Page 579 – Nejat Society

MKO’s Role in Saddam’s Invasion of Kuwait Disclosed

The anti-Iran terrorist Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) has played an active role during the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait in 1990, a document released by a Kuwaiti daily disclosed.

According to a report published by the Kuwaiti Al-Dar daily, the MKO members had all-out cooperation with Saddam forces and were in massive intelligence coordination with former Iraqi regimes’ military and security authorities during the occupation of Kuwait.

The MKO members had also participated in checkpoint operations and interrogated Kuwaiti citizens, the Habilian Association, an Iran-based human rights group, quoted the Kuwaiti paper as saying.

The daily said that MKO’s main elements were stationed at a hotel near Hawalli square during the Kuwait occupation.

The Invasion of Kuwait was a major conflict between Iraq and Kuwait, which resulted in the seven-month long Iraqi occupation of Kuwait, which subsequently led to direct military intervention by US-led forces in the Persian Gulf War.

The invasion started on August 2, 1990, and within two days of intense combat, most of the Kuwaiti Armed Forces were either overrun by the Iraqi Republican Guard or escaped to neighboring Saudi Arabia and Bahrain.

The state of Kuwait was annexed, and Saddam Hussein announced in a few days that it was the 19th province of Iraq.

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 were 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 also argue for the MKO to be taken off the US terror list.

August 29, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization as a terrorist group

Delist Terrorists as ‘Provocative’ Action Against Iran

Retired US General: Delist Terrorists as ‘Provocative’ Action Against Iran
Praises MEK as ‘Overt Military Counterforce to the Iranian Regime’

In comments that further underscore the depth of the support the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) has generated with its massive pay-for-speech campaign, retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney praised the MEK and called for their delisting as part of a campaign of “provocative actions” against the Iranian government.

“We need a very active tit for tat policy, so every time they kill Americans they have an accident in Iran,” declared McInerney at the pro-MEK conference in Washington DC. It wasn’t too long before he made it clear that the MEK would be arranging these “accidents,” declaring the group a “credible overt political-military counterforce to the Iranian regime.”

Such comments would seemingly go against the MEK’s repeated claims to have transitioned from Islamo-Marxist cult into the non-violent champion of the free market it now styles itself as, but didn’t seem to phase anyone, including the conference’s organizer Ray Tanter, who insisted the attacks the MEK has conducted inside Iran were simply “military activities” and didn’t count as terrorism.

The MEK was a founding member of the State Department’s list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations, and conducted numerous attacks against US targets before the Iranian revolution, transitioning into a key Saddam Hussein ally afterwards and eventually into a darling of US hawks who are keen to use them as a proxy force to attack Iran.

by Jason Ditz

August 28, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

Attendees Don’t Really Understand What The MEK Is

Attendees Bused Into MEK Rally, Some Of Whom ‘Don’t Really Understand What The MEK Is’

A large crowd gathered today outside the State Department today to protest the designation of the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK) as a “foreign terror organization.” Police at the scene told ThinkProgress the groups organizing the demonstration said at least two thousand people were there, though the estimate seemed high.

The MEK’s profile has risen as stateside supporters — including former government officials — have launched a massive, coordinated, and multi-million dollar campaign to have them removed from the terror rolls. Critics argue that the group may still have designs on committing violent acts and that their public support in Iran is virtually non-existant.

Among Iranians, who dominated the crowd, many said they rallied for the MEK because they supported democracy in Iran and opposed the post-revolutionary Islamic regime.

But many apparent non-Iranians came out as well, most wearing flags, headbands, and even yellow vests with images of the group’s leaders — Maryam and Massoud Rajavi — on the chest. Of this group, few seemed to have many details about the MEK, and instead pledged vague notions of support for human rights and democracy, often even getting the name of the MEK wrong.

Some of the attendees had been bused and flown in at no personal cost, receiving transportation and in some cases lodging and meals.

One attendee who spoke with ThinkProgress, Melvin Santiago, 23, a homeless man living in shelters in Staten Island, New York, said he’d found out about the protest from a friend he’d come with. They made the trip along with about 100 other people in four rented coach buses.

“He saw [a flier] yesterday passing by the church,” said Santiago of his friend. “He usually goes there for the food pantry.”

On a day’s notice, Santiago said he hadn’t had a chance to learn too much about the MEK — he thought the group was called “Ashraff,” which is the name of the camp in Iraq where 3,400 members currently live.

Some of the other attendees knew little about the MEK’s history. The State Department designated the group in 1997 and made allegations of decades of terrorism, including against Americans when the U.S. had good relations with the Shah before the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Two attendees from Arkansas, who’d come up with an Iranian friend who lives nearby, said that they suspected collusion — “hanky panky” — between the State Department and the Islamic Republic.

Others had an interest in Iran. One attendee said he lived in Iran and played professional basketball there. He said he supported human rights in Iran. He said the reverend at his church informed him about the rally, though he admitted that “to be honest, I don’t really understand what the MEK is.”

By Zaid Jilani – Thinkprogress

August 28, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

The Lobbying that Shouldn’t be Happening

The extraordinary lobbying campaign on behalf of the sometime Marxist/Islamist cult/terrorist group known as the Mujahedin-e Khalq is getting waged on ever more fronts. The specific objective is to get the Obama administration to remove the MEK from the list of foreign terrorist organizations. Wherever the money to fund the campaign is coming from, some of the largest expenditures so far have been in the form of fat speaking fees to notables who are willing to accept the check and come out in favor of delisting the group. Some of these high-profile hired advocates later acknowledged they did not have all that much knowledge about the MEK.

Having purchased advocacy at the high end, the organizers of the campaign are now buying it at the low end. For a demonstration outside the State Department on Friday, demonstrators who, it is probably fair to say, know even less about the MEK than the big-name speakers were bussed in from as far as New York City. Many demonstrators were provided not only the transportation but also in some cases lodging and meals. One of the participants, a 23-year-old homeless man from Staten Island named Melvin Santiago, said he learned about the demonstration from a friend who in turn got word of it through a flyer distributed in front of a church—where the friend, said Santiago, “usually goes for the food pantry.”

Those who have sold their advocacy for big bucks deserve shame; those who have done so for a meal or two maybe deserve our pity. Those who have gotten mixed up in the campaign through a crude belief that Iran is an enemy and the enemy of my enemy is my friend need to realize that being an enemy’s enemy does not make one a friend. Those who have some notion that the MEK can serve as a force for opposing Iran are badly mistaken about the nature of the group—a good description of which is in a recent piece by Elizabeth Rubin in the New York Times. [..]

Even setting all that aside, there is an important procedural issue involved. On this issue alone, the pro-MEK campaign is objectionable. The decision of the secretary of state that the campaign is attempting to influence is not some subjective act of crafting policy. It is supposed to be a straightforward application of the terms of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996, which created the formal list of foreign terrorist organizations (creation of such a list having been necessitated by other provisions in the act, such as the criminalization of material support to terrorist groups). The procedure for listing or recertifying FTOs, as they are called, involves not only the State Department but also the Justice Department and the intelligence community. It is a long legal and administrative procedure, as I can testify from having been involved in the creation of the initial list of FTOs after passage of the 1996 law. The criteria to be applied involve such things as involvement in terrorist activity and effects on U.S. interests (which is not to be equated with terrorist attacks being directed against U.S. targets). Having conducted an anti-U.S. terrorist attack recently is not one of the criteria; if it were, many current FTOs—such as Lebanese Hizballah—would not be on the list.

Abbas Milani, in an otherwise informative piece in these spaces about the MEK, unfortunately suggests equivalence between the well-funded pro-MEK campaign and statements that have been critical of the campaign and the group. Milani even talks about Iranian regime funding of anti-MEK lobbyists. (That last point is a little puzzling. The regime assuredly hates the MEK as much as most Iranians do and, if the group were delisted, would get plenty of mileage from loudly proclaiming that this action shows how phony is any U.S. affirmation of supporting democracy in Iran. But precisely for that reason, and because of how the action would help to discredit the democratic opposition in Iran, the more strategically minded hardliners in the regime probably would quietly welcome delisting.) Whatever the Iranian regime may be doing, the statements critical of the pro-MEK campaign that I am familiar with (and have participated in myself) have nothing to do with the regime, and they are not an attempt to lobby the secretary of state. Instead, they are a calling to account of the large and illegitimate campaign that is trying to pressure the secretary. The calling to account would not be necessary if the pro-MEK campaign were not being waged. The MEK has been recertified as an FTO several times in the past with no noise about it in the street, on speakers’ platforms, or in opinion columns.

The secretary of state should pay no heed to what Melvin Santiago and the other hungry homeless outside her office window are saying, or to what the high-paid hired guns are saying, about the MEK. Nor does she need to pay any attention to what people like me are saying about the group. She should keep the windows closed and just pay attention to the terms of the law and to what officials in the departments and agencies involved say about whether the terms of the law still apply in this case.

by Paul R. Pillar – National Interest

August 28, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

Supporters of Iranian resistance group rally at State Department

Hundreds of supporters of the Iranian resistance group Mujahedin-e Khalq rallied in front of the U.S. State Department in Washington Friday, demanding the United States remove the group from its list of foreign terrorist organizations. In a sophisticated display of its public relations ability, the demonstration featured scores of young supporters wearing matching yellow T-shirts and straw hats chanting slogans, live big-screen broadcasts of the speakers, appearances by well-know U.S. politicians and the release of white doves that flew up toward the State Department’s enormous navy-blue flag as a storm of yellow and blue confetti filled the air.

The protest took place as the State Department prepares to decide whether to remove the organization from its list of foreign terrorist organizations. The MEK denies that it supports terrorism.

The department placed the MEK on the list in 1997. The group initially supported the 1979 Iranian Revolution, but later turned against the ayatollahs and, until 2003, carried out bombings and killings of Iranian officials.

The State Department also cites eyewitness accounts and MEK documents that it says demonstrate that MEK members participated in and supported the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and, in the 1970s, carried out terrorist attacks against U.S. interests in Iran as well as assassinations of Americans.

In the 1980s, because of the group’s anti-Iran actions, Iraq’s Saddam Hussein provided it with financial support and military training. During the Iran-Iraq War, the State Department says, Baghdad "armed the MEK with heavy military equipment and deployed thousands of MEK fighters in suicidal, mass wave attacks against Iranian forces."

The MEK surrendered its heavy arms to the U.S.-led coalition that invaded Iraq and, in 2003, said it was renouncing violence. Since then, roughly 3,400 M.E.K. members have been living at a refugee camp called Camp Ashraf on the Iran/Iraq border.

But the new Iraqi government, which is more sympathetic to the Iranian regime, wants to move the MEK out of Iraq. The camp has been violently attacked several times by Iraqi security forces. In one attack this spring, at least 30 of the camp’s residents died.

At Friday’s rally at the State Department, girls wearing yellow tiaras on their heads with the word "Ashraf" led the audience in cheers.

Onstage, former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell and former U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy addressed the crowd, urging support for its cause. The MEK, which is based in France, has spent millions of dollars to win backing in Washington.

The State Department, in its 2010 Country Reports on Terrorism, noted, "The MEK’s political arm, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, has a global support network with active lobbying and propaganda efforts in major Western capitals. NCRI also has a well-developed media communications strategy."

Some Iranians in the United States have been critical of the MEK. In a press release Friday, Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian American Council, said delisting the group "would be disastrous for Iran’s nonviolent democratic opposition ."

Calling the MEK "a cult that abuses its own members," Parsi said it has "no support among the Iranian people." The MEK, he said, has been paying U.S. politicians to get it off the list of foreign terrorist organizations.

"If the MEK campaign is successful," he said, "it means that America’s national security is officially on sale to the highest bidder, and terror groups are free to set U.S. policies if the price is right."

By Jill Dougherty, CNN Foreign Correspondent

August 27, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Why are U.S. political and diplomatic figures endorsing a terror group?

In recent weeks, a number of national U.S. news outlets have documented a strange phenomenon. Dozens of retired U.S. government officials, spanning the liberal-to-conservative political spectrum and some paid tens of thousands of dollars in speaking fees, have joined a well-orchestrated lobbying campaign to remove a controversial Iranian exile group from the list of terrorist organizations maintained by the U.S. State Department.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is expected to make a decision on the group’s status within weeks. She should take a close look at the history of the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK) before making a decision.

The MEK is a cult-like organization run by Iranian exiles Maryam Rajavi and her husband Massoud. Ms. Rajavi lives in Paris and leads the National Council of Resistance in Iran, a group that claims exile-government status. According to the FBI, it is a front group for the Mujahedeen-e Khalq.

Also known as the Warriors of God, MEK has a history of anti-American rhetoric and unsavory associations over the past four decades under the leadership of the Rajavis. It was initially aligned with the leaders of the Iranian Islamic revolution and later with Iraq’s dictator Saddam Hussein after the group was expelled from Iran. It is accused of dozens of assassinations and bombings, including one which killed six American advisers in Iran, and murdering Kurdish refugees in Iraq at Hussein’s behest. It is currently based at a camp in Iraq protected by the U.S. military but facing expulsion by the Iraqi government. A clash between Iraqi forces and camp members resulted in 34 deaths in April.

Despite the MEK’s ugly history, a power-packed roster of speakers has appeared at forums in the U.S. and Europe to endorse its drive to get off the terrorist list. Among the luminaries are former Vermont governor and Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, retired Gen. Wesley Clark, former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton, former Energy Secretary and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson and former FBI director Louis Freeh. Some of the high-profile speakers admit they knew little about the group beyond their briefing by MEK advocates.

According to a study by the Rand Corporation in 2009, the MEK has deceptively retooled its image to that of a democratic, nonviolent organization dedicated to bringing down the Iranian government. As such, the group is cultivating prominent Americans looking for a plausible alternative to Iran’s current leadership.

The MEK doesn’t seem to fit that bill. The Rand study reported that up to 70 percent of the 3,500 people at MEK’s Iraqi camp were deceptively recruited and are held against their will. Even prodemocracy groups inside Iran have denounced the MEK as a totalitarian cult group dedicated to the Rajavis.

An investigation by the Christian Science Monitor reported that millions of dollars provided by MEK have paid those high-profile speakers’ fees and hotel costs for the events. Although U.S. law prohibits Americans from providing direct assistance to or taking payments from terrorist groups, the connection is disguised by running the funds through third parties, usually Iranian exile groups in the U.S.

Prominent Americans should not be accepting payments and supporting a group that has shed American blood in the past and has no viable support inside Iran. We urge Secretary Clinton to keep the MEK on the terrorist roster.

Chron.com

August 27, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

MEK rally planned for Friday at State Department

Supporters of the Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK) movement are planning their largest-ever gathering in Washington on Friday in front of the State Department.

"Join us in solidarity with the Iranian people, Camp Ashraf, and against the dictatorship ruling Iran," reads the flyer advertising the Aug. 26 rally and march at the 22nd and C Street entrance of the State Department’s Foggy Bottom headquarters. MEK supporters have been gathering there for months, imploring State Department employees and visitors to press Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to remove the MEK from State’s list of foreign terrorist organizations.

"Dear Hillary, My name is Shaghayegh. I am 14 and I live in Camp Ashraf, Iraq. I am afraid I am going to be murdered," begins an open letter from an MEK member to Clinton that has been printed in full-page ads in the Washington Post.

The State Department placed the MEK on its list of foreign terrorist organizations in 1999 for its involvement in bombings that killed six Americans, but is reviewing that status now.

The event is the latest and greatest example of the MEK’s multi-million dollar effort to build support among Washington’s political elite. The speakers at the event will include: Congressman John Lewis (D-GA), former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, former FBI Director Louis Freeh, former Sen. Robert Torricelli, Rep. Patrick Kennedy, and former CIA Deputy Director of Clandestine Operations John Sano.

The MEK also lists among its supporters in Washington former National Security Advisor Gen. James Jones, former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, former Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Richard Myers, former White House Chief of Staff Andy Card, Gen. Wesley Clark, former Rep. Lee Hamilton, former CIA Director Porter Goss, senior advisor to the Romney campaign Mitchell Reiss, Gen. Anthony Zinni, former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, former Sen. Evan Bayh, and many others.

So what is the MEK? Well, that depends on who you ask. The group, which has an ideology based on the fusion of Islam and Marxism, was formed in Iran in 1965. It allied itself with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and fought against the Shah and his Western backers. After falling out of favor with Khomeini, the group was given shelter in Iraq by Saddam Hussein, who used them to conduct brutal cross-border raids during the Iraq-Iran war.

MEK leader Maryam Rajavi, who lives in Paris with her husband Massoud Rajavi, reportedly told her followers in 1991, "Take the Kurds under your tanks, and save your bullets for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards."

After the fall of Saddam, the United States helped broker an agreement whereby 3,400 MEK members were confined to a complex in Iraq called Camp Ashraf, which was protected by the U.S. military but then handed over to the Iraqi government in 2009. In an interview on Tuesday, Iraq’s ambassador Samir Sumaida’ie said that the MEK was dangerous and "nothing more than a cult."

In 2005, Human Rights Watch published a report accusing the MEK in Camp Ashraf of enforcing loyalty by subjecting "dissident members to torture and prolonged solitary confinement," and being responsible for "two cases of death under interrogation."

Elizabeth Rubin wrote about her 2003 trip to Camp Ashraf in the New York Times earlier this month. "Access to the Internet, phones and information about the outside world is prohibited. Posters of Ms. Rajavi and her smiling green eyes abound," she said. "Friendships and all emotional relationships are forbidden. From the time they are toddlers, boys and girls are not allowed to speak to each other. Each day at Camp Ashraf you had to report your dreams and thoughts. If a man was turned on by the scent of a woman or a whiff of perfume, he had to confess."

The MEK says it renounced violence in 2001 and professes to be leading the resistance to the Iranian regime. That claim, in addition to lucrative payments to former officials in both parties, has bought it a lot of attention and friends in Washington. But how can senior officials take money from a terrorist group?

"The MEK’s delisting campaign is funded by a fluid and enigmatic network of support groups based in the United States. According to an MEK leader, these groups are funded by money from around the world, which they deliberately shield from U.S. authorities," the Huffington Post reporter Christina Wilkie wrote. "These domestic groups book and pay for their VIP speakers through speaker agencies, which in turn pay the speakers directly and take a fee for arranging appearances. That way, the speakers themselves don’t technically accept money from the community groups."

An event organizer told The Cable that the MEK is expecting between 5,000 and 10,000 people at its rally at the State Department on Friday, which begins at 10 a.m.

Foreign Policy.com – By Josh Rogin

August 27, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

Some participants in the rally had no knowledge about MKO

Several hundred supporters of the Iranian opposition Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO, aka MEK and People’s Mujahedin) gathered on August 26 in front of the State Department in Washington, D.C., to urge Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to remove the group from the United States’ list of foreign terrorist organizations.

The participants, who were wearing yellow vests with pictures of the leaders of the group, Maryam and Massoud Rajavi, chanted, "We want justice, we want peace, we want MEK off the list" and also "Iran, Rajavi, Rajavi, Iran."

The State Department is reviewing the status of the MKO, which it put on the list of terrorist organizations in 1999. The group, which has been described by former members as a Marxist/Islamist cult, is also designated as a terrorist organization by Iran.

The MKO, which was involved in a series of attacks in Iran in the 1980s, says it has renounced violence and is working for democracy in Iran. The group sided with Iraq during the bloody Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, and more than 3,000 members are still based in Camp Ashraf in Iraq.

Today’s event included speeches by several former U.S. officials and congressmen, including former Representative Patrick Kennedy (Rhode Island-Republican) who said in Persian, " I am Iranian, I am an Ashrafi," referring to the camp in Iraq. He also warned Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki that he will be put on trial in the International Criminal Court for attacking Camp Ashraf.

Organizers said the event was broadcast live for Camp Ashraf members. Several rally participants told RFE/RL they have family members in Ashraf.

One of the organizers, who identified herself as Shirin, told RFE/RL the removal of MKO from the list of foreign terrorist organizations would allow MKO members in Ashraf to move to other countries.Shirin said the MKO’s removal from the list would allow those who are "hesitant" because of this status to join the opposition group.

Rally participants also included a number of non-Iranian-Americans. Several of them told RFE/RL they had little or no knowledge about the MKO. "We’ve come for Iranian people," said one African-American.

When asked whether he and his female companion received money to attend the rally, the woman first said yes, but then retracted her statement at the man’s behest.

Another MKO supporter said describing the group as a cult is a label by intelligence agencies, which he said do not understand the nature of the group. In response to a question about the whereabouts of MKO leader Massoud Rajavi, who hasn’t been seen for years, he said his location should be kept secret for his personal safety.

Today’s rally was the latest event in a series the MKO has held in recent months in Washington to push for its delisting. Western media have reported that former U.S. officials have received substantial financial contributions to speak at MKO events and express support for the delisting of the group.[..]

Tehran-based political analyst Nejat Bahrami told RFE/RL earlier this month the delisting of the MKO would make average Iranians frustrated with the United States.

"The messages [U.S. President Barack] Obama has sent to the Iranian people on several occasions, including for Norouz, have been very encouraging," he said. "But I think [the delisting of the MKO] would neutralize those positive statements. And it might lead to frustration with U.S. policies and even hatred."

By Golnaz Esfandiari, Hossein Aryan

August 27, 2011 0 comments

Iraq

Iraqi victims of MKO to collect signatures to expel the group

Chairman of the Committee for the defense of Iraqi victims of Mojahedin Khalq working to collect signatures to expel MKO (MEK, Rajavi cult) from Diyala, Iraq

The head of the Special Committee to defend the victims of the crimes of Mojahedin Khalq, Mr. Nafee-Issa, said the Committee is working to collect signatures for the expulsion of the Mojahedin from the province of Diyala, and from Iraq.

In a statement to All-Iraq News Agency on Tuesday, Mr. Nafee-Issa said that "the Committee is working to collect a large number of facts that show the crimes of this organization and what caused the killings of civilians in Iraq since 1986 till 2003."

He added that "organized crime continued after 2003 as a result of political interference in the affairs of Iraq by creating sectarian strife between Iraq’s people and in addition working to destabilise the security situation in the province of Diyala and the country in general."

Camp Ashraf, or as it is now known camp New Iraq, houses thousands of Iranian fighters of the MKO, an Iranian opposition faction, which based the headquarters for its Chairman at the camp nearly three decades ago.

All Iraq News, Translated by Iran Interlink

August 27, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

Hundreds demonstrate in DC for Mojahedin Khalq

WASHINGTON — Hundreds of people are demonstrating in Washington to demand that an Iranian opposition group formerly allied with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq be removed from the U.S. list of terrorist organizations

Former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell and former Rhode Island Rep. Patrick Kennedy were among those speaking in support of the Mujahedin-e Khalq. The midday crowd filled a street outside the State Department for a rally with confetti and doves released into the air.

The U.S. declared the group a terrorist body in 1997. But a court last year ordered the State Department to reconsider the designation.

The MEK carried out a series of bombings and assassinations in Iran in the 1980s, and fought alongside Saddam’s forces in the Iran-Iraq war. The group says it renounced violence in 2001.

August 27, 2011 0 comments

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