Downing Street still considers the anti-Iran Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO) as a terrorist group, says the British justice secretary. 
British Secretary of State for Justice Jack Straw said on Wednesday that his country firmly believes in the terrorist nature of the MKO group, despite a controversial decision last year to remove the dissidents from the UK terror list.
Straw said he sorely regrets the British court ruling which de-proscribed the grouplet from the country’s terror blacklist.
"When I was the home secretary, I said it was a terrorist group and the parliament agreed. The difficulty is that there is an independent kind of court which can make the final decisions out of the law. And it decided that the evidence do not support what the government was saying," Straw told IRNA in an exclusive interview.
Following a UK court ruling in 2008, the British parliament lifted the terror ban on MKO — irrespective of the abundance of evidence pointing to the group’s 40-year history of performing terrorist operations in Iran.
The group masterminded a slew of assassinations and bombings inside Iran, one of which was the 1981 bombing of the offices of the Islamic Republic Party, in which more than 72 Iranian officials were killed, including then Judiciary chief Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti.
Earlier in January, the European Union decided to follow in Britain’s footsteps and moved to redefine the group as a non-terrorist organization, annulling its previous decision to freeze MKO funds.
The Mujahedin Khalq Organization, which blended elements of Islamism and Stalinism, was founded in Iran in the 1960s but was exiled some twenty years later for performing acts of terrorism in the country.
A 2007 German intelligence report from the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution has identified the MKO as a "repressive, sect-like and Stalinist authoritarian organization which centers around the personality cult of [MKO leaders] Maryam and Masoud Rajavi".
High-ranking MKO members have camped-out in most of Europe’s parliaments for the past two years and have managed to gain scattered support from various high-ranking circles in the West.
Anne Singleton, an expert on the MKO and author of ‘Saddam’s Private Army’ explains that the West aims to keep the group afloat in order to use it in efforts to stage a regime change in Iran.
"With a new Administration in the White House a pre-emptive strike on Iran looks unlikely. Instead the MKO’s backers have put together a coalition of small irritant groups, the known minority and separatist groups, along with the MKO. These groups will be garrisoned around the border with Iran and their task is to launch terrorist attacks into Iran over the next few years to keep the fire hot," she explains.
"The role of the MKO is to train and manage these groups using the expertise they acquired from Saddam’s Republican Guard," Singleton added.
As already elaborated on, irreparable damages to Mojahedin Khalq Organization (MKO) under Rajavi’s lead had their roots mainly in his flaws and characteristics like his arrogance, egotism, ambitiousness, narcissism, etc. They are so inherently
rooted in him that even organizational instructions and indoctrinations succeeded not in changing his attitude and to convince him take a different approach.
Here the aim is to review his ambition to submit members and as he calls it exploit organizational hierarchy that turned to a principle in his initiated ideological revolution and gave him the pretext to make internal purges. The open-minded and impartial readers may raise the question why, despite the existence of more experienced members who were more intimately related to MKO founders, Rajavi assumed power while he was less qualified and had revealed signs of weakness in some phases like the interrogations conducted by SAVAK (Pahlavi’s notorious security agency) in prison. There is no doubt that Rajavi had some qualifications and enjoyed an open and active mind and was good in lectures and theoretical discussions; however, they made MKO founders more concerned rather than pleased. In addition to factors referred to at which Rajavi grabbed to attain a high rank in the organization, there are other factors contributing to his organizational promotion.
In fact, if we consider the ideological revolution of Rajavi as an instrument at his hands to fulfill his ambitious objectives, we have to take his role as an MKO member into consideration to find out how he managed to usurp the leadership of Mojahedin after the mass arrests of 1971 despite the presence of more qualified cadres. This is a question posed by many remnants of MKO answered in different ways with regard to various factors. According to an MKO former member:
There is a point to be noted: Rajavi was one of those not to go a long way in the organization recruitment. MKO leaders were affected by his youth and foray and soon entered him in the central cadre. I think he was the youngest member of the central cadre of the organization in 1971. 1
As his intimates state, Rajavi lost his popularity in a phase of his imprisonment due to his anti-revolutionary and anti-value characteristics and activities. Taking a look at the events of 1971 and mass arrests reveals that he used all possible means to eliminate more qualified cadres. In addition, he made an attempt to indoctrinate founders and leaders with the idea that he had the required potentiality to shoulder major responsibilities. From a professional point of view, he was rightful in competing with others to prove his qualifications; however, in a revolutionary organization, blowing the organization for achieving personal ambitions is considered an anti-value phenomenon.
There are many evidences that Rajavi was always after questioning and criticizing cadres and leaders to make them passive and give them a feeling of inferiority to obtain organizational rise. Even in some cases he openly declared his objective in competing against other cadres and eliminating them from the organization scene. In a condition that his activities can affect MKO founders like Asqar Badizadagan, its influence on lower cadres seems inevitable. As Meisami puts into words:
Masoud [Rajavi] acted in a way that made all cadres including Asqar [Badizadegan] subject to inferiority. As Behrooz stated, he acted in a way that Asqar [Badizadegan] even left teaching chemistry and function of explosives. 2
Or when the organization decides to make contact with Al-Fatah (a Palestinian organization) to exchange experience and military training, Rajavi considers himself the most qualified member, even more qualified than the organization founder, Hanifnejad, and says:
I have the qualification to write a letter to Palestinians. 3
Lotfollah Meisami refers to the same event in more details and writes:
Rajavi went to Palestine as a translator and refrained to pass the instructional phase and there made all cadres (Badizadegan, Bakeri, and Torab Haqshenas) feel inferiority. When members decided to write an article for Palestinians, Rajavi said he is the one who could write it and made other members passive. Asqar [Badizadegan] who was a chemical engineer left teaching the formula of explosives to members under the influence of Rajavi. 4
It has to be pointed out that Rajavi pursued his egocentric activities in a condition when the organization founders and Hanifnejad in particular put a great deal of significance on ethical principles and considered anti-value features of members destructive. The reasons why they blinked at Rajavi’s violations may constitute the subject of other articles.
References:
1. The memoirs of Dr. Mohammad Mehdi Jafari: MKO from inside, Negah-e Emruz publication, 2002, p.48.
2. The memoirs of Lotfollah Meisami, vol. 2, 2002, Tehran, p.75.
3. ibid.
4. Meisami, Lotfollah, Degeneration of a Mojahed, No. 32.
Bulgarian Deputy Foreign Minister Urdan Popov Wednesday called the anti-Iran group, Mojahedin-e-Khalq Organization, a terrorist group despite European Union’s recent decision to strike the MKO off its terror list.
“According to the existing laws MKO is a terrorist group,” Popov said in a meeting with Chairman of the Iranian parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Alaoddin Boroujerdi.
The remark by popov whose country is an EU member came after a controversial decision by the 27- nation bloc’s foreign ministers in Brussels to drop the MKO from the blacklist. The MKO had been blacklisted as a terror organization by the EU since 2002.
Regarding Iran-Bulgaria bilateral relation, Popov noted that there are no obstacles on expansion of mutual cooperation.
“Properties and capabilities of the two countries, particularly in energy, require new initiatives for the promotion and expansion of bilateral cooperation,” he went on saying.
Alaoddin Boroujerdi, for his part, expressed satisfaction over expansion of bilateral ties and stressed boosting bilateral consultations and cooperation between Iran and Bulgaria.
Elsewhere, Boroujerdi referred to the sensitive conditions in the Middle-East, Iraq and Afghanistan in particular, and said, “The policy of the Islamic Republic is based on establishment of durable and long-term calm and stability in the region.”
He also criticized West’s double-standard approach towards campaign against drugs and terrorism and solution of the crisis in Palestine.
London-Jack Straw, the British Justice Secretary, says the outlawed Mojahedin Khalq Organization (MKO) is a terrorist group from the viewpoint of his government.
Straw told IRNA the MKO is a terrorist organisation and the British government is at the same position that the government of the Islamic Republic is.
“When I was the home secretary, I said it was a terrorist group and the parliament agreed. The difficulty is that there is an independent kind of court which can make the final decisions out of the law. And it decided that the evidence do not support what the government was saying,” he said.
Following a court ruling in 2008, the British parliament de-proscribed the MKO from its list of terrorist organizations despite the abundance of evidence proving the MKO has conducted hundreds of terrorist operations against the Islamic Republic of Iran and Iraq, including the murder of Kurdish minority during Saddam Hussein’s reign over Iraq.
Straw said it is regrettable that the court removed the terrorist MKO from the country’s terror list.
Earlier a British Foreign Office Spokesman told IRNA that the British government continues to believe that the MKO is responsible for “vile acts of terrorism over a long period”.
Barry Marston added there is no dispute about the group’s terrorist activities and that the “British government is not satisfied the MKO has done enough to distance itself from its past”.
Asked about the fate of Nosratollah Tajik, the Iranian national who was arrested in Britain on charges of trying to smuggle night vision goggles to Iran, Straw said Tajik is now free on bail.
Tajik, 55, a former Iranian ambassador to Jordan stands accused of being the British link in a conspiracy to supply goggles to Iran.
He was allegedly secretly filmed discussing the three million dollar deal in a London office by men he thought would supply the equipment. They were in fact US agents. The US government now wants to extradite Tajik to face trial for his role in the alleged plot. Tajik denies the charges, saying he has been fit up by the CIA.
“Tajik is still in the country. He is free to move around. His case remains under consideration by the Home Secretary. I am not directly involved,” Straw said.
MKO’s violent acts and atrocities are originated in its theory structure
The presence of the organization [MEK] in Iraqi territory has nothing to the Iraqi nation except danger.
The recent annual report of the Department of State might not have anything new on the status of the Iranian Mujahedin Khalq Organization which has been designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization since years ago. But the speech made by Condoleeza Rice following the publication of the new list, which called the group as substantially terrorist, should be taken as serious.
The MKO tries to pretend that it has denounced terrorism and represents a peaceful struggle because they claim to have abandoned violence for years. But, the investigations by the State Department’s experts did not include its recent acts but the terrorist nature of MKO of which its ideology and strategy completely originates and will never get separated. MKO is a destructive cult with a terrorist potential, according to the experts, and will not lose such potentiality without arm and camp and will never miss its real nature.
Therefore from a technical viewpoint – if one doesn’t want to work on political interests and benefits – the investigation on the nature of a group is prior to its short-term functions. If we don’t evaluate the nature correctly, we will make mistake in viewing its short–term function, as many unprofessional people made the same mistake.
Terrorist designation of the groups or entities by various countries is primarily done due to the national security (although sometimes the lists get a political flavor) and its objective is to determine the organization with terrorist potentiality and take them under direct supervision.
However, the designation of the terrorist nature of a group is based on the interests and acts of the group through its background and many other criteria, so it requires a deep and multilateral investigation.
We do not intend to punish before the commitment but we want to investigate this case more deeply trying not to view MKO’s short-term claims as a base.
The nature we are discussing includes long-term functions and we would like to confirm that the potential capacity of MKO will be definitely actualized if the condition is appropriate and when the facilities are provided eventually the previous status will be revived.
In the recent report on MKO published by German federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, there is no difference between MKO and NCRI and also it is mentioned that there is no evidence to approve that the organization has denounced its violent acts. The report also notes that the organization is a cult, the fact that many experts agree.
The cult-like and terrorist nature of MKO requires it to commit terror acts in case of necessity, because it has theorized the engagement in violence in its theory system. Therefore such an organization is always dangerous for its environment. It is a destructive risk for the security of every society and could be considered as a substantial threat. Thus it must be restricted and neutralized.
Unfortunately, today the main body of MKO is located in our country. Saddam Hussein brought them to our territory due to his own benefits as well as other disasters he left for us. The west that has once used the group against the Islamic Republic, now doesn’t want to accept them in its soil. This is exactly like they want to get rid of their nuclear garbage that they have used it and now that it is a threat they want to get rid of it. The presence of MKO in our territory brings nothing except danger and threat to Iraqi nation who has no reason to suffer the risks of this nuclear garbage. The west should keep them in its own territory since they are well aware of their threats.
Al Mo’tamar Newspaper
![The presence of the organization [MEK] in Iraqi territory has nothing to the Iraqi nation except danger.](https://st.nejatngo.org/Image/Press/Al_Motamer/AL_Motamer_20081029.jpg)
Rajavi & Cult Leadership
Egypt has agreed to the establishment of a Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO) base in the country as the terrorist group seeks a new home.
The MKO, which identifies itself as a Marxist-Islamist guerilla army, has carried out acts of terror against Iranian nationals and officials. Outlawed in Iran, the group was relocated to Iraq and allegedly assisted former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein in the massacre of thousands of Iraqi civilians in the 1990s.
After the finalization of a security agreement between Baghdad and Washington, the Iraqi government regained control of the country’s national security issues. The interim agreement gave control of Camp Ashraf, the MKO headquarters and training site, to the Baghdad government as of January 1, 2009.
Baghdad seeks to expel the members of the terrorist group from the country.
MKO leaders, meanwhile, are scrambling to woo regional countries to establish a foothold in the region.
Iraqi sources were quoted by Mehr news agency as saying that certain countries that oppose Iran are considering allowing the terrorist group to remain in the Middle East.
Egypt, they said, has agreed with a request by MKO leaders to establish a camp in the country.
Many countries, including the US, have designated the MKO a “terrorist” organization. The US State Department acknowledges that the MKO assassinated at least six US citizens in Iran, prior to the victory of the Islamic Revolution in 1979.
Iran has called on Iraq to extradite MKO terrorists to Iran where they would face prosecution for their criminal acts.
“We believe that certain MKO leaders who organized and carried out criminal acts against the Iranian nation should be handed over to the Iranian government so they can be tried and brought to justice,” said Tehran’s envoy to Baghdad, Hassan Kazemi-Qomi.
However, US ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker said in a January interview that the Iraqi government had “provided assurances that none of these (MKO) individuals will be forcibly sent to a third country where they have reason to fear for their safety or well-being, and we know those assurances will be respected.”
Zebari: Mojahedin Khalq expulsion from Iraq will be strictly monitored by a special committee
BAGHDAD – Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari has stated that Baghdad intends to host talks between Iran and United States over the security situation in Iraq and called for maintaining “Iraq-Iraq-U.S. triangle”.
In an exclusive interview with the Mehr News Agency, Zebari said the Iraqi government, given the current situation in the country, views hosting such talks as a priority.
He pointed out that Iran is “one of Iraq’s most important neighbors” that is seeking “special relations with Baghdad with goodwill” and that Baghdad’s relations with Tehran are of “great significance”.
He added the U.S. influence in Iraq is also “undeniable”.
Iran’s foreign minister has ruled out holding new security talks with the United States over Iraq, saying improved security situation has made such talks unnecessary.
However, Zebari said there are issues that Iran and the United States should “settle between themselves”, and in the run-up to “new Iraq” Baghdad favors cooperation between the three parties by maintaining “Iran-Iraq-U.S. triangle.”
The foreign minister also dismissed reports that Iraq is showing leniency in expelling Mojahedin Khalgh Organization (MKO), saying the Iraqi government has taken its decision on the group and the expulsion will be strictly monitored by a “special committee”.
The MKO has claimed responsibility for carrying out numerous terror attacks against Iranian nationals and officials, and has also been accused of assisting former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein in the slaughter of thousands of Iraqi civilians in the 1990s.
The MKO established a camp for about 3,500 members in Iraq, which its forces used to launch cross-border attacks into Iran. It fought alongside Saddam Hussein’s forces during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war.
Many senior Iraqi officials have assured Iran that the MKO members will soon have to leave Iraq.
Zebari also stated that Baghdad understands Tehran’s concerns about the Iranian diplomats detained by U.S forces and expressed hope that Iraq’s negotiations with the U.S. will lead to the release of the diplomats.
The U.S. military detained five Iranian diplomats in the city of Arbil, 310 km (190 miles) north of Baghdad, in January 2007. In November that year, U.S. officials said they would release two of the five diplomats.
http://www.mehrnews.com/en/NewsDetail.aspx?NewsID=835267
Honorable and Distinguished Director of the International Lawyers Organization MR.SOBHASH CHANDRA BIRLA
I am one of the former long time members and a veteran of this cult (PMOI) . I
had been living and working with them for almost two decades. I know them perfectly and I would like to inform you about some facts which exist in this cult. I read your concern about ASHRAF garrison and its residents. You said that “conversion of ASHRAF garrison to a prison, is considered as a war crime.”
Actually , the war crime that you mentioned has already happened and occurred in this cult since long time ago. The leaders and operatives of this cult had participated and co- operated fully with the SADDAM’s suppressive forces in annihilation and destruction of any Iraqi people’s just-struggle during Iraq national and popular uprising against SADDAM HUSSEIN and his government as a result of that many Iraqi people got killed and perished. Killing of Iraq innocent people in co- operation with Iraq dictator is called war crime, and the people who does such a act are called war criminals. I would like to draw your attention to another fact which substantiates and proves that war crime has happened inside of this cult. The people who have been stranded in this cult since long time ago , have been deprived of having access to Foreign Radios and TV programs , internet and mobile. We were not allowed to get in touch with our family and loved ones through mail or phone till the fall of SADDAM HUSSEIN. Many people who could not tolerate the harsh conditions and daily suppressions committed suicide .Many dissidents were turned over to Iraq authorities during SADDAM HUSSEIN’s reign and spent many years in horrendous situation in notorious prison, ABU GHORIB. Many of those in ABU GHORIB got swopped with Iraqi POWs in Iran.
Many, such as MR. SAEED KIYANI and MR. SAEED NOROZI,…… got killed suspiciously and mysteriously inside this cult.
I as a victim of this cult urge you and your organization to help those who need your help in this cult . Help them to have a second chance to choose what they really want. Help them to return to their lost lives once more and revive it .
BEST REGARDS. PARIS-15/FEB-2009
Hassan piransar, iranpeyvand
Alert and alert, the West states must be on the highest alert and feel moral and political responsibility to prevent more disastrous incidents in Ashraf garrison which can terrorize then jeopardize the local peace and security.
Maryam Rajavi (Iranian Ben Laden) has already tested the success of such an adventurous experience in Paris in June 2003 to achieve her terrorist aims and political blackmails. so that, she issued an ideological command to her cult innocent and deceived members to resort holy self-burning suicide with the intention of de-stabilizing the French political atmosphere to impose her illegitimate conditions on French govt. not to extradite her to Iran because of her terrorist committed crimes in Iran. The price of such an adventurous action was the destruction of two tempting women in France in June 2003. The more delay the heavy human losses in the Ashraf garrison as occurred in Paris in June 2003. Therefore, as a separated ex- member of the “People Mujahidin Organization of Iran” (PMOI) who have been under inhuman psychological and physical torture by this chaotic sect cal l for the urgent and press actions and efforts without any hesitation to salve the live of thousands incarcerated innocent victims in Ashraf garrison situated in Iraq. If the West public opinion and political elites consider the demoniac and inflamed message of Maryam Rajavi’s husband who is the ideological leader of this cult, they will find out that the history is going to be repeated again and create a new Paris self-burning disaster in Ashraf garrison with the highest dimensions of creature of the human catastrophe. Masood Rajavi stimulated and encouraged the caged victims of Ashraf garrison to upheaval against Iraqi elect govt. sovereignty and not to obey the rules and regulations, which has been passed by Iraq constitutional assembly. He intimidated Iraqi govt. to imply with his illegal demands not to impose Iraq dominion over his unlawful self-govt. in the territory of Iraq. Otherwise, he will openly goad and compel his deceived innocent victims in Ashraf garrison to start a hunger strike and if they cannot get their demands from Iraqi govt., they must resort self-holocaust solution to make the West public opinion to support his illegal demands. The authentic sources familiar to his violent nature and characteristics believe that Masood Rajavi’s message is too bloodthirsty and full of intimidations, desperations, and self-contradictions and he does not care how many people will be on fire and killed in his self-created holocaust. Now, I, as a survivor of this terrorist cult ask the West public opinion and responsible authorities to take Masood Rajavi’s message serious to avert Masood Rajavi’s latent holocaust in Ashraf garrison. According to an Iranian axiom, “when you push a wild cat on the ring or on the corner of the room; the cat will scrape and claw you.” It means that when there is an absolute impasse and no alternative to rescue the live and change the conditions, the reaction of such wild animals with violent natures towards such dead end conditions are unexpected, desperate, vague, and outrageous. As a result, the reaction of wildcat is adventurous and violent, it may invade you by any weapon, and way and bomb commit either suicide or self-burning. Based on the past Masood Rajavi’s terrorist adventures in the occasions of impasse conditions and political catch-22, the experience shows that, he is always endeavoring to theorize his cultic conspiracies to prepare the atmosphere for terrorist adventures. That is why he used the language of threat in his message vs. Iraq elect govt. several times in different ways and tried to place the responsibility of his future prepared terrorist activities on the shoulder of Iraq govt. and the rest of the world. That is why; the most significant part of his message is that “the world can not be in the peace and security without the establishment of security in the Ashraf garrison” where is his main and key base for preparing terrorist activities. The reality is that, if the West states are not determine to take necessary action regarding Masood Rajavi’s expressed threats today, thus, tomorrow will be too late. Moreover, the human beings will face the reiteration of Paris self-burning disaster in Ashraf garrison with the highest terrible dimensions. Therefore, the fenced in Ashraf garrison victims are expecting the human consciences and human rights organizations not to hesitate in rescuing them.
Iranpeyvand