purposes. She was photographed strolling around a display of pictures of the MEK’s so called martyrs from the time of the revolution until now. This was published on their Farsi websites. Edalaat Association wrote an analysis about why Maryam has done this while 99% of her time is spent with the Israeli lobby and the like. The article says there is an identity crisis inside the MEK among members and unpaid supporters who cannot understand what is the MEK’s relation to Israel, Al Qaida, Syria, Nigeria, and etc. Rajavi has taken these pictures to prevent the internal forces from collapsing.

In English:

++ Fox News published a reply by Hamid Babaei, counselor and head of the Press Office for the Permanent Mission of the Islamic Republic of Iran to the United Nations in New York, to an op-ed by former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. Babaei described Guiliani’s “warm embrace of the MEK terrorist organization” as “shocking and deplorable”, describing it as “a repressive cult despised by most Iranians and Iraqis.”

++ Elsa S. Vejo Destrella Digital (Digital Star) spoke with Alejo Vidal- Quadras MEP as the key man in Spanish political relations with the Iranian People’s Mujahedeen. She writes the question of where the MEK gets its money? “The question still remains unresolved and the experts bring to the fore the question of where does the MEK get all the money it costs to maintain this important network of contacts and support . According to Vidal-Quadras, solely from the Iranians in the diaspora, “some of them are very wealthy”. Although other politicians we consulted doubt this. “I am not so naive to think that the contributions of all Iranians in exile are sufficient to maintain that infrastructure. I do not rule out that there may be powers that are instrumental in acting in their favor”, admits Gari Duran Sen. PP Baleares, and one of the Mojahedin’s greatest defenders in Spain. The USA , Israel and Saudi Arabia are among the possible hidden funders. Duran, however, says she does not care about that; “I have seen people on hunger strike, I have seen the pictures of the dead and have heard their mothers talk, and unless you have to conclude that this is a giant deception, to me it is real.””

++ Nejat Association wrote an open letter to Ms Laura Boldrini, President of the Chamber of Deputies of Italy, asking to meet with her during her visit to Iran with a 10-member delegation, headed by co-chairman of Iran-Italy parliamentary friendship group Ettore Rosato. Nejat said it wanted to meet to find a way to rescue the members in Iraq and try to put them in contact with their families in Iran.

++ Ali Gharib writing ‘Controversial Iranian Exile Shakes up Canadian Parliament’s Human Rights Program’ in The Nation, exposed the damage caused by the inclusion of Maryam Rajavi by Skype in the event. According to Gharib, “Dr. Ahmed Shaheed, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran, Shaheed requested to withdraw from the official Iran Accountability Week proceedings. He agreed, an assistant said, to brief lawmakers “in a different context than Accountability Week.” Asked why, Shaheed’s representative responded, “He just didn’t think it was appropriate.” The assistant explained that Shaheed felt the event’s framing “made it feel less like a briefing and more of something that encroached upon what he believes is his independence on the issue” of human rights in Iran.” “…Another human rights advocate working on Iran, who asked not to be named, raised the issue of other advocates sharing a platform with the head of the MEK, which the activist called “toxic and irrelevant”—a view widely held among Iranians of all political stripes, save members of the MEK itself.”

16 May 2014

May 17, 2014 0 comments

Maryam Rajavi

Introducing Maryam Rajavi as a human rights activist is the wrong tool for the wrong job

Although Canada is not party to the P5+1 nuclear negotiations, the Canadian parliament’s all-party Iran Accountability Week aimed to put pressure on Iran over its human rights record. Instead, it degenerated

Introducing Maryam Rajavi as a human rights activist is the wrong tool for the wrong job into another crude attempt to fuel enmity and hatred and prevent any rapprochement between Iran and western powers, even a clumsy attempt to create conditions which would derail the negotiating process. The weeklong series of events backfired badly as Ali Gharib writing in The Nation revealed.

The inclusion of the Mojahedin Khalq’s notorious second in command, Maryam Rajavi, who describes herself as the ‘president-elect’ of a future Iran, was guaranteed to create controversy. The MEK itself has a well documented history of human rights violations. The group is hated by Iranians inside and outside the country.

Predictably, several participants pulled out of the event. Most notably Dr. Ahmed Shaheed, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Iran.

Among the others there were divisions. Some indicated that the inclusion of Maryam Rajavi is not in the benefit of Israel, others clearly scorned her presence, as Ali Gharib reported: “One human rights advocate working on Iran, who asked not to be named, raised the issue of other advocates’ sharing a platform with the head of the MEK, which the activist called “toxic and irrelevant”—a view widely held among Iranians of all political stripes, save members of the MEK itself.”

The result was that Maryam Rajavi’s backers were forced to get her to water down her speech, to narrow it down to talking about the MEK’s camps in Iraq and what is happening there and not to use the event as a platform for wider anti-Iranian attacks. Even then Rajavi had nothing but MEK propaganda, riddled with lies and misinformation, to tell the assembly.

The Skype appearance followed a failed attempt to get Rajavi a US visa during the P5+1 negotiations on May 8. It was known that Rajavi had also applied to visit Canada, but apparently she wasn’t welcome there either, and in the end Rajavi’s speech from her headquarters outside Paris had to be censored to render it bearable if not credible for real human rights advocates and activists who attended. Even then they felt they had been deceived and tricked into listening to someone contemptible.

The presence of Maryam Rajavi – an advocate of the Saddamists, Al Qaida and ISIS in Iraq – exposes the real agenda behind the so-called human rights advocates who invited her. While it is understandable that MOSSAD may use the MEK as a mercenary force to assassinate Iranian scientists or for information laundry, nobody will accept the MEK as humanitarian. This is simply the wrong tool for the wrong job.

Anne Khodabandeh (Singleton), Middle East Strategy Consultants,

May 17, 2014 0 comments

European Union

Open Letter of Iran Pen Association to Mr. Struan Stevenson MEP

To The Honorable Mr. Struan Stevenson MEP and President of the European Parliament’s Delegation for

Relations with Iraq,

Recently in MEK / PMOI related websites there was a statement published in your name in which you expressed concern about the situation of Iraqi people as well as the undemocratic Iraqi Elections and the interference of Iranian Regime in that country.

Iran Pen Association consists of former MEK/PMOI cadres each with more than 20 years of membership in MEK, who have been critical of this organization and also campaign as human rights activists in western countries. In regards to the related statement to you, we would like to bring the following to your attention:

1. You express concern for the elections in Iraq and lack of democracy in that country, while you have been lobbying for and supporting an undemocratic cult, i.e. MEK/PMOI and repetitively relay the dictated rhetorics of this cult in your statement published in MEK websites.

2. In a grave contradiction to your concerns about democracy in Iraq, you ask the US Government to step in and interfere in the Iraqi elections and its outcome.

Dear Mr. Stevenson,

We believe that whatever the result of the Iraqi elections may be, it is the internal affair and destiny of the Iraqi people and Iraqi political parties to decide for themselves. How, in your mind, the US interference in another country and specifically in the elections of another country can result in democracy in that country that you want US to meddle in the Iraqi elections?

Mr. President,

In our opinion your statement has been word by word and directly dictated by the MEK/PMOI cult. It has been written with specific political objectives that represent MEK/PMOI’s intensions to meddle further more in political arena of Iraq. The MEK/PMOI plans for a pro-MEK government in Iraq to take office so that this Cult can remain in Iraqi soil and at the same time continue the rule of suppression on its forces in Camp Liberty in Baghdad.

Dear Sir,

While you have been even more fanatic and radical to support this Cult than its members and keep relaying MEK’s rehtorics against Iraq and the government of Nuri Al-Maleki, we challenge you to answer our questions below in a written statement:

a. Are you aware of the grave violations of human rights committed by MEK/PMOI leaders inside the MEK/PMOI, including in Camp Liberty? Do you know that children under the age of 18 have been recruited and used in military operations by MEK/PMOI? Have you heard that MEK/PMOI members are forbidden to contact or meet their families for many years? Haven’t you heard and read reports of the abuse of women members in MEK/PMOI, including sexual harassments, women being forced to divorce their husbands, children being forcibly separated from their parents?

b. Are you not aware that there is absolutely no democracy in MEK/PMOI and that there is systematic suppression of members with a widespread censorship throughout this Cult?

c. Don’t you know of MEK/PMOI’s money laundering network in the west?

d. Have you no knowledge that MEK/PMOI were mercenaries of Saddam Husain and that its forces participated in many operations against the Iraqi Kurds and against the Shiie in south of Iraq in the 1990’s and against the Iranian soldiers during Iran-Iraq war?

e. Do you not know anything about MEK/PMOI terrorist activities inside Iran during Saddam Husain’s era, including mortar attacks on civilian targets in Iran which resulted in the loss of many civilian’s lives?

f. Are you not aware of MEK/PMOI interference and meddling in internal affairs of Iraqis and the political arena of the country in post-Saddam Iraq? Do you know that one of the main reasons for attacks against Camps Ashraf and Liberty in Iraq which have resulted in many deaths and casualties is due to the meddling and agitation by MEK/PMOI in Iraq?

g. Have you no knowledge of the systematic brain wash and mind manipulation practices that the members of the Cult are subjected to and have you never read reports of such practices by the leaders? Do you not know of horrific limitations imposed on the members of this Cult and that no one has the right to decide his or her destiny in MEK/PMOI?

And finally, Mr. Stevenson; while you are so concerned about democracy in Iraq, we ask you to use your conscience and also be worried about the abolition of democracy and human rights in this Cult of MEK/PMOI and stop supporting and lobbying for such a decadent cult. Instead we urge you to worry for the destiny and plight of the captive people in Camp Liberty and try hard for their liberty and exit from the insecure and volatile circumstances in Iraq.

Regards,

Iran Pen Association

May 15, 2014 0 comments

Nejat Publications

Pars Brief – Issue No. 79

Inside this issue:

Five Camp Liberty residents fled the Cult
Embrace of Mojahedin Khalq (MKO, MEK, NCRI, Rajavi cult) shocking, deplorable
The MEK’s Influence in EU Politics Matters
SPAINISH POLITICIAN’S DANGEROUS RELATION
Progressive MeK, what an absurd idea!
Current Iran “Crisis” Began With Overthrow of Democratically Elected Government in 1953

Download Pars Brief – Issue No. 79
Download Pars Brief – Issue No. 79

May 15, 2014 0 comments

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