Elaheh Iranian singer

Elahe Iranian Singer and Anne Singleton

Elahe is one of the most important singers in Iran’s history. She has sung and made famous many of Iran’s traditional (asil), pop, jazz, and standard hits. Her voice was so liked by Davood Pirnia, the original creator and director of Radio Iran’s "Golha" program, that he employed Elahe to manage it for a while. Her voice is on more "Golha" shows than any other singer.

Would you please briefly describe your singing career for us.

I trained for two years in the classical Iranian singing style. At that time, Davood Pirnia, introduced this style to radio listeners with the popular Golha programme. The orchestra and the singers of this program established this form of classical music in Iran. I was the leading singer for fifteen years that the programme was broadcast. Of course, after the revolution it was no longer possible for women’s singing voices to be heard and we were silenced.

With this background please tell us how you became involved with the Mojahedin organisation.

For a long time I was unable to sing for the people in Iran. One of the ways I could have continued with my singing career was to join with the exiles on the American west coast. But there was so much infighting between them and petty behaviour that I didn’t want to join with any of the factions.

Then, in 1994, I was approached by some people who said they were from an Iranian intellectual group in Europe which wanted to stage a concert as a gesture of defiance toward the Iranian regime and to show solidarity with the people inside the country in their struggles for freedom and democracy. They told me they were supporters of the Mojahedin. Of course I had heard of the Mojahedin but I knew little about them. The way these young people described them was as freedom fighters.

They invited me to sing in the concert. I have always felt that my voice, because it was made famous by the listeners of the Golha programme, my voice belongs to the people of Iran and that I should return it to them somehow. So, the Mojahedin became the way to do this. Of course, I wasn’t alone and there were several other popular singers who also agreed to sing in the concert.

Can you describe how they approached people and how they behaved toward you in persuading you to take part in their concert.

I told them that although I was sympathetic to the Mojahedin’s stance against the regime, I would not be involved in anything political, so there should only be Iranian flags at the concert, and I would sing some classical songs and nothing else. Now, in all my singing career, I have never had a written contract. My word was always enough. But they insisted on having a contract. I believed they were just amateurs and so I agreed. The contract was for six evening concerts with a forfeit of several thousand dollars if I didn’t show up. Since this had never been a problem for me in the past, I agreed. Then they went away and I didn’t hear from them again. A month before the concert I still had no news, so I tried to contact them without success. Then a week before the concert it was announced everywhere as a Mojahedin concert in support of Maryam Rajavi!

After the concert, Iranian radio stations started swearing at me because I had sung for the Mojahedin. The Mojahedin themselves paid me only half the money we had agreed and then no more. Radio USA said that I should go on air and apologize to Iranians everywhere. All that happened was that all the rest of the opposition groups, instead of helping me, only pushed me further toward the Mojahedin with the pressure of their criticisms and these uncompromising attacks on me. I didn’t have a sympathetic refuge anywhere.

Then the Mojahedin themselves started a campaign of showing great affection and kindness toward me. They pretended to really care for me and that they were concerned about me. In this phase, they couldn’t do enough for me. I know now that this is the usual method used by cults to recruit people. At that time, even though I knew it was all lies, there was something seductive and intriguing about their behaviour so I ended up curious to find out more about them.

Could you describe your perception of how the Mojahedin operates as a cult.

I was invited to join them as a singer, and I had thought they were freedom fighters, but it soon became apparent that they are a cult – an extremely narrow and strict cult.

After the people burned themselves when Maryam was arrested I told them not to contact me anymore.

They are like Hassan Sabbah. No, worse. Sabbah protected his men from their sexual urges by castrating them, but he never asked them to burn themselves for him. Rajavi has no mercy. He places himself above everyone. The Rajavis have their own luxury lifestyle with the best homes, clothes and food while everyone else has to suffer degradation.

No friendships exist inside the Mojahedin, they are extremely harsh with even their supporters. The commanders order them about this way and that on nonsensical work. They have two faces, one is the good public face they show to the outside world, the other is all swearing and harshness and anger.

Most of all I hated what they did in Iraq with Saddam. I hate what Iraq did to my country in that war. I discovered in that relationship that Rajavi has no limits – he really doesn’t care who he allies himself with, friend or foe. I asked Maryam once about their work with Saddam. She told me: ‘if Saddam hadn’t lost the war and had captured Iran. When we had taken over in Iran we would have rewarded Saddam and given him Khuzestan’!

One thing that was very interesting to observe from close up is that both of the Rajavis are obsessed with power. I remember one of the NCRI members was talking to Massoud Rajavi about what the Mojahedin would do once they arrived back in Tehran. Rajavi, with a glint in his eye, told him: ‘When we go to Iran it will take a few days before we reach Tehran. On the way we will kill one million Bassij forces and one million Pasdaran and…, then we’ll just see what happens.’

There are some interesting dynamics between the leaders. It is obvious that Maryam wants power and is prepared to push Massoud aside to achieve this. Also, her ex-husband Mehdi Abrishamchi wants her to replace Massoud. Why not? When Maryam came to Europe in 1993 her husband had an affair with her second in command, Fahimeh Arvani back in Iraq. Everyone knew about that, poor woman.

If the USA supports them now and pushes them into Iran, they will be worse in Iran than Saddam was for the US in Iraq. They performed intelligence work against their own country in a time of war. I met an Iranian nurse recently and she wept as she told me about the war. She said the Azmayesh factory constructed metal sheets to use in the war to shelter from attack. 30,000 Iranian soldiers were there. But the Mojahedin gave the intelligence to the Iraqis, who then bombarded them. Between 70-80,000 men lost their lives because of the Mojahedin. That’s why I know they are more ruthless than anyone can believe.

Did you know the Mojahedin before you met them.

I had heard of them, everyone had. But I didn’t know them as I do now. I thought they were freedom fighters. We hadn’t heard about the crimes they committed with Saddam. And especially we hadn’t heard anything about how they behave inside the organization.

Nowadays I have seen more than enough with my own eyes, and if I say nothing else, it is to warn others not to go near them. They are criminals and traitors. When I call them criminals I’m not exaggerating. I was once visiting them in Paris. Of course, they go all out to be hospitable and look after us. But there was a young woman there who was working alongside us that I remember well and with good reason!

One evening I was really tired but felt too anxious to sleep, so when I went to my room I took a sleeping pill and settled down to rest. After a while I heard a noise in the room and, half-awake I lifted my head to look. I saw the young woman standing with her hand in my handbag. I was so drowsy I didn’t know if I was dreaming or not and drifted back to sleep.

When I woke in the morning I discovered she had stolen my passport, my Green Card and around one thousand US dollars from my bag. Yet there she was in front of me. When I confronted her about it, one of the women commanders stepped in and sent her away. But they never returned my things.

Another time I was persuaded to visit them in their camp in Iraq. It happened that back home my shoes had been giving me some discomfort, so I had put a piece of paper in one of them to ease the pain. While I was having dinner in the garrison, I slipped my shoes off to be more comfortable and the paper must have been visible. Without warning the woman sitting next to me grabbed my shoe, took the paper out and ran away. For a moment I was amazed and perplexed. What …? Then I realised what had gone on. They suspected that someone in the camp had passed me a secret message to take out of the camp. In that moment I knew everything I ever needed to know about them. I knew that people inside were desperate to leave. I knew that they would do anything in their power to prevent that happening, and I knew that all the stories I had heard about their prisons and torture of their own people were all true. It was truly disturbing.

I have seen more than I needed to. I have seen that they do many illegal things. But you know, the thing they do worse than all this, which isn’t even illegal is to play with people’s minds and hearts.

I joined with them because of the people of Iran and all the time I tried hard to change them and to inform them about the realities both of the world and about themselves. It was as though they could not see anything but their own lies. I even tried to get Maryam Rajavi to change those hideous clothes she wears. When I first met her she was wearing a military uniform. It was completely inappropriate for what she wanted to do. Then, after I suggested she dress more attractively, she spend thousands of dollars on outrageous pink or yellow clothes, handmade from upholstery fabric! She doesn’t have a clue and no one around her dares to criticise or even suggest she does things differently. It was only me who got her out of that uniform.

All the time I was with them singing in their concerts, they told me, don’t talk about Iran only talk about Maryam. But I had no interest in her. I didn’t work with the Mojahedin, I was an opposition voice, a thorn in their flesh. I sang because I wanted to return my voice to Iranians.

How did the Mojahedin behave toward you when you wanted to dissociate yourself from them?

It is true that once anyone gets into the claws of the Mojahedin they get trapped there, like in a cat’s paw, and every time they try to escape the paw comes down on them again, sometimes with claws extended, sometimes with softness. But nevertheless it’s a real trial to get away. One of the ways they used to trap people like me was through debt. They never paid us fully for our work even though we had agreements. They were always promising to pay next week, next month, next time.

One of the veteran NCRI members spoke to me in confidence some time ago, he said, ‘Elahe, why don’t you get out of here. People like me can’t leave because we are totally dependent on the Rajavis for all our needs. We don’t have a penny, but at least you have a home and independence, and family. Leave now while you have the chance.’ I was really saddened by this.

I visited Maryam in Paris one day and I told her: ‘Look, the cage you have put me in is not even golden, it’s wooden. I can’t see the people and they can’t see me’. All she could do was just stare at me. I asked them to pay me the money they owed me for all the concerts I had performed for them which I had not yet received.

Whenever I asked for the money which they owed me, which I have to say was a considerable amount, they kept telling me they can’t pay. A short time after the start of the war in Iraq I saw Mohammad Mohaddessin and he told me: ‘Look our people in Iraq are stuck and we have no money’. Then four days later, the French police raided Maryam Rajavi’s home in Paris and along with all her garments and computers, they found eight million dollars in cash. Imagine. The next time I saw Mohaddessin he blushed with embarrassment. But I still didn’t get my money.

Last year, I decided that I had had enough. I wrote a formal letter of resignation and faxed it directly to Maryam. But for a year they haven’t announced my decision and it appears they don’t want to accept it. They kept phoning me, saying OK, come and get your money. Once they said I should go to see Maryam in Paris to get my money. When I got there, they had laid on an extravagant dinner party apparently in my honour. They invited many of their French neighbours in Auvers-sur-Oise and even Danielle Mitterand came to dinner. All the time, Maryam kept trying to sit next to me so she could get some photographs or film me with her. But I knew what she was doing so I evaded her. Again, I left without my money.

In fact I was afraid too. I know that even now they use intelligence surveillance against people that they suspect are against them. They use phones in that way. They ring someone up and pretend to be someone else so they can get information from that person and record what they have to say. They don’t just do it with Iranians, they do it with westerners too, with human rights workers and government places. It’s not just Iranians. I also discovered that they have plans for ‘accidents’ for people. Right now I am worried. They are capable of anything. They have a widespread network in European countries and they could easily and quite discreetly harm me or my children. I am still afraid of what they could do to me or to my children.

Do you think being linked with the Mojahedin has changed how people view you?

I believe that history will be the judge. We have all made mistakes in our lives, we all have our ups and downs, especially now because Iran’s recent history has been of change and upheaval for many people and we have all had to do our best to cope with this. What I am certain of is that my legacy is my voice and that for years to come people will enjoy my voice and my songs. These belong to Iran and to the world of music. The Mojahedin will also take their place in history regardless of my involvement. I believe history will judge them to be the despicable liars and traitors that I and others know them to be.

Finally, how would you describe the MKO’s appreciation of art?

Art for the Mojahedin is like anything else. If they can exploit it they will do so. It has no other meaning. They use anything and everything for their own aims whether that is people or art. Just as they use and destroy people, they use and destroy art. And, I should add, the artists too.

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Former members of the MEK

Evidence Proves MKO Massacred Kurds

A brief look at Morvarid Operation (memoirs of Hamid Dehdar Hassani, former member of the MKO)

Kill the Kurds to save the life of “The Master”!

In everybody’s lives, there are black points whose remembrances are associated with shame and disturbance. Whether the act is pleasant or painful is up to the views and attitudes of the individuals toward their surrounding world and rules, which govern human relationships. March to September 1991 is bitterest loathsome shameful point in my life.

After a relatively heavy mental process, I was just starting to digest the issue of cooperating with the Iraqi regime that operation “Morvarid” was set before me and other members of the organization (MKO). After Saddam invaded Kuwait (Kuwait Occupation), the US and its allies started heavy bombings in order to retake that country. Amid that war, known as “Gulf War”, Iraqi Kurds who had been suppressed by Saddam regime for years started expressing their opposition to Saddam. The risk of being toppled by revolutionary Kurds threatened Saddam, whose army had lost its power due to Gulf War as well as war with Iran. I never forget that although US planes never bombed MKO bases, Rajavi ordered all members of Ashraf to spread over the hills of Kurdish region of Kefri in order to be safe from bombings. The bitter events started when MKO members were ordered to return to Ashraf Camp.

We were passing the Kurdish township of “Tuz” when we heard the ill-fated voice of Rajavi on radios. “Revolutionary guards and agents of Iranian regime in Kurdish clothes are going to attack MKO members, therefore kill them as soon as you see them” this was his message!

Neither anyone nor I could have thought that there’s something else behind this event. At those anxious hours, no one could think that Rajavi’s order was a show of his faithfulness to Saddam. Saddam (who was called “landlord” by Rajavi) was on the edge of cliff and revolutionary Kurds were taking the control of Iraqi cities, one after another. At that time, the ouster of Saddam meant the full destruction of MKO and according to Rajavi himself (which was expressed later in meetings): “Whether we want or not, our interests and fate are tied to those of Iraqi government.”

On that bitter day, following the order of Massoud Rajavi, MKO members attacked those regions believing that Iranian agents and revolutionary guards (in Kurdish clothes) were hiding in the villages.

A number of minibuses, full of passengers, were set on fire by MKO’s weapons near the city of Kirkuk and Kefri. Women, children and other passengers burnt to ashes in front of us. Rajavi had said that they would kill all MKO members if they’re not stopped, therefore MKO members used cannon fire from a close distance so that the bodies of Kurds were torn into pieces, and they (members) enjoyed seeing such scenes. After Massoud Rajavi, it was the turn of Maryam who shouted on the radio like a vulture:

“Shoot at these (Kurds). Ride your tanks over them”!

Time passed and my anxieties melt down a bit. Then, I, some other members, found that no one was in front of us except Iraqi Kurds, women, children and old defenseless people.

Although I saw a number of Kurd rebels, there was no Iranian Revolutionary Guards. I understood that I was involved in a horrible crime! When I expressed my protest to my commander (Farhad Olfat) and said that Kurds’s issues had nothing to do with us, he shouted on me: “No one fights against Saddam except the Iranian agents! Now we can destroy regime’s social base among Iraq Kurds…” Rajavi and his agents used different explanations to justify this crime but they shamed to say that they had committed this crime because they were Saddam’s serviles. In addition to deployment of forces into Kurdish areas, MKO had established checkpoints across the roads to prove its total officiousness to Saddam. MKO members stopped cars, identified revolutionary Kurds and opponents of Saddam, arrested them and delivered to Iraqi security officers. If someone protested to the activities of MKO, or refused to cooperate with them, he was beaten severely. Recalling these scenes is shocking. MKO arrested a number of Kurd villagers and took them as detainees to Ashraf Camp.

Once, Baathist officers came to receive a number of Kurd detainees. We got them on an IFA trucks and brought them, blindfolded and handcuffed, to the gates of the camp. Mehdi Abrishamchi (a high-ranking official of the organization) climbed the truck and pushed the detainees off the vehicle, using violence. Baathist officers also used maximum violence to take them to Saddam prisons. Mehdi Abrishamchi, wet-nursing , behaved the Kurds like animals.

Many of the MKO members raised questions about such activities, but no one was able to protest. During a meeting, Massoud Rajavi stated insolently: “in a recent meeting with Izzat Ibrahim, he appreciated our efforts and called the MKO the best friend of Iraqi government. He said they’re going to give us new armors and weapons to show their appreciation for the suppression of Kurd rebels.”

Rajavi called “Morvarid” a self-defense but he never explained the reason and logic behind the involvement of MKO in Iraq’s internal affairs and suppression of Saddam opponents. Of course, it was clear that there was no honesty in the explanations of Massoud Rajavi because everyone knew the consequences of Baghdad occupation by Kurds. Rajavi deceived members and said that Iranian revolutionary guards were in Kurdish clothes but soon all members found that there’s not even an Iranian Revolutionary among detainees or the dead. Therefore, Rajavi and his agents talked about “protecting the landlord (Saddam)”. In a meeting after Operation Morvarid, Rajavi said: “in this operation, we wanted to advance toward Tehran, but the master (Saddam) didn’t’ advise it!”

I don’t know what happened to Kurd detainees but after the fall of Saddam Hussein many mass graves-full of the bodies of these Kurds- were found. After Operation Morvarid, Mojahedin-e khalq has always been in fear of being subjected to the anger and revenge of Iraqi Kurds, therefore Rajavi tried to justify his crimes and win the satisfaction of Kurds but Iraqi Kurds or Shiites who had been attacked repeatedly by MKO never accepted it as a revolutionary freedom-seeking force. Some members of MKO were attacked by Kurds in Iraq and even after the fall of Saddam, ordinary Kurds killed a MKO commander (revenging the lives of innocent women and children killed by Mojahedin). It was so difficult for the MKO (after the operation) that they couldn’t go the cities without bodyguards. They asked for Baathists help when they wanted to go shopping in the city. MKO members were armed to teeth when going into cities. People looked at them with anger and hatred. Some Iraqis spat on them and were called “traitors”…

Today, years after massacring Kurds by MKO, memories are still agonizing me. Nightmares of destroyed villages and houses of the Kurds upset me. I can never forget the kids who burnt to ashes in the bosom of their mothers by the fire of MKO.

Indeed, why were they killed?

 

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Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Who is the MEK?(Part two)

Who is the MEK? Why are they protected in Iraq? (Part two)

The War on Terror. The Iraqi occupation. The neoconservative idealist notion of liberating the Middle East. Regime change in Iran. All of the points reach a nexus with the Mujahideen-e Khalq [MEK], an anti-Iranian regime Foreign Terrorist Organization in Iraq with US backing. In this second installment of the series, I cover the Congressional and neoconservative support for the MEK and the MEK’s role as misinformed of Iran’s nuclear weapons program.

Congressional support

"I know about support on Capitol Hill for this group, and I think it’s atrocious," said Dan Brumberg of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "I think it’s due to total ignorance and political manipulation."

In late 2001, Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY) tells the Village Voice, "I don’t give a shit if they are undemocratic. OK, so the [MEK] is a terrorist organization based in Iraq, which is a terrorist state. They are fighting Iran, which is another terrorist state. I say let’s help them fight each other as much as they want. Once they all are destroyed, I can celebrate twice over."

"This group loves the United States. They’re assisting us in the war on terrorism; they’re pro-US," said Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL). "This group has not been fighting against the US. It’s simply not true."…"In no meeting or briefing I have ever attended has anyone called this group an anti-US, terrorist organization," she continued, adding that the group has provided useful intelligence to the US government on Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

"In November [of 2002], Ros-Lehtinen released a letter of support for the MEK that she said had the backing of 150 colleagues, whom she repeatedly refused to identify. Among the 150 signers are reportedly 30 committee and sub-committee members and 35 committee and subcommittee ranking members. "Because of the [Iranian President Mohammed] Khatami’s well-funded campaign on propaganda, lies and misinformation, I have decided not to release the names of these signers."

A month earlier, as Ros-Lehtinen’s letter circulated throughout the House, Reps. Henry Hyde (R-IL) and Tom Lantos (D-CA), also wrote to their colleagues, giving them a "full" and "accurate" picture of the MEK.

"We are strong opponents of the current government of Iran but do not believe that it is necessary to use terrorism or make common cause … [with] Saddam Hussein to change Iran’s government."…"Particularly in view of the fact that the MEK is based in Iraq, has taken part in operations against the Kurds and Shia, has been responsible for killing Americans in Iran, and has supported the takeover of the American Embassy in Tehran, we wanted you to have the full background on this organization as most recently reported by the Department of State, so that you may best decide whether to lend your name to the letter" of support. It further advised, "Some colleagues have signed similar letters in the past and then been embarrassed when confronted with accurate information about the MEK."

Ros-Lehtinen dismissed the US intelligence reports of the group’s involvement in Hussein-led campaigns against Kurds and Shia as "hogwash" and "part of the Khatami propaganda machine." Before the Iraq invasion, Yleem Poblette, staff director for the House Subcommittee on the Middle East and Central Asia and aid to Rep. Ros-Lehtinen, stated, "In the months leading up to the war, we made it very clear that these folks are pro-democracy, anti-fundamentalism, anti-terrorism…They are our friends, not our enemies."

On January 15, 2003, the New York Times ran a full-page ad on page A8 advocating for MEK support. The ad printed six photographs of current Congressional supporters, including Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Tancredo (R-CO), Filner (D-CA), Towns (D-NY), Jackson-Lee (D-TX) and Diaz-Balart (R-FL). Insight on the News reported the MEK had given to former Senator Robert Torricelli (D-NJ) more than $136,000 in hard money and several thousand to Towns and Ros-Lehtinen. Source.

Bob Ney (R-OH), who was once a supporter of MEK, summarized MEK support as anti-Iranian zeal. "I think a lot of people just hear [MEK] folks coming in saying, `We’re for democracy.’ These members [who support the MEK] are American members of Congress. I don’t question their patriotism or their loyalty to the United States. But on this issue, they just aren’t looking at the facts." Ney on MEK’s lobbying access, "We better watch those characters coming into the building. They’re a terrorist group. I do not believe that we need to allow them access to our physical Capitol grounds."

In late April, 2003, Bob Ney wrote a letter to the editor of the The Hill, MEK of same lot as al Al Qaeda and Hamas, in response to a recent full-page ad and letter to the editor from the group:

"In fact, because of the MEK’s long association with and support with Saddam Hussein’s regime, the former Iraqi information minister may very well have been the one who taught the MEK his craft of making false statements in the face of incontrovertible facts." Ney later alleged the reason behind Ros-Lehtinen’s refusal to publish her list of 150 Congressional supporters: "it does not exist." "At one point, it may have; in fact, when MEK representatives first visited my office several years ago, preaching democracy in Iran, I was glad to join them in what appeared to be their effort. However, I quickly discovered that the MEK are not the proponents of democracy they claim to be but are in fact documented terrorists with a history of killing American citizens and supporting Saddam Hussein. Today, no more than a handful of members supports the MEK, and even that number is dwindling."

While the frequency of public comments in favor of the MEK has declined, it is safe to assume that the same ideology which fostered Congressional support for the MEK (a fierce desire to spread democracy to Iran by any means necessary), largely remains among some Congressional hawks.

Just months after Ney’s letter, following the June arrests in France of leader Maryam Rajavi and others as well as the seizure of $1.5 million in MEK funds, members of Congress wrote a letter to President Chirac urging the immediate release of Rajavi and the others. Among the signatures were Reps. William Lacy Clay (D-MI), Dennis Moore (D-KS), Tom Tancredo (R-CO), Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX), and Edolphus Towns (D-NY).

Tom Tancredo (R-CO), always good for a genius soundbyte, stated his support for the MEK because they are an "asset to US intelligence" and "the most reliable source of information for the region." Tancredo’s press secretary, Carlos Espinosa, commented, "Are these guys saints? No…If there’s a problem, it’s that the MEK is on the [FTO] list." Espinosa added that the intelligence the MEK has supplied to America has been `100 percent true.’ "Call them what you want, but they’re not liars." Elsewhere, Tancredo has defended his support of the MEK by comparing Ted Kennedy’s support of the IRA.

In January 2004, the MEK would take part in a fundraiser in `solidarity’ with the `Iranian resistance.’ The American Red Cross, which hosted the event, later refused to accept the funds raised by the event because of its political nature. The US had temporarily lifted a ban on US donations to Iranian organizations in order to increase humanitarian aid. This allowed for the Iranian-American Solidarity Society of Kansas City and the Society of Iranian-American Medical Professionals, both led by MEK member Saeid Sajadi, and the Association of Iranian Women, led by MEK member Behjat Dehghan to sponsor the event. According to the IRS, 17 of the 23 sponsors were MEK front organizations. The event was addressed by neoconservative thinker and Bush advisor Richard Perle, British Labour MP and MEK supporter Win Griffiths and MEK leader and "president-elect" Maryam Rajavi (via satellite link). This appears to be in direct breach of Executive Order 13224 on terrorist financing. Perle later commented that he was under the impression the event was in support of an earthquake in Bam and that the proceeds would go to the Red Cross and was not aware of any ties the fundraiser had to the MEK. Perle also commented that "it did not have the aura of an event with terrorist sponsorship." (The basis of that observation is remains rather puzzling.) FBI agents were also in attendance at the event, reportedly as part of an ongoing investigation. Days later, the Treasury Department froze the assets of the event’s prime organizer.

In 2005, Ed Towns (D-NY) responded to a Human Rights Watch report which cited numerous human rights violations, including torture, beatings and solitary confinement by the MEK on its enemies and internal members who have sought to leave the group.

"It is an outrage to see the Iranian regime is using the American NGP, Human Rights Watch, to politically attack and tarnish the reputation of its main opponent the [MEK]."…"Human Rights Watch should view the MEK as its partner in defense of human rights in Iran not perpetrators. I firmly believe HRW’s report on the MEK published on May 18th will only advance Tehran’s agenda to derail the fight for democracy and human rights in Iran," calling on the group "to retract the report and provide a more factual account of rights violations in Iran."

On April 6, 2005, Tancredo and Rep. Bob Filner (D-CA), co-chaired an Iran Human Rights and Democracy Caucus meeting, with the Iran Policy Committee in attendance as panelists. During the meeting, the caucus and the IPC members agreed on the need to remove the MEK from the FTO list. Among the IPC are neoconservatives Raymond Tanter, Paul E. Vallely (Fox News pundit and advocate for regime change in Iran, North Korea and Syria), and Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney (also a Fox News pundit and advocate for regime change in Iran, North Korea and Syria).

A week following the caucus, the National Convention for a Democratic, Secular Republic in Iran was held, also in Washington. Maryam Rajavi again speaks via satellite. Filner was also in attendance commenting that, "Unless we deal with Iran, there will never be a solution in Iraq." The neoconservatives are even more passionate in their

Neoconservative support

Iranian.com reports:

"Although [MEK] agents have claimed that the inclusion [of MEK as a terrorist organization] was part of Clinton’s appeal to the reformist government in Iran, the argument is no longer cogent in light of the fact that during Bush’s 5 years in office he has yet to remove the [MEK] as a terrorist group despite significant political pressure by various neo-conservatives (this includes Daniel Pipes who currently has a chair with the US Institute of Peace) and Republican representatives."

"Not only were the [MEK] re-designated as a terrorist group under the executive order by Bush on Nov. 2, 2001, but the President used the MEK as an example of Saddam’s support for terrorism during the drive up to the Iraqi war when stating: `Iraqi shelters terrorist groups including the Mujahideen-e Khalq, which has used terrorist violence against Iran and in the 1970s was responsible for killing several US military personnel and US civilians.’"

The Asia Times reports:

"The Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz reported `AIPAC is spurring Congress to pass a sanctions bill against Iran.’ AIPAC is also pressuring the US to support the Iranian MEK (a.k.a. the NCRI) for use against Iran’s mullahs."

Michael Ledeen on the MEK:

"The MEK, an organization I do not admire, but whose information is generally credible on such matters, claimed that more than 50,000 workers participated , from Pakdast and Varamin near Tehran, to Golestan province in the north and Khorassan province in the east [against the Iranian regime]."

(The MEK is notorious for inflating the numbers of protestors and the severity of its military forces in order to create an impression of formidable opposition.)

Douglas Feith, undersecretary for policy at the Department of Defense has argued that since the MEK hasn’t attacked any Americans since the 1970s, it needn’t stay in the FTO list.

The Asia Times’ A Spector of the Iran Contra Affair is Hauting Washington:

"it appears certain elements in the Pentagon leadership, specifically Douglas Feith, are trying to sabotage sensitive talks between Tehran and the State Department to promote cooperation over Al Qaeda and other pressing issues affecting Afghanistan and Iraq. The Pentagon clique thinks Ledeen’s old friend Ghorbanifar can help, according to Newsday, which reported August 8 that two of Feith’s senior aides – without notice to the other agencies – have held several meetings with the Iranian, whom the CIA has long considered "an intelligence fabricator and nuisance."

Daniel Pipes wrote a column on his blog pleading the MEK’s case:

"Is the MEK a terrorist group? No. It used terrorism decades ago, when its members attacked Americans. For the last 15 years, however, the MEK has been organized as an army, and its only violent activities have been directed against the Iranian regime."

…

"Can the MEK be useful? Yes. Western spy agencies are short on "human intelligence" – meaning spies on the ground in Iran, as distinct from eyes in the sky. Coalition military commanders should seek out the MEK for information on the Iranian mullahs’ agents in Iraq. The MEK can also supply key information on development in Iran – where, despite a tendency towards exaggeration, it has had some major scoops. Its information in mid-2002 about Iran’s nuclear program, for example, was better than what the IEAE knew, thereby leading a shocked US government to kick off an investigation that confirmed just how far advanced the Iranians are toward building a nuclear bomb."

…

"Finally, because Iran’s mullahs irrationally fear the MEK (as shown by their 1988 massacre in the jails of Iran of 10,000 long-imprisoned MEK members and supporters), maintaining the MEK as an organized group in separate camps in Iraq offers an excellent way to intimidate and gain leverage in Tehran."

British historian Ali Ansari comments on the MEK, "They are trying desperately to set themselves up as Iran’s equivalent of the Iraqi National Congress. The Iranians will be aware that the Americans are trying to keep them as a potential INC."

"They [want] to make us mercenaries," a MEK official told Newsweek, referring to the US.

Raymond Tanter, writing in response to reports in the Washington Post that Iran was some ten years from nuclear weapons capability, disagreed:

"The intelligence community has not had a good track record regarding Iran. Most of the major nuclear sites that are now known to the outside world and are inspected by the International Atomic Energy Agency, including the uranium enrichment site in Natanz and the heavy water facility in Arak, were revealed by Iran’s main opposition, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)." Tanter compares the IEAE’s findings to a "disinformation program" from the Iranian regime. "If American analysts are using ‘creative analysis’ to make up for lack of current, actionable intelligence from assets on the ground, it would argue for using information from Iranian dissidents to provide ‘lead intelligence,’ information that can be used to verify intelligence obtained from other sources and methods," according to Tanter.

On September 15, 2005, Tanter is set to hold another Iran Policy Committee seminar (he is the co-chair) in support of the MEK. In mid-October, the MEK is up for State Department review of its terrorist status. If the State Department removes the MEK from the list of foreign terrorist organizations, the MEK stands to receive large sums of aid to help them carry out any number of murderous deeds inside Iran in order to overthrow the regime.

Media influence and intelligence supply

Intelligence supply as credibility building

"In August 2002, the group revealed the existence of the Arak heavy water facility and a massive underground uranium enrichment plant at Natanz, both of which Tehran later declared to the IAEA, the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog."

The press conference in question was held in downtown Washington, DC. The NCRI also alleged that the Iranian government was using a front company, the Mesbah Energy Company, to hide unwanted disclosures associated with the project. Iran maintained that its rationale for opening the facilities were strictly for energy purposes, "In the next 20 years, Iran has to produce 6,000 megawatts of electricity by nuclear plants and the launch of these two centers are aimed at producing necessary fuel for these plants," Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi said.

Under IAEA regulations, Iran was not required to notify the watchdog until it had begun "source or special nuclear materials" at Arak or Natanz.

"However, the satellite images of the site put on [the] internet by an American specialized firm a day after confirmed that the information was provided to the group by some Pentagon sources keen to get the [MEK] out of the terrorist list, giving it the image of a group that has reliable sources inside Iran."

(Because if you can help the Americans with intelligence, you’re should no longer be deemed a terrorist.)

Later, a CIA source would comment, "’We had all these information and have reported them to the Administration,’…frustrated at the leak of sensitive intelligence documents to the terrorist group."

"Evidence of these effects can already be seen by [MEK]’s effectiveness in persuading the mass news agencies to publish stories advocating that newly elected President Ahmadinejad was pictured directly involved in the 1979 hostage [taking]."

Counterpunch notes:

"Every few weeks these Chalabi-like, men-in-black characters-and also Fox News commentators-come up with some `top secret satellite photos’ showing non-existent nuclear weapons sites in Iran (how a US-designated terrorist organization gets top secret satellite photos is, of course, beyond anyone’s imagination.)"

CSM reports:

"Some [MEK] tips have led to recent revelations about key aspects of Iran’s clandestine nuclear program, though many others have proven unreliable. Long a diplomatic hot potato, which Tehran has offered to solve by exchanging [MEK] militants for Al Qaeda players now in Tehran, the [MEK] continues to complicate US-Iran-Iraq relations."

(But, as you’ll see later, the neoconservatives refused to give up their grunts.)

In September of 2004, just days before an International Atomic Energy Agency meeting, the National Council of Resistance of Iran held a meeting in London, the NCRI claimed that it had unearthed more information about Tehran nuclear weapons program. They claimed that Iran secretly had a nuclear weapons facility in Bandar Abbas and that it is the "second largest facility for converting uranium to yellow cake. This site has not been disclosed before and it is in its final stage of being fully installed."

Cameron Brown, assistant director of Israel’s Global Research in International Affairs, said she believed the information but warned, "Remember the lousy information that the United States had on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction also came from dissidents."

However, on January 24, 2005, the AP ran a story clearing Iran and dismissing the NCRI’s allegations. "Ali Akbar Salehi, Iran’s former envoy to the Vienna-based IAEA, said Iran had informed the agency in 2003 about the Bandar Abbas facility."

"August 18, 2005 – In a press conference in London, Hossein Abedini of the National Council of Resistance of Iran told reporters that Iran’s Ministry of Defense and Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps had secretly produced the centrifuges on the orders of the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khomeini."

A day later, Reuters ran a story with the NCRI as their source, presumably from the same press conference, claiming that Iranian officials had recently expressed their pleasure with the progress being made at Iran’s heavy water program in Arak. The NCRI claimed that the site could produce plutonium.

On August 20, a former senior member of the MEK told the Iran Press Service:

"All the information that [MEK] provides the western media is pure lies and fabricated to discredit the Iranian regime and help the United States and Israel to put more pressure on Iran."

The article also reports that the MEK simply tells the media "what the CIA feeds them." Later, Mas’oud Khodabandeh, a former senior MEK officer, would confess,

Further:

"Except the information on Natanz and Arak the group disclosed, documents that were given to them by the Americans, all other material the [MEK] gave to the media are open secret, most of them from the Iranian press, like the name of companies and firms that works for the Defense Ministry and are known to the IAEA."

Khodabandeh deserted from the [MEK] and now runs a website, Iran-Interlink.org, which exposes the true face of the MEK, and leads the Association for the Support of Victims of MEK.

The MEK campaign to spread misinformation doesn’t stop at holding press conferences and writing press releases. The MEK has adjusted to the web and hosts Iran Focus, and Iran Terror are MEK-affiliated news sites. In addition, the NCRI has a website, featuring the latest publications of their misinformation and, even, an RSS feed. The blog, Iranian Truth, has more background on MEK’s media affiliates.

In the third and last installment, I’ll focus exclusively on the deal that never was. For several months, the US (backed by the State Department) was vigorously attempting an exchange of captive MEK members in Iraq for five top Al Qaeda members, including Saad bin Laden, the son of Osama bin Laden, and Saif al Adl, intelligence chief. The neoconservatives would ultimately prevail, the deal was dropped, and they kept their pawn.

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Mujahedin Khalq Organization as a terrorist group

Report to Senate Foreign Relations Committee

THE QUEST FOR IRAN’S DEMOCRATIC MOVEMENT.

Testimony for the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

One side of the opposition spectrum is represented by the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO or MEK) which the U.S. State Department designated a "foreign terrorist organization" in 1997. Still identified as a terrorist organization, the MKO also is known as the National Liberation Army of Iran (the militant wing of the MKO), the People’s Mujahedin of Iran, National Council of Resistance, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, and Muslim Iranian Student’s Society (a front organization used to garner financial support). The EU designated the MKO’s military wing as a terrorist organization in May 2002.

The MKO was created in the 1960s and its ideology combines Islam and Marxism. It was involved with anti-U.S. terrorism in the 1970s, and it initially supported the 1978-79 revolution. In June 1981, it staged an unsuccessful uprising against the Islamic regime; many members were imprisoned while others fled the country. The MKO transitioned from being a "mass movement" in 1981 to having "all the main attributes of a cult" by mid-1987, Professor Ervand Abrahamian writes in his 1989 book, Radical Islam: The Iranian Mojahedin. The MKO refers to its head, Masud Rajavi, in religious terms, calling him the rahbar (leader) and imam-i hal (present imam).

From its Iraqi exile the MKO attacked the Iranian regime’s leadership: a 1981 bombing killed President Mohammad-Ali Rajai and Prime Minister Mohammad-Javad Bahonar, in 1992 it attacked 13 Iranian embassies, and it is behind other mortar attacks and assassination attempts in Iran. Former President Saddam Hussein granted the MKO refuge in Iraq, and it helped Saddam Hussein suppress the 1991 uprisings of Shia in southern Iraq and Kurds in the north, so it is not very popular in Iraq. The MKO fought Iranian forces in the Iran-Iraq War, and this has discredited the organization among the Iranian public.

In May 2003, after Operation Iraqi Freedom, the MKO agreed to turn over its weapons to U.S. forces, and over time most of them have been restricted to one location, Camp Ashraf. In July 2004, MKO members in Iraq were granted "protected status" under the Geneva Conventions. The Iranian government has repeatedly offered an amnesty to rank-and-file members if they return to Iran, but the amnesty does not extend to the organization’s leadership. A reluctance to return is understandable: many MKO members who were imprisoned in the early 1980s were tortured into recanting, and for a few months in 1988-1989 thousands of MKO and leftist prisoners were executed. Iranian state media sporadically reports on groups of former MKO members who have returned, but it is not clear how they are treated.

Some U.S. commentators have recommended removing the MKO from the terrorist list and using it as an armed resistance movement against Iran. There also are suggestions that MKO personnel should be cultivated as intelligence assets that might re-energize the reform movement in Iran. It is unlikely that MKO members would be trusted, since some reformists fought MKO personnel in the war, others created the security institutions that hunted them down, and most are part of the current political system. Furthermore, information provided by the MKO, which does not have the same objectives as the U.S., is likely to be self-serving and unreliable. Using MKO personnel as a partisan force is appealing, but association with them will discredit the U.S. in Iranians’ eyes.

In conclusion, there are steps the U.S. can take to hasten Iran’s becoming a democracy. The belief that there is a pre-existing democratic movement or even an effective opposition group, however, is inaccurate. And although most Iranians undoubtedly favor independence and self-determination, assisting individuals rather than organizations without proper planning will be neither efficient nor effective.

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USA

An Open Letter to US President

Mr. George Bush, the President of the United States

At the 4th anniversary of 9/11 events, I’d like to have your attention to the following important notes.

1. As a former member of the Mojahedin-e Khalq, Iranian terrorist group based in Iraq, I have always lived in fear since I’ve left the group; fear from being assassinated or kidnapped by the MKO because I and others left the group in response to its terrorist activities. 9/11 events proved that terrorists are cruel. Since then, we have always felt that we should do something, not only for our own lives but also for the lives of innocent people who’ve been kept there in the MKO and their only fault is that they’re human beings.

Although the 9/11 wasn’t the only day on which the people of the world felt deeply the danger of terrorism, but it was one of the most horrible days. 9/11 proved that terrorism, in its wildest forms, has the capacity to cross the power lines and choose its victims by creating new methods, without being concerned about inhuman consequences of such attacks. Deep fear made by such terrorist attacks is worse than the damage.

9/11 events stressed this fact that the idea of getting to political aims by terrorism, anywhere in world with any justification, only helps its expansion. These attacks once again attracted world’s attention to terrorism and exposed the uniform nature of all terrorists. These attacks and its aftermath directed public attention towards Bin Laden and Taliban (as the most dangerous terrorists).

However, we should not forget that terrorism is not limited to Taliban and Bin Laden. The word “terrorism” reminds Europeans of Afghanistan. They may pass a number of terrorists each day while walking in a park in London or in New York, or while buying books in Ottawa or in Berlin, without knowing that. They barely believe that some of these terrorists are more dangerous than Bin Laden.

These terrorists may not issue “Fatwa” for killing westerners as Bin Laden does; their faces may comply with the standards of developed nations; these acceptable faces may talk about the concepts of freedom, democracy and human rights even more than US and European statesmen but their presence is as hazourdas for human civilization as the presence of Bin Laden.

They may appear in the streets of the cities of the West, under the name of charities for children and hungry people, but the reality is that “terrorism is what terrorism does”.

2. Since 1987, MKO has all major aspects of a cult:

– Lifelong leader who’s called “Imam”

– Strict hierarchy in which the orders come from above and all should obey unquestionably (Stalinist system).

– No one has the right to form family live, except the leader.

– All members should live in ghettos

– The group believes in armed struggle as an ideological principle and it has never quit it.

Such an organization has high potential to eradicate security and democracy in the West. They’re like time bombs, ticking in the Western society, which would explode in the case they’re not defused. The first victims of such an event would be the innocent people of the West. The religious cult of the MKO started with killing US officers in Iran and continued with self-immolations in June 2003 in Europe, showing abhorrent aspect of its ideological abilities. More like a political chantage, these recent shameful acts’ message to the West was that MKO would do anything to get to its goals even if the cost is the elimination of human beings. We can even expect that a member of this organization takes bomb and explodes himself in US or Europe in the near future.

Mr. President,

With the issues mentioned above it’s natural that your respected government- and governments of Canada, Australia and many other Western countries- recognized imminent threat of the MKO and put it on the terror list. This is appreciated and we expect no changes this year in the status of the MKO. We, former members of the MKO, are ready to cooperate on this.

But what has surprised me is practical measures of that government towards the list. According to US law, the properties of the organizations on the list should be confiscated and the activities of the groups should be banned.

MKO has political-financial activities in the US regardless of the law. MKO holds meetings, press conferences and demonstrations in different cities of the US (the last of which was held on November 20, 2004 in Washington). They’re planning for another demonstration on September 14th to protest to Iranian president’s visit to New York.

I ask you as the president of the United States:

1. Isn’t the MKO on your government’s list of terrorist organizations? If yes, then why is it treated with laxity?

2. Why isn’t it banned from political-financial activities?

3. Your security organizations know that the MKO is active under forged and unreal names, don’t they? So, why have you closed your eyes on them?

4. It should be kept in mind as an example that compromising with Taliban and tactic cooperation with that group has had horrible consequences for the people of Afghanistan and then the people of the US.

The fear is that this idea would be spread that the US is going to experience the same disaster, this time by using the MKO.

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The MEK Expulsion from Iraq

Talabani: MKO Should be Expelled

Iraq’s president Jalal Talabani has emphasized the quick expulsion of the members of terrorist MKO from Iraq.

According to IRIB, in a meeting with Iranian charge d’affaires in Baghdad, Mr. Talabani said the MKO was the common enemy of Iran and Iraq, adding that: “We have also suffered from the terrorist crimes of this group. So, Iraqi government is tough in pursuing their expulsion from Iraq.”

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Human Rights Abuse in the MEK

MEK;a terror group;a cult or a source of intelligence ?

‘ font-size: 10pt”>The State Department says MEK is a terror group. Human Rights Watch says it’s a cult. For the White House, MEK is a source of intelligence on Iran.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>May 18 – A controversial exile movement cited by President George W. Bush as a source of information on Iran’s nuclear ambitions is condemned for psychologically and physically abusing its own members in a new report by Human Rights Watch.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>In a document scheduled for public release this week, Human Rights Watch alleges that the Iranian exile group known as Mujahedine Khalq (MEK) has a history of cultlike practices that include forcing members to divorce their spouses and to engage in extended self-criticism sessions.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>More dramatically, the report states, former MEK members told Human Rights Watch that when they protested MEK policies or tried to leave the organization, they were arrested, in some cases violently abused and in other instances imprisoned. Two former recruits told the human-rights group that they were held in solitary confinement for years in a camp operated by MEK in Iraq under the protection of Saddam Hussein. MEK representatives in the United States and France, where MEK is headquartered, did not immediately respond to NEWSWEEK phone calls and an e-mail requesting comment.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>MEK has long been controversial because of its history of violent attacks in Iran, its relationship with Saddam’s regime and its background as a quasi-religious, quasi-Marxist radical resistance group founded in the era of the late Iranian shah. In 1997, the Clinton administration put MEK on the State Department’s list of foreign terrorist groups. MEK’s U.S. supporters, among whom at one point numbered dozens of members of Congress, charged that the Clinton administration only labeled MEK as a terrorist group as part of an ill-conceived attempt to improve relations with the ayatollahs who currently run Iran. However, the Bush administration added two alleged MEK front organizations to the State Department’s terrorist list in 2003.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>Despite the group’s notoriety, Bush himself cited purported intelligence gathered by MEK as evidence of the Iranian regime’s rapidly accelerating nuclear ambitions. At a March 16 press conference, Bush said Iran’s hidden nuclear program had been discovered not because of international inspections but "because a dissident group pointed it out to the world." White House aides acknowledged later that the dissident group cited by the president is the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), one of the MEK front groups added to the State Department list two years ago.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>In an appearance before a House International Relations Subcommittee a year ago, John Bolton, the controversial State Department undersecretary who Bush has nominated to become US ambassador to the United Nations, was questioned by a Congressman sympathetic to MEK about whether it was appropriate for the U.S. government to pay attention to allegations about Iran supplied by the group. Bolton said he believed that MEK "qualifies as a terrorist organization according to our criteria." But he added that he did not think the official label had "prohibited us from getting information from them. And I certainly don’t have any inhibition about getting information about what’s going on in Iran from whatever source we can find that we deem reliable."

‘ font-size: 10pt”>However, current and former senior U.S. national-security officials, who asked not to be named because they are not supposed to talk about intelligence-gathering activities, say that all the major revelations MEK publicly claims to have made regarding nuclear advances in Iran were reported in classified form and from other sources to U.S. policymakers before MEK made them public. A Western diplomat familiar with the work of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations component that has been monitoring Iran’s nuclear program, said that while the MEK has occasionally come up with accurate information about Iran’s nukes, the group has come up with a similar number of other tips that have not checked out.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>According to Human Rights Watch, several members of Congress, including both Republicans and Democrats, only last month attended a Washington meeting of a legal "MKO-backed" group called the National Convention for a Democratic, Secular Republic in Iran. In February, the group says, a think tank co-chaired by retired U.S. military officers called for MEK to be dropped from the State Department terrorist list and recommended that the U.S. government actively support MEK in its campaign to bring down the Iranian theocracy.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>According to administration officials, some Pentagon officials want to recruit former MEK members as U.S. secret agents who would infiltrate Iran on intelligence missions. The Pentagon has emphatically insisted that it has no plans to work with the MEK or any of the group’s members.

‘ font-size: 10pt”> According to the report, MEK, formed in 1965 by three political activists, originally was an "urban guerilla group" which participated in the struggle against the shah that resulted in the 1979 Iranian revolution and produced the current theocratic regime in Tehran.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>In an early schism following the revolution, the MEK and Abolhassan Bani Sadr, briefly Iran’s president during the 1980 U.S. Embassy hostage crisis, split away from the main revolutionary movement led by Ayatollah Khomeini and went into exile. Later, Bani Sadr in turn split from MEK after a disagreement with Massoud Rajavi, who, with his wife, Maryam, subsequently became the movement’s unchallenged leader. During the Iran-Iraq War, Saddam allowed MEK to set up several military camps in Iraq with a headquarters encampment near Baghdad known as Camp Ashraf and the group proceeded to conduct paramilitary operations against the Tehran regime, the largest of which was mounted unsuccessfully shortly after Iran agreed to a U.N.-brokered ceasefire in the Iran-Iraq War. MEK reportedly lost more than 1,000 fighters in this attack.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>According to Human Rights Watch, following this 1988 military defeat, the Rajavi’s leadership of MEK became increasingly authoritarian and cultlike. According to an MEK defector’s memoir, Rajavi claimed to have a mystical relationship with a prophet known as Imam Zaman, who is Shia Islam’s version of the long-awaited Messiah. In order to better cement their relationship with their leader, and hence ultimately their Messiah, Rajavi then instructed his followers to divorce their spouses. The group had already established a practice of "self criticism," under which members were asked to undergo their own personal "ideological revolution" by confessing personal inadequacies in cultlike confession sessions.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>Paranoid about defectors and possible infiltrators from the Tehran regime’s intelligence apparatus, in the l990s, according to Human Rights Watch, MEK leadership ordered a series of stringent "security clearances" in which "many" members were arrested by group organizers and interrogated and even imprisoned in special buildings inside the boundaries of MEK camps in Saddam-ruled Iraq. Human Rights Watch says the testimony of former MEK prisoners paints "a grim picture of how the organization treated its members, particularly those who held dissenting opinions or expressed an intent to leave the organization."

‘ font-size: 10pt”>Witnesses contacted by Human Rights Watch reported two deaths during the course of MEK internal interrogations and other cases of lengthy imprisonment. One MEK detainee interviewed by Human Rights Watch, Mohammad Hussein Sobhani, claimed to have spent eight and a half years in solitary confinement in MEK detention facilities after he started raising questions about the leadership’s policies. He said he was beaten on 11 occasions with wooden sticks and leather belts. Another former MEK member interviewed by Human Rights Watch, Farhad Javaheri-Yar, claimed to have been imprisoned in solitary confinement by the group for five years.

‘ font-size: 10pt”>Other witnesses told Human Rights Watch claimed it was the practice of MEK interrogators to tie thick ropes around prisoners’ necks and drag them along the ground. One witness told investigators: "Sometimes prisoners returned to the cell with extremely swollen necks ”their head and neck as big as a pillow." In a statement accompanying its investigative report, Joe Stork, a Human Rights Watch expert on the Middle East, commented: "The Iranian government has a dreadful record on human rights. But it would be a mistake to promote an opposition group that is responsible for serious human rights abuses.”

‘ font-size: 10pt”>By Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball

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Mujahedin Khalq Organization as a terrorist group

In the Shade of Saddam and Bush

"The police surrounded us. As my weapon jammed, I swallowed the cyanide capsule, but the poison had perhaps expired since it had no effect", remembers Arash Sametipour. The instructions were clear: "That they do not take you alive".

The terrorist, who was then 25 years old, released the safety lock of his last grenade and exploded it. Five years later and after several operations, Sametipour now has an artificial arm, but he is content with being alive and talks of brainwashing by a group that took to him close to death, the Mujahidin-e khalq.

He is not the only one who talks. The disappearance of Saddam Hussein’s regime has led to the discovery of horror hidden behind the walls of this Iranian armed opposition group.

In its report “No Exit”, published in May, Human Rights Watch revealed the abuses and violations of human rights in the camps of this organization during the last two decades. The testimonies gathered by Human Rights Watch in Iran corroborate the descriptions of solitary confinement, forced confessions, execution threats, beatings and torture of those who tried to leave the group.

To Iran’s surprise and disappointment, Iraqi occupation by the US didn’t lead to dismantling of this military group, considered terrorist by Iran, the US and the EU. Members of this group (3,534, according to data gathered last March) remain disarmed in Camp Ashraf (a hundred kilometers to the northeast of Baghdad), since April of 2003.

Washington has granted them the status of “protected people under the Fourth Geneva Convention”. This agreement brought up the distrust of the Iranian regime – which issued a public pardon last year for all members of this group.

Since then, at least 273 militants have returned to Iran. Ali Moradi, 45, is one of them. He has returned to Iran five months ago. "Iraqi captured me as prisoner at the beginning of the war and I spent nine years in their jails", he says. There he was caught by the Mujahidin. "They visited us with very negative information on what happened in Iran and offered us freedom from jail only if we joined them; we were under heavy pressure given the circumstances. Eventually, about 150 of us joined them”, he adds.

Bad years

“Our joining the Organization was immediately made public by them and it made it impossible for us to return to Iran", remembers Moradi, convinced that the 15 years that followed were as bad as the nine previous ones. “I was married and I was in touch with my wife through the Red Cross when I was in jail, but after joining the Mujahidin I could no longer do it. My family thought that I had died and my wife married another man. That isolation was part of the ideological revolution promoted by the leaders of the group.”

"They didn’t let us have feelings towards women, mothers, children, or even to speak about it with friends. We had to write daily reports on the weaknesses of our friends. According to Moradi, there were two meetings of that type: “Current, daily critical meeting which tortured the spirit, and the weekly. In weekly meetings, we were forced to write down our feelings towards the women we had imagined during the week, and we had to talk about it in public, and this is really difficult regarding our Iranian culture”.

Moradi had Marxist ideas and paid for it. “They separated me from the rest and did not let me participate in their meetings and religious ceremonies because the ideology of Mujahidin was based, at least initially, on an interpretation of Islam as a revolutionary message. I felt to be under pressure”.

Finally, five years ago he was expelled from the Organization, and according to HRW’s report, was put into internal jail of the MKO (iskan). “We were 13; a Christian, a member of an ethnic minority, and the rest were all Marxists”.

Without documentation, without contact with the outside world, the only alternative was Abu Ghraib, the notorious Iraqi prison. The most prominent MKO dissidents finished there. They were the first ones to reveal the techniques of brainwashing and arresting dissidents inside the organization. Even the arrival of the US Army couldn’t halt the leaders of the group.

"They neither had arms nor could they maintain the pressure in their prisons, so I requested to leave them; after several meetings – in which they threatened me like a prisoner – one of my friends helped me pass a message to an American officer and explain the situation for him. They transferred me to their camp and I was able to return to Iran with the assistance of the Red Cross.”

Mujahidin-e Khalq was formed 1965 as an anti-Shah group. Nevertheless, after the Islamic revolution, it did not find a place in the new order and continued to fight against the clergymen who led the revolution. A rebellion 1981 ended with its ringleaders in jail and many of its members in exile. They settled in France until 1986, when the French Government started to improve its relations with Tehran and the leadership of the group – controlled by Massoud and Maryam Rajavi – was transferred to Iraq. In the war against Iran which started in 1980, the regime of Saddam provided the group with all types of facilities, including camps and training the military forces.

Since 1988 (when the war ended) their activities were reduced, although they continued to count on the help of Baghdad for infiltration in Iran and attempting to assassinate senior Iranian authorities or official buildings. On the eve of the presidential elections in 2001, several commandos crossed the (Iraqi) border and entered Iran and tried to create chaos and also to prevent the re-election of Mohamed Khatami. For instance, they fired mortars at Police Headquarters in Vozara street. There were no dead, but it angered the authorities.

The Story of Babak Amin

The person in charge of the attacks on Vosarat street, Babak Amin, now 40, has returned to continue his studies in the field of communication that he had left in 80s. "I studied at the University of Vienna and there I made contact with the members of the group (hypocrites); I was looking for an organization which fought to bring democracy and freedom to my country, and this group’s propaganda on Iranian regime’s human rights violation attracted me.” Along with some friends, without informing their families , they went to Iraq. They received two months of military training in Jalilieh Camp in Iraq’s Kurdistan and then became members of the Organization.

The beginning of their work in MKO coincided with the arrival of the Rajavis in Baghdad and the formation of the National Liberation Army, the guerilla army and the military arm of the organization. “Camp Ashraf was established and we began to receive professional military training from Saddam’s Republican Guard", remembers Amin. Then he points to several operations against his country in which he participated, while he adds that heavy military trainings came after the end of the war.

"In 1990, the organization initiated another ideological revolution: “the married members had to divorce; the fiancés had to break up, and all members had to accept the supreme leadership of Rajavi and his wife.

Amin relates these stories while his hands are empty; he lost the best years of his life in a useless persistence. His leaders allowed their members to act as the soldiers of Saddam and during the Iraqi invasion to Kuwait, Mujahidin were sent to Khanequin to suppress the Kurds. As the situation worsened, the Rajavis deepened their ideological revolution. In 1993, the turn came for “the positive discrimination, a step in which the army took the nickname of a character of American novels.

“The military leaders had to yield their posts to women, and thus I became number two in my company”, explains Amin. Amin was also the director of attacking Tehran, which led to his arrest.

In 2000, Maryam Rajavi, new leader of the militants, deployed several operational teams to Iran to foment chaos before the presidential elections of 2001. But military commanders never crossed the Iranian borders. “10 operations directed by me in Tehran were successful. Soon, the arrival of provisions from Iraq came to a halt and we had to interrupt the work. Khatami won the elections and we received orders to return, but the janitor of the house where we lived exposed us”, Amin recalls.

After settling accounts with the Iranian judiciary, Amin has returned to university and counts on the support of his parents to live, although he has resorted to the aid of a psychologist in order to start a normal life.

Moradi is also trying to remake his life in his hometown, Khorramabad. But he’s unemployed. “After 25 years of life, I have nothing except these clothes”.

the young Sametipour, has not forgotten Elham yet, the young daughter of a MKO activist. He had fallen in love with her but he never saw her again after joining MKO Iraqi camps in 1999. Now, he dedicates himself and his time to an NGO [Nejat Society] which supports the families of those MKO militants who have not returned yet.

EL PAIS

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Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Who is the MEK?

Who is the MEK? Why are they protected in Iraq? (Part one)

The War on Terror. The Iraqi occupation. The neoconservative idealist notion of liberating the Middle East. Regime change in Iran. All of the points reach a nexus with the Mujahideen-e Khalq [MEK], an anti-Iranian regime Foreign Terrorist Organization in Iraq with US backing. In this first entry in a three-part series, I explore the history of the MEK and its protection by American forces in Iraq.

Background and history

Origin

The Mujahideen-e Khalq (MEK), also known as the People’s Mujahideen of Iran, are a revolutionary political extremist group that dates back some 40 years. The MEK was founded an anti-Islamist rule organization which has sought a ‘people’s revolution’ in the nation of Iran since its inception in 1965. The founders of the MEK were intellectuals at Tehran University who strongly opposed the rule of the Shah in the 70s, espousing a secular, Marxist ideology. The MEK has a military faction called the National Liberation Army (NLA), and is also affiliated with the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI). In addition to the MEK, the NLA and the NCRI, numerous front organizations are also led by husband-and-wife Massoud and Maryam Rajavi. During the early 70’s, the MEK were responsible for the following assassinations of Americans:

• June 2, 1973: Lt. Colonel Lewis L. Hawkins

• May 21, 1975: Air Force Colonel Paul Schaeffer

– Air Force Lt. Colonel Jack Turner

• August 28, 1976: Donald G. Smith

– Robert R. Krongrad

– William C. Cottrell

The MEK also assisted and endorsed the occupation of the US Embassy in Tehran and hostage taking.

The Flight to Iraq

The MEK played a  role in the 1979 Iranian Revolution . In 1981, the MEK bombed the offices of the Islamic Republic Party, murdering 70 senior Iranian officials. Countless arrests, executions of MEK members and the closure of MEK locations, led the MEK to flee to Iraq in order to enlist in the Iran-Iraq war of the 80’s.  In 1986, the MEK established its permanent headquarters in Iraq, with Saddam Hussein as its main source of funding. The [MEK] was used by Hussein to quell internal uprisings, especially the Shiite and Kurdish uprisings in 1991. “They were worse than the Iraqi army, because they weren’t Iraqs,” said Muhsim Ali Akbar, a Kurdish official in Khanaqin, where the MEK sent tanks. “They didn’t care.”

Iranian perception of the MEK

“Though many Iranians take issue with their clerical rules, [MEK] members are widely seen as traitors, as they fought alongside Iraqi troops against Iran in the 1980s.”

“The message of a dozen former militants interviewed…is that the [MEK] is no longer deemed a critical threat by the Iranian regime.”

Inside Iran and throughout the Middle East, the MEK are known by critics as the Monafeqin (hypocrits), a derogatory reference to Mujahideen.

Shortly before the recent presidential elections, 150 protestors demonstrated outside the governor’s office, waving flags and chanting ‘Death to hypocrites.’ “Based on intelligence we’ve received, a network was trying to create problems before the election,” said Ali Aghamohammadi, spokesman for Iran’s National Security Council. Included in the pre-election disruptions were the bombs that killed eight outside of Iranian government offices. “In Tehran, it’s only the MEK who have the operational power to launch something like this.”

Iranians typically see the contradictory ideals of the MEK and its appeal as more of a cult than an organized, coherent political movement. HRW reports, “The level of devotion expected of members was on stark display in 2003 when the French police arrested Maryam Rajavi in Paris. In protest, ten [MEK] members and sympathizers set themselves on fire in various European cities; two of them subsequently died.”

MEK makes the FTO list

In 1997, the State Department included the MEK on its list of FTOs (foreign terrorist organizations). The EU and the UK have also included the MEK in their FTO lists. To this day, the MEK remains on the US FTO list, despite attempts by Congress and neoconservatives to drop their terrorist status. Anthony Cordesman, former national security advisor and Middle East expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies:

“It’s a group that has attacked and murdered Americans…. But it has always been able to persuade people who don’t know about the region that it is more democratic than it really is.”

Recent activities

Recent attacks

In 1998, the assassination of the director of Iran’s prison system, Asadollah Lajevardi. In 1999, the assassination the deputy chief of staff of Iran’s armed forces, Ali Sayyad Shirazi. More recently, the MEK has carried out a series of mortar attacks and hit-and-run raids against Iranian government buildings in 2000 and 2001, killing the Iranian Chief of Staff. Also in 2000, a mortar attack on President Khatami’s palace in Tehran.

“The notable exception [to recent MEK attacks against the Iranian regime] is the simultaneous attacks conducted by the MEK in April 1992 on Iranian embassies in eleven countries, in retaliation for the bombing of MEK bases in Iraq by the Iranian Air Force just days earlier.”

Arrests & transfers

“Seven Iranians were arrested in 2001 in the US after $400,000 was found to have been transferred to a MEK front organization in the United Arab Emirates, which the FBI claims was ultimately used to buy weapons.”

“Last summer [of 2002], the US State Department outlawed several [MEK]-affiliated groups in the US. In June, France arrested 150 activists, including self-declaring “president-elect” Maryam Rajavi.” More than $1.3 million in MEK funds were seized. President-elect’ Maryam Rajavi remains detained at the MEK’s base in France to this day.

Early depiction in the War on Terror

On September 12, 2002, the Bush administration released its white paper on Iraq. It was similar to his speech to the UN General Assembly on the danger Iraq posed. The only concrete instance of terrorist ties to Iraq was none other than the MEK, “Iraq shelters terrorist groups including the [MEK], which has used terrorist violence against Iran and in the 1970s was responsible for killing several US military personnel and US citizens.”

American protection post-Iraq invasion

“The MEK claimed neutrality in the recent Iraq war, but it in fact took active measures against invading Americans and British forces. As of March 2003, the Mujahideen maintained 16 bases in the southern central and north-central areas of Iraq. Virtually all of these came under attack during the war. The first attack took place on March 28, when RAF warplanes attacked the Habib base, situated 82 kilometers north of Basra. The base was also attacked on the following day and subsequently abandoned by the [MEK]. The Americans bombed the massive Ashraf camp (72 kilometers northeast of Baghdad) more akin to a garrison town serving as the [MEK]’s global headquarters, on March 29. Ashraf was bombed again on April 4, April 12 and April 14.”

Shortly after the airstrikes, the MEK and the US reached a cease-fire agreement. “By one count, after the recent invasion of Iraq, the [MEK] surrendered to US troops 300 tanks, 250 armored personnel carriers, 250 artillery pieces, and 10,000 small arms. Still, the group is reported to be able to continue anti-regime broadcasts into Iran.” The Iraqi army uses some of this equipment to this day.

The MEK has been a central piece in the neoconservative push for regime change in Iran. So central that the administration has refused to turn over members to Iran in exchange for five senior Al Qaeda figures, including Saad bin Laden, the son of Osama bin Laden, and Saif al Adl, intelligence chief. More about this scrapped exchange later.

“Apart from the obvious short-term benefit of securing protection from an armed rebel group allied with the Iraqi regime, the long-term objective of the US Government is believed to have been an attempt to preserve the only major armed opposition to the Iranian regime.”

“On April 15, 2003, the US Army signed a cease-fire permitting the MEK to keep its weapons and use them against Iranian regime infiltrators in Iraq. This deal infuriated the State Department, which then convinced the president to undo it, leading to the strange sight of US troops surrounding MEK camps on May 9, disarming [MEK] fighters and taking up positions to protect them.”

Despite frequent denials of prisoner-of-war status and eligibilty under Geneva Conventions, the US granted the MEK full coverage under the Geneva Conventions. “How is it that [the MEK] get the Geneva Convention, and the people in Guantanamo Bay don’t get it? It’s a huge contradiction,” says Ali Ansari, a British expert on Iran. “This will be interpreted in Iran as another link in the chain of the US determination to move onto Iran next.”

“We already knew that America was not serious in fighting terrorism,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi said, adding that the US had now created a new category of ‘good terrorists.’ “The American resort to the Geneva Conventions to support the terrorist hypocrites is naïve and unacceptable.” On top of protections under the Geneva Convention, the US concluded that “there was no basis to charge any of them with terrorist actions” or past murders.

“But the [MEK]’s fate in unclear. While the Iraqis want it disbanded, the politically-savvy group still has support among some congressmen and Pentagon officials, who see it as a potential tool against Iran.”

August of 2003 brought the closure of MEK-affiliated offices in Washington by the State Department and the freezing of its assets. Before this, Attorney General Ashcroft had been a staunch supporter of the MEK. From October 2001 until mid-August of 2003, Ashcroft made no moves to shut down MEK-affiliated front organizations, despite a widely-publicized MEK lobbying presence in Washington. Earlier in September 2000, Newsweek reports that Ashcroft, as a Senator, sent a letter of support to the MEK which was read aloud to a cheering crowd at a MEK/NCRI rally at the UN during a protest of President Khatami. NRCI spokesman Alireza Jafarzadeh recalls that he “had several meetings with Ashcroft aides” and that he considers Ashcroft “a supporter of his group.” Also in 2000, Ashcroft would write Attorney General Janet Reno, advising her to release Mahnaz Samadi, leading spokesman for the National Council of Resistsance of Iran. Ashcroft wasn’t alone in his support for the MEK. In part two, I’ll cover the widespread support and misinformation rampant among Congressmen and neoconservatives focused on toppling the Iranian regime.

In October of 2003, Secretary of State Colin Powell wrote Defense Secretary Rumsfeld to remind him that the MEK were US ‘captives, not allies.’

In November 13, 2003, Condoleezza Rice clarified the US’ role as protector and regulator of the MEK, “I just want to be very clear that the US remains committed to preventing the MEK, which is now contained in Iraq, from engaging in terrorist activities, including activities in Iran, and its reconstitution inside Iraq as a terrorist organization.”

A month later, Paul Bremer stated, “We want to involve the UN High Commission for Refugees in settling the [MEK] in three countries,” which the Iraqi government would determine. On December 9, the Governing Council ruled to deport the MEK. Two days later, members Nurredin Dara suggested sending them back to Iran, a move the MEK said would amount to a war crime.

Also towards the end of 2003, the Iraqi Governing Council orders the MEK to leave Iraq by the end of the year and end its ‘black history’ in Iraq. Pentagon officials do not want the MEK to disband and keep the MEK in Iraq.

In early 2005, some 250 members of MEK return to Iran from Camp Ashraf under custody, receiving amnesty by the Iranian government. The over 3,500 MEK members that remain in Camp Ashraf call those who leave ‘quitters.’

In June of 2005, Scott Ritter revealed that the MEK had already begun CIA-backed actions against the Iranian regime.  Ritter  points to increased US concentration in Azerbaijan in order to conduct short air strikes and pilot-less drones flying over Iran on recon missions. Iran has, of course, not shot down these crafts so as not to give the US a reason for an attack.

If war with Iran is inevitable due to the pressure of the neoconservative faction, it will begin as a covert war. A covert war that will possibly instigate something much more severe.

In part two, I delve into the stateside support of the MEK. Some members of Congress and many neoconservatives have rallied behind the MEK as a force for toppling the Iran regime. Similarly, I address the role of various MEK front organizations in recent media disinformation campaigns. Lastly, I conclude with the pursued deal with Iran to receive Al Qaeda members for members of MEK.

Daily KOS Website

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Duplicity of the MEK nature

MKO Bribes to Distort Reality

Some MKO defectors recall a common amazing memory: After the US disarmed the MKO and realized that most of MKO members want to leave the Organization, they established a camp near Camp Ashraf and settled defectors-whether those who had escaped MKO or had left it with the assistance of Americans- in that camp. MKO, entangled in a crisis, resorted to dirty tricks to stop members from leaving. For instance, Americans’ interpreter in interviews was a woman called “Paria”. MKO bribed her with gold and jewelry and asked her to change the translation of defectors’ words (that is, to distort the reality) so that Americans open an unreal file for them. Defectors were not aware of this since they didn’t know English. But the time came for a former member who had lived in the US for years and had come to Iraq (MKO) from the US. During the interview, American general (State Department’s interviewer) asked if he was tortured by the MKO. He realized that “Paria” changed his words and said: “MKO treated me very well but I want to go to my own life”! He became angry by this distortion of reality by her and started himself to tell the truth in English. Americans fired her as soon as they found that she was not honest and employed another interpreter called “Fatima” (apparently from Afghanistan). It’s been said that Paria had not even a gold ring when she came but after a while, she wore several bracelets. Even the former members asked her about this. “Ms. Paria! You’re dressed with gold!!!??,” they said to her ironically. Indeed, why the MKO is so much afraid of realities regarding former members, being interpreted? If they have acted according to the criteria of human communities, and if they have observed democratic factors in their organization, why should they bribe an interpreter with gold and jewelry?! Isn’t it that they wanted to prevent the publication of realities?! But, these defectors and former members will finally cry out to the world and Rajavi won’t be able to silence these cries anymore.

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