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MEK and War Agenda in Trump Admin

Trying to Exploit Iran’s Diverse Ethnic Population to Advance a War Agenda

On September 25, during the annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly, United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI)—a pro-Israel, anti-Iran lobby group—held a “summit” in New York that was attended by, among others, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Israeli ambassador to the U.S. Ron Dermer, and Sigal Mandelker, the outgoing Under Secretary of Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, as well as diplomats from Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. As usual, tough rhetoric was uttered by all the speakers, and threats were made.

The day before the summit, another meeting was held that had allegedly been organized by Mark Wallace, the CEO of UANI, although it is widely believed that UANI was behind the meeting. The participants in the meeting were supposedly representatives of various Iranian opposition groups in exile, as well as ethnic secessionist groups. The meeting was, however, dominated by the Mojahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), a group that until 2011 was listed by the U.S. State Department as a terrorist organization and is despised by all Iranians due to its alliance with the regime of Saddam Hussein during the Iran-Iraq War and other acts viewed by virtually all Iranians as treason. Also present were the National Council of Resistance of Iran, MEK’s political arm, and the Organization of Iranian American Communities, another MEK front group. A fourth group, the U.S. Foundation for Liberty and Human Rights, appears to be linked with MEK, as the content of its website uses the same rhetoric as the MEK. Representatives of six ethnic groups also attended the meeting, none of which has any significant support inside Iran as best one can tell.

One of the groups participating in the gathering was the Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Ahwaz (ASMLA). Ahwaz, or Ahvaz, is the provincial capital of Khuzestan, the oil-rich province in southwestern Iran near the border with Iraq. ASMLA claims to represent the minority Iranian Arabs in Khuzestan who are supposedly suppressed by Tehran. The group, founded in 1999, has carried out several terrorist attacks in Iran over the past fifteen years, including in January 2006, in May 2015, in June 2016, in January 2017, and in October 2018.

“This is the first time in history, since the Iranian revolution in 1978 and 1979, that such a broad cross-section of the leaders and delegates from Iranian dissident … groups have gathered in a convention for Iran’s future.” Wallace boasted despite the fact that those same “leaders” are either little known or are virtually universally despised in Iran.

This is not the first time that the U.S. far right has tried to exploit Iran’s diverse ethnic population in order to stir trouble in the country and advance its anti-Iran agenda. In fact, this practice has a long history that goes back to practically the 1979 revolution and the hostage crisis of 1979-1981. Since April 1980, when Washington cut diplomatic relations with Iran, successive U.S. administrations and the U.S. far right have seen exploiting ethnic grievances in Iran as a key route toward destabilizing the country.

The Clinton administration imposed a package of sanctions against Iran in 1996 that the Bush administration renewed in 2001 and again, indefinitely, in 2006. After preventing the European trio of Britain, France, and Germany from reaching an agreement with Iran over its nuclear program in summer of 2005, the Bush administration launched its efforts to exploit Iran’s ethnic minorities and the dissident groups that supposedly represent them, in order to either break up Iran into multiple weak states, or, at the very least, to stir up trouble and destabilize the country.

That strategy has a long history in the Middle East. Washington, for example—acting at the behest of the Shah of Iran—backed a Kurdish insurgency in Iraq until 1975. It has been best exemplified in the ways in which Israel has applied it to some of its Arab neighbors. In February 1982, three months before Israel invaded Lebanon in support of the Christian Falange militia, the Likud strategist Oded Yinon published an article [in Hebrew, whose translation was published by Israel Shahak, the Israeli academic and civil-rights advocate] in which he called on Israel’s leadership to adopt a policy of fragmenting the Arab world into a mosaic of ethnic and confessional groupings. “Every kind of inter-Arab confrontation would prove to be advantageous to Israel,” he argued, urging that Israel must reconfigure its geo-political environment through the Balkanization of the surrounding Arab states into smaller and weaker states.

Building on Yinon’s analysis ten years later, neoconservative historian Bernard Lewis—who would become a key informal adviser to Vice President Dick Cheney in the run-up and immediate aftermath of the U.S. invasion of Iraq—wrote in an essay in the journal Foreign Affairs:

Another possibility, which could even be precipitated by [Islamic] fundamentalism, is what as of late has become fashionable to call ‘Lebanonization.’ Most of the states of the Middle East – Egypt is an obvious exception – are of recent and artificial construction and are vulnerable to such a process. If the central power is sufficiently weakened, there is no real civil society to hold the polity together, no real sense of common national identity or overriding allegiance to the nation-state. The state then disintegrates – as happened in Lebanon – into a chaos of squabbling, feuding, fighting sects, tribes, regions and parties. If things go badly and central governments falter and collapse, the same could happen, not only in the countries of the existing Middle East, but also in the newly independent Soviet republics…

In their infamous “A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm,” the policy document written in 1996 for Benjamin Netanyahu, the then-newly elected Prime Minister of Israel, Richard Perle et al. suggested that Israel should “work closely with Turkey and Jordan to contain, destabilize, and roll-back some of its most dangerous threats [meaning Iran and Iraq].” David Wurmser, one of the authors of the same report who served on Cheney’s national security staff from 2003 to 2007, went further, writing in a lengthier report that Syria and Iraq could easily fragment into separate ethno-sectarian segments, “a development that would enhance the security of Israel and the West.”

These ideas were clearly picked up by the Bush administration and later applied to Iran. “In the past six months, Israel and the United States have also been working together in support of a Kurdish resistance group known as the Party for Free Life in Kurdistan [known as PJAK or PEJAK],” Seymour Hersh reported in November 2006. “The group has been conducting clandestine cross-border forays into Iran, I was told by a government consultant with close ties to the Pentagon civilian leadership, as `part of an effort to explore alternative means of applying pressure on Iran.’”

In February 2007, the Telegraph of London reported that:

CIA officials are understood to be helping opposition militias among the numerous ethnic minority groups clustered in Iran’s border regions. In the past year there has been a wave of unrest in ethnic minority border areas of Iran, with bombing and assassination campaigns against soldiers and government officials… Funding for their separatist causes comes directly from the CIA’s classified budget but is now ‘no great secret,’ according to one former high-ranking CIA official in Washington.

In the same month, Cheney himself traveled to Pakistan and met with its then-president, General Pervez Musharraf. Pakistani government sources said at the time that the secret campaign against Iran by Jundullah was on the agenda when the two met. Jundallah was a Baluch terrorist group that for years staged terrorist attacks in Iran from its bases in Pakistan. In an interview later that month, Cheney referred to the Jundallah terrorists as “guerrillas” in an apparent effort to lend them legitimacy.

In April 2007, ABC News reported that, according to Pakistani and U.S. intelligence officials, Jundallah had been secretly encouraged and advised by U.S. officials since 2005.

In an interview with National Public Radio in June 2008, Hersh explained how the Bush Administration’s policy of “my enemy’s enemy is my friend” led it to support Jundallah and MEK. The next month, Hersh quoted Robert Baer, a former CIA clandestine officer who had worked for nearly two decades in South Asia and the Middle East, as saying, “The Baluchis [a small ethnic minority group residing in Iran’s and Pakistan’s provinces of Baluchistan] are Sunni fundamentalists who hate the regime in Tehran, but you can also describe them as Al Qaeda. These are guys who cut off the heads of nonbelievers—in this case, it’s Shiite Iranians. The irony is that we’re once again working with Sunni fundamentalists, just as we did in Afghanistan in the nineteen-eighties.” Baer repeated those assertions in the fall of 2008 at a symposium co-organized by this author on U.S.-Iran relations at the University of Southern California.

In the same article, Hersh also stated that the MEK received arms and intelligence, directly or indirectly, from the U.S., and that PJAK, “which has also been reported to be covertly supported by the United States,” operated against Iran from bases in northern Iraq for at least three years. PJAK used Iraqi Kurdistan as its base to carry out multiple raids into Iran that killed many civilians, as well as soldiers and policemen. At the time, the Bush administration denied helping PJAK, despite the fact that the group’s chief, Rahman Haj-Ahmadi, had traveled to Washington around the same time, reportedly to gain financial and military support for his militia. In 2009, the Obama administration declared PJAK a terrorist organization.

PJAK is still active in the border area between Iran, Turkey, and Iraq. When in December of 2017 there were scattered demonstrations in several Iranian cities against the terrible state of the Iranian economy, PJAK issued a statement asking people to rise up. It carried out terrorist attacks inside Iran on 27 July 2019 that killed and injured scores of people.

In December 2009, Selig Harrison reported in the New York Times that the Bush administration had provided support to Jundallah, as well some Kurdish groups operating in western Iran. According to his report, that assistance was sent through Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency, while the Kurdish groups received their support through Israel’s Mossad.

The Bush administration was not the only one that was trying to exploit the dissatisfaction of some of Iran’s ethnic groups to destabilize the country. Israel and Saudi Arabia were also participants. In January 2012, Mark Perry reported how Mossad agents, using U.S. passports and posing as CIA agents, tried to recruit members of Jundallah to fight their covert war against Iran.

Jundallah’s leader, Abdolmajid Rigi, was captured by Iran’s security forces and executed in June 2010. The Obama administration put Jundallah on the terrorist list in November 2010. The group then split into Pakistani and Iranian branches. The former attacks Shiites in Pakistan, while the Iranian branch, known as Jaish ul-Adl, continues to carry out terrorist attacks and kidnappings in Sistan and Baluchistan province in southeastern Iran, near the border with Pakistan. It is widely believed in Iran that Jaish ul-Adl is supported by Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates.

The Kurds and Baluchis are not the only ethnic groups that the Bush administration and its allies tried to exploit. In a July 2008 article, Hersh also mentioned possible U.S. support for separatists in Khuzestan province. As already pointed out, over the past 15 years, Iranian-Arab separatists have carried out bombing and terrorist attacks in Khuzestan, the latest of which took place in October 2018, when they attacked during a military parade. An armed group, Ahvaziya, claimed responsibility for the attacks. Ahvaziya is part of the ASMLA group that participated in the Washington meeting of Iranian separatist groups.

Iran has accused Saudi Arabia of funding, arming and training the group. After the attacks, Abdulkhalegh Abdulla, a former adviser to the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, wrote in a tweet that the attack was not terrorism because it was against Iran’s military, and that the attacks were part of what Mohammad bin Salman, the crown prince and de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, had threatened in May 2017, namely, that Saudi Arabia is “not waiting until there becomes a battle in Saudi Arabia,” and so it “will work so that it becomes a battle for them in Iran.” His tweet created deep anger in Iran.

As the author recently reported, the Trump administration has decided to continue what the Bush administration began. Before he was appointed as Trump’s national security adviser, in his “manifesto” for getting the U.S. out of the nuclear agreement with Iran, John Bolton advocated U.S. support “for Kurdish national aspirations, including Kurds in Iran” and providing “assistance to Balochis, Khuzestan Arabs, Kurds, and others…” After his appointment, Bolton, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and Brian Hook—who is the State Department’s Special Representative for Iran and directs its “Iran Action Group”—met with some of the leaders of Iran’s Kurdish groups. Last June, Abdullah Mohtadi and Mustafa Hijri—who lead, respectively, the Iranian Communist Kurdish group Komala and the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran [KDPI]—travelled to Washington, with Mohtadi reportedly meeting with Pompeo and Hijri meeting with State Department officials. Komala’s office in Washington has registered with the Justice Department as a lobbying group to “establish solid and durable relations” with the Trump administration.

Both groups have carried out terrorist attacks inside Iran, and, under the guise of calling for a federal system, both have separatist tendencies. The separatist nature of the KDPI became clear when, back in 2012, Hijri asked the U.S. to declare Iran’s Kurdistan province a “no-fly zone,” so that his forces could attack government forces freely and eventually secede from Iran. Hijri has also called for “regime change” in Iran, and has declared the Islamic Republic “a common enemy” of the Kurds and Israel, asking the Jewish state for support.

The attempt by UANI, a group that reportedly receives a lot of its funding from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, to provoke ethnic strife in Iran may well lead to more bloodshed, but it will likely ultimately fail. Iranians of diverse backgrounds have lived together side-by-side and have preserved their nation for thousands of years. Iran’s true opposition inside the country—the reformists, religious-nationalists, secular leftists, labor groups, human rights activists, and others—and its supporters in the diaspora reject discrimination against minorities, ethnic tensions, economic sanctions, military threats, and foreign intervention. In the democratic Iran that the true opposition will eventually achieve, all Iranians, regardless of their ethnicity, religion, or gender, will be equal.

Muhammad Sahimi is a Professor at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.

October 21, 2019 0 comments

Iran Interlink Weekly Digest

Iran Interlink Weekly Digest – 262

++ There have been several pieces in Farsi about the Giuliani affair and how after already losing John Bolton the MEK are now in a panic over losing Giuliani too.

++ An article answers Maryam Rajavi’s statement declaring that she is against the Turkish actions in Syria and is supporting the Kurds. This article points out that Rajavi killed more Kurds than anyone. That’s the reason the Kurdish council boycotted the UANI session in New York when you were invited. Other commentary points out that Rajavi enters into everything like a mosquito, except the real issues she needs to answer for and which she hasn’t answered for three decades – the families, supporting Saddam, internal abuses, etc. Every now and then the MEK make it clear they are proud mercenaries for any issue, but then they also claim all they are about is rescuing Iran. This is why even while talking about the Turkish actions in Syria, the MEK’s announcement is announcement is 80% swearing against Iran as though Iran is responsible for this.

++ Another example of this mercenary approach is that MEK appear to believe some executions are good executions while some executions are bad. One article in particular lists all the executions committed by the MEK themselves; from killing Americans in Iran, the executions of Kurds in Iraq, right up to recent executions in Albania like Malik Sharai. It notes that the MEK was silent about all the executions by Saddam. And how in all the past four decades they have not dared to mention the barbaric executions in Saudi Arabia. As if those are OK.

In English:

++ City News, Albania reported that journalist Gjergji Thanasi has sued MEK enforcer Behzad Saffari Dehkord for defamation. Saffari has several times labelled Thanasi ‘an agent of the Iranian regime’ – the standard epithet applied to all of MEK’s critics. But perhaps when your terrorist cult has been foisted on a small, struggling country and is intolerable to every citizen except those paid by the MEK or the US, such behaviour needs to be brought to book. The MEK sent one of Albania’s highest paid lawyers to the first hearing, but Saffari will be obliged to attend the next hearing in person.

++ Mazda Parsi, Nejat Bloggers, refers to the book ‘Gullible Superpower: U.S. Support For Bogus Foreign Democratic Movements’ by Ted Carpenter of the Cato Institute and reviews the chapter on the MEK. Parsi says that advocacy for the MEK is not limited to the U.S. and Israel but includes Saudi Arabia and now Albania. According to Reza Alghurabi of the Herald Tribune, Albania’s support was bought by the U.S. which paid $25m to the government and $20m to the UNHCR. The MEK has also generously paid “hefty sums of money for a ten-minute speech on behalf of the group”. Such payments have corrupted Albania’s approach to Iran. “In exchange the Albanian authorities serve them with hostile acts towards Iran”, says Parsi. However, no matter how much the MEK’s advocates try to pretend that the Iranian people do not loathe the MEK, this is an established fact.

++ A piece in the Tehran Times reviews the work of Iranian filmmaker Mohammad-Hossein Mahdavian. Mahdavian has made two films about the MEK’s history in Iran, Trace of Blood and The Midday Event. “The stories of “The Midday Event” and “Trace of Blood” were set in the 1980s when Mahdavian and Ebrahim Amini, with whom he co-wrote the screenplays for the films, were only children. However, in an interview with Mahdavian, veteran critic Hushang Golmakani, who works for the Persian monthly Film, called the details of the sets and dialogues of “Trace of Blood” perfect. ‘The film has the potential to be biased, but it has maintained its balance. The film has very good dialogues and perfect ending’, Golmakani noted. It appears that a perfect filmmaker who is genuinely skilled in transforming real political narratives into films has emerged.”

++ MEK advocate Rudi Giuliani was in the spotlight this week with several articles mentioning the MEK as one of many foreign groups who have paid him handsomely for his advocacy. In relation to the MEK, Politico reported that “Giuliani has claimed he’s only working ‘as a private citizen—thank God I can still do that’.” NBC News ran a lengthy detailed examination of Giuliani and other high-profile figures who have been happy to shill for the MEK over many years without registering as lobbyists for a foreign group. This may or may not be the beginning of Giuliani’s downfall. But it certainly is another nail in the coffin of the MEK.

++ Muhammad Sahimi in Lobelog describes UANI sponsored gatherings of so-called Iranian opposition groups as the U.S. far right’s efforts “ to exploit Iran’s diverse ethnic population in order to stir trouble in the country and advance its anti-Iran agenda”. Sahimi details the background of these groups and concludes: “The attempt by UANI, a group that reportedly receives a lot of its funding from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, to provoke ethnic strife in Iran may well lead to more bloodshed, but it will likely ultimately fail. Iranians of diverse backgrounds have lived together side-by-side and have preserved their nation for thousands of years. Iran’s true opposition inside the country—the reformists, religious-nationalists, secular leftists, labor groups, human rights activists, and others—and its supporters in the diaspora reject discrimination against minorities, ethnic tensions, economic sanctions, military threats, and foreign intervention. In the democratic Iran that the true opposition will eventually achieve, all Iranians, regardless of their ethnicity, religion, or gender, will be equal.”
October 18, 2019

October 21, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq as an Opposition Group

Trace of Blood

A Film About MEK History

Filmmaker emerges to bring dramas from Iran political history to life

“I was born during the war, which had lasted for so long that I thought that it would be forever and would never end. When I heard people talking about the frontline I imagined it was a geographical location like a sea or a forest near the borderlines of each country where the war took place. We were in our childhood, experiencing a certain way of life. We chanted slogans in the schools and talked about certain issues and heard about subjects from the media that deeply influenced our hearts and minds. Today, the experiences of those years caused me to be interested in returning to those years with new feelings and perceptions, which come from awareness, and I want to recollect the memories of those years again.”

Mohammad-Hossein Mahdavian made the remarks during the Fajr Film Festival in Tehran in February after the premiere of his latest political thriller, “Trace of Blood”, which is currently on screen at Iranian theaters.

Perhaps nobody imagined that a filmmaker of political thrillers was being born in the new wave of Iranian cinema in 2016 when Mahdavian made his debut feature “Standing in the Dust” at 34.

The film recounted the life story of Ahmad Motevasselian, an IRGC commander who was kidnapped by the Zionist regime in 1982 in Lebanon.

The choice of subject matter was viewed by critics as an easy and clever way for the newcomer to obtain approval for the film from Iranian cultural officials.

At the time, the film was produced at the Owj Arts and Media Organization, a Tehran-based institution that produces revolutionary works in art and cinema. Nowadays, the projects that the organization supports no longer face burdensome bureaucratic hurdles imposed by the state.

“‘Standing in the Dust’ was the most customized movie I have ever made, and was my most popular film and also received critics acclaim,” Mahdavian told the Persian daily Sharq after the premiere of “Trace of Blood”.

“‘Lottery’ was my most independently produced film, but it failed to satisfy the critics,” he added.

A year later, Mahdavian’s second movie, “The Midday Event” on the terrorist activities of the Mojahedin-e-Khalq Organization (MKO) in Iran in the 1980s, demonstrated his passion for factual political stories taken from modern Iranian history.

In this film, the new government, after toppling the Shah in 1979, assembles a security group to fight against MKO’s terrorist attacks in 1982.

His third film, “Lottery” about trafficking Iranian women to the United Arab Emirates was viewed as regressive by critics.

“I have the courage to make a film and accept the negative reviews. But what urges me to continue on this path is the people for whom I make the films,” he noted.

“Trace of Blood”, also known as “Blood Trap”, is a sequel to “The Midday Event”. In this film, Iranian security forces come together in 1988 to trace the MKO’s undercover agents, which had penetrated the security forces in 1982. They also want to foil Operation Eternal Light, which the MKO carried out against Iran with the full support of the Iraqi dictator, Saddam.

The stories of “The Midday Event” and “Trace of Blood” were set in the 1980s when Mahdavian and Ebrahim Amini, with whom he co-wrote the screenplays for the films, were only children.

However, in an interview with Mahdavian, veteran critic Hushang Golmakani, who works for the Persian monthly Film, called the details of the sets and dialogues of “Trace of Blood” perfect.

“The film has the potential to be biased, but it has maintained its balance. The film has very good dialogues and perfect ending,” Golmakani noted.

It appears that a perfect filmmaker who is genuinely skilled in transforming real political narratives into films has emerged. However, he wants to try his hand at other genres.

“There is no time to lose; life is too short and I haven’t made a lot of films. Certainly, I will try other genres—I don’t know when—but I want to try something different,” he said.

“If I find a different story appropriate enough to be turned into a film, of course I will make it. Once, I even wanted to make a film for children, because whenever we intend to take our children to the cinema, we can’t find films entertaining enough for children,” he added.

The social theme of the story in “Lottery” from his short but brilliant career reflected a shift. Centering on topics such as sex trafficking rings in Iran is a bit much for this cinema. His camera should be focused on major stories such as the Iran hostage crisis in 1979, which has been distorted by numerous biased movies from Iranian and foreign filmmakers, including Ben Affleck’s 2012 movie “Argo”.

Mahdavian seems to go his own way in filmmaking. He is clever enough to avoid joining specific currents, which tend to categorize everything by the rules of politics. His avoidance of these trends should help prevent him from being tagged as a governmental filmmaker.
By Seyyed Mostafa Mousavi Sabet

October 21, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Paid speeches, MEK Terrorists, Legal woes

Giuliani’s work for Iranian group with bloody past could lead to more legal woes

Giuliani ally Michael Mukasey’s move to register as a lobbyist for an Iranian dissident group may spur the DOJ to investigate, experts say.

In the spring of 2017, former U.S. attorney general Michael Mukasey met with representatives of the Iranian dissident group Mujahedeen e-Khalq (MEK), a State Department-designated foreign terrorist organization until 2012.

Mukasey wasn’t alone. Joining him at the meeting was another high-profile American political figure: Rudy Giuliani.

For nearly a decade, the former law partners have pushed the agenda of the MEK, giving paid speeches and writing newspaper op-eds expressing support for a group linked to the deaths of six Americans in the 1970s.

But it wasn’t until late last month that Mukasey registered as a foreign agent lobbying pro bono for MEK’s political arm. Giuliani still hasn’t, raising the possibility that the Justice Department could target him in an illegal lobbying probe, experts say.

“This is the kind of scenario that very commonly leads them to launch an investigation,” said Josh Rosenstein, a Washington-based lawyer who advises clients on compliance with federal lobbying laws.

If Giuliani and Mukasey were”working together or in parallel,”Rosenstein added,”then it’s a huge problem for Giuliani.”

Mukasey’s move to register as a lobbyist for the MEK’s political affiliate comes as Giuliani, the former New York City mayor-turned-personal lawyer to President Donald Trump, is facing growing legal peril connected to his international business activities.

Giuliani’s overseas dealings, primarily in Ukraine, are under fresh scrutiny after two of his associates were charged last week in a scheme to funnel foreign money to U.S. politicians.

The New York Times has reported that Giuliani’s business dealings are under federal investigation and prosecutors may be looking at his exposure for failing to file as a foreign agent.

Legal experts say Giuliani’s work on behalf of the MEK and its political arm, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, also raises questions about whether he may have run afoul of the Foreign Agents Registration Act, or FARA. The law requires American citizens to disclose to the Justice Department any lobbying or public relations work on behalf of a foreign entity, regardless of whether they’re paid for the representation.

A review of the group’s government filings shows that Giuliani met with MEK officials at least once every year since 2014. A range of issues were discussed, including “Iran’s nuclear weapons as well as Iran’s terrorism in the region, including Iraq and Syria” in 2014, the plight of Iranian dissidents living in Iraq in 2015, and the protests in Iran in 2018.
During that period, he has appeared at MEK-related events in Poland, Albania, Paris and Washington. FARA experts say Giuliani’s speech in Washington in May 2018 and U.S.-based writings in support of the group are particularly problematic.

“This certainly walks like a FARA issue and talks like a FARA issue,” said Matthew Sanderson, a defense lawyer who specializes in foreign lobbying cases.

He said the Justice Department will likely try to “develop facts to determine whether these efforts to influence public opinion in the U.S. were at the request or direction of MEK, a foreign interest.”

“This is a particularly unusual situation because Mr. Giuliani was acting as the president’s counsel, all while acting in ways that suggest he was simultaneously representing certain foreign interests,” Sanderson said.

In an interview with NBC News, Giuliani said he has no reason to register as a foreign agent because, unlike Mukasey, he’s not planning to speak to U.S. government officials about the MEK.

“I’m not doing what he’s doing,”Giuliani said.”He’s not registering for any previous activity. He’s registering because he’s asking for a specific meeting with the government.”

Giuliani would not elaborate on the reason for the meeting. Mukasey declined comment.

Representatives for the group’s political arm did not return requests for comment.

Formed in the 1960s as a Marxist-Islamist movement, the MEK has a bloody history.

The group, whose name translates as “People’s Holy Warriors of Iran,” is accused of killing six Americans before the 1979 Iranian revolution and assassinating Iranian diplomats in the subsequent years.

A longtime ally of the Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, the MEK was placed on the State Department’s terror blacklist in 1997. The group enlisted an A-list cast of former American political and law enforcement leaders as part of its effort to remove itself from the terrorist list and enhance its reputation in the West.

The strategy worked. In 2012, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced a decision to remove the group from the list.

Daniel Benjamin, a State Department counterterrorism coordinator from 2009 to 2012, has focused extensively on the network of American politicians who have been paid by MEK, including Giuliani and Mukasey.

“I found it pretty distasteful that they were shilling for this group even if it was delisted,” said Benjamin, now a professor at Dartmouth College. “This is a group that has American blood on its hands, and it’s never owned up to that.”

Benjamin said the group has long attracted anti-Iran hard-liners who recruit like-minded peers.

“Look at those who have gone on their gravy train and then go to their events and say MEK is going to bring democracy and peace to Iran,” Benjamin said. “Basically these guys bring aboard their pals. Especially among the hardest line anti-Iran folks, this is the place to go. Though plenty of people become much more hard line once their pockets are filled with MEK money.”

“The big question,” Benjamin added,”is where does all this money come from?”

Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran expert with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, described the organization as a fringe group with mysterious benefactors that garners scant support in its home country.

“Their population in Iran hovers between negligible and nill,” Sadjadpour said.
Still, the MEK’s roster of supporters includes an array of prominent Americans: former FBI Director Louis Freeh; former Democratic governors and presidential candidates Howard Dean and Bill Richardson; Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton; and former Obama national security adviser James L. Jones.

In speeches and media interviews, Giuliani and the others have insisted the MEK is now a democratic-minded opposition group committed to overturning the mullah-led government in Tehran. They say their support for the group is also based on humanitarian motives — to ensure the safety of the Iranian dissidents living in Iraq who face the threat of attacks.

Giuliani’s MEK advocacy dates to at least 2010. In December of that year, he and Mukasey were among a group of prominent Republicans who traveled to a rally in Paris where they called on the Obama administration to remove MEK from the U.S. list of foreign terrorist organizations.

“For your organization to be described as a terrorist organization is just really a disgrace,” Giuliani declared before a crowd of Iranian exiles, according to an article in The Washington Post.

Mukasey urged the White House to offer “all possible technical and covert support to those fighting to end oppression in Iran.”

“What it has done and what it is doing is nothing less than an embarrassment,” he told the crowd, according to The Post.

The following year, Giuliani and Mukasey co-wrote an op-ed in the National Review with two other MEK supporters defending the organization.

In the 2011 piece, headlined “MEK is not a terrorist group,”Giuliani and the others argued against suggestions that the authors were providing material support to a terror group. The MEK has”provided valuable intelligence to the United States to Iranian nuclear plans,”they wrote.

In his FARA filing, dated Sept. 26, Mukasey wrote that he’s not being compensated for his MEK advocacy.

“The registrant has agreed to communicate with executive branch and legislative officials in the United States government on behalf of the foreign principal and its members on an unpaid basis,”the filing says.”However, the foreign principal will reimburse the registrant for direct expenses such as filing costs and travel.”

The filing lists Sept. 20, 2019, as the date of the agreement with MEK.

Sanderson, the defense lawyer who focuses on government lobbying, said the listing of that date could pose problems for Mukasey if he started doing lobbying work for MEK before then.

“Filing a late registration, especially if you’re not accurate in your description, could result in charges,”Sanderson said.

But Sanderson added that filing late is still better than not filing at all.”If you approach the government and proactively say, ‘I’m registering,’ even if it’s late, you’re in a much better position than if the government comes to your door.”

Giuliani would not say how much the group pays him for his appearances. He said there’s no reason why the Justice Department would target him for activities that dozens of other former U.S. politicians and military figures are participating in.

“If I have to register, so do three former heads of the joint chiefs of staff and eight very prominent Democrats and eight very prominent Republicans,”Giuliani said.

In an interview with NBC News’ Andrea Mitchell in Poland this past February, Giuliani said he worked to get the MEK off the terror list because”there was no evidence of any kind of terrorist activity for over 20 years, if any, and they were basically revolutionaries who overthrew the shah.”

“They believe in democracy, in human rights, rights of women,”said Giuliani, who was appearing at an MEK event.

In the interview, he also defending advocating for the MEK while also working as the president’s personal lawyer.

“I’m a private lawyer, so private lawyers have private clients,”Giuliani said.”This has been a client of mine for years. Maybe if I was taking a new position. Maybe if i was taking a bold new different position. I’m just repeating what I said 11 years ago, 10 years ago.”

Mukasey told The New York Times in 2011 that he had been paid his standard speaking fee — $15,000 to $20,000, according to the Web site of his speakers’ agency — to deliver talks at MEK-related events.

He insisted that his decision to advocate on behalf of the group was not driven by money.”There’s no way I would compromise my standing by expressing views I don’t believe in,”Mukasey told The Times.

Federal prosecutors have brought few FARA cases over the years. But the law garnered renewed attention during the special counsel’s investigation into Russian election interference.

Two Trump associates, Paul Manafort and Rick Gates, were charged with failing to register as foreign agents.

Giuliani’s contacts with the MEK extended into this past summer. In July, he traveled to Albania to meet with the group’s president, Maryam Rajavi.

An article from the MEK’s official website said Giuliani”emphasized that America stands on the side of the Iranian people and supports their struggle for freedom.”
By Julia Ainsley, Andrew W. Lehren and Rich Schapiro – nbcnews.com

October 20, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

Maryam Rajavi mirrors Chalabi

Ahmad Chalabi, the Iraqi politician who died in 2015, is widely known for pushing for the U.S. invasion of Iraq. From exile he helped provide the manufactured excuses needed by the United States for the invasion in 2003 but was eventually denied any share in power after the fall of Saddam Hussein.
Chalabi was perhaps the Iraqi most closely associated with President George W. Bush’s decision to go to war. He cultivated close ties with journalists in Washington and London, American lawmakers, the neoconservative advisers who helped shape Bush’s foreign policy, and a wide network of Iraqi exiles, many of whom were paid for fabricating and distributing intelligence against Saddam Hussein’s government.
It was later revealed that his group, the Iraqi National Congress, received more than $100 million from the C.I.A. and other agencies between its foundation in 1992 and the start of the war. He cultivated friendships with a circle of hawkish republicans – Dick Cheney, Douglas J. Feith, William J. Luti, Richard N. Perle and Paul D. Wolfowitz – who were central in the United States’ march to war.
Chalabi was used by the American warmongers to ‘sell’ the claim that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction and that he had refused to fully cooperate with United Nations weapons inspections as an excuse to launch war against the country.
But the case for the war was predicated on flawed intelligence, and a 2006 report by the Senate Intelligence Committee concluded that “false information” from sources affiliated with the “Iraqi National Congress” was used to support key intelligence community assessment on Iraq and was widely distributed in intelligence products prior to war.
Did Chalabi push the U.S. into the war or was he rather used by advocates of war to produce excuses and announce false intelligence? It was later proved that Chalabi was truly the loudspeaker of the White House warmongers whenever they were not able to directly show their faces. They needed a so-called opposition group to do the job for them or at least to pull the trigger.
Now the Iranian Maryam Rajavi, leader of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK, MKO, NCR, NLA, Rajavi Cult) is playing (and has played for a long time) the same role as the Iraqi Ahmad Chalabi, this time in relation to Iran.
Now the Iranian Maryam Rajavi, leader of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK, MKO, NCR, NLA, Rajavi Cult) is playing (and has played for a long time) the same role as the Iraqi Ahmad Chalabi, this time in relation to Iran.
On Monday September 30, 2019 in Washington, the group, which has close ties with the warmongers of the White House, announced baseless details blaming the missile drone attack against Saudi oil facilities on Iran. Without any evidence, the MEK claimed that the decision for the attack was taken by the Supreme National Security Council, presided over by President Rouhani and with the presence of Foreign Minister Zarif.
This echoes the small task the MEK was previously given to promote the manufactured nuclear crisis against Iran. In August 2002, Alireza Jafarzadeh, the representative of the National Council of Resistance (a front organization for the MEK) to the U.S., appeared in a press conference in Washington and issued some nuclear intelligence against Iran. This was later proven to have been handed over to the MEK by Israeli Intelligence. This was being done while the group was listed as a terrorist entity by the U.S. State Department. The Americans only needed an Iranian opposition group to start the crisis, it wasn’t fussy about which one.
The MEK is a highly controversial group. It was responsible for killing several Americans in Iran during the 1970s. In 1992 its members attempted a violet attack on Iran’s U.N. delegation in New York. In 2012 it was removed from the U.S. State Department’s list of foreign terrorist organizations after an intense lobbying campaign that included paying retired U.S. government officials and leaders. Its supporters in the White House say the MEK has been an essential conduit for sensitive information about Iran’s nuclear program.
MEK members in Iraq were largely disarmed after the 2003 American invasion. The group had been granted protection by Saddam Hussein before the invasion and by the US army after the invasion and lived at Camp Ashraf for two decades. After the U.S. troop withdrawal in 2009, many group members moved in 2012 from Camp Ashraf to Camp Liberty, an abandoned U.S. military base. They have been now granted a remote and isolated base in Albania under the Trump Administration where the leaders have reconstructed their cultic internal relations and are doing their job in exactly the same way as performed by Ahmad Chalabi – the manufacture of excuses and false narratives to pave the way for war.
The MEK’s well financed meetings in Paris and now Albania are used as a platform for American politicians to announce their policy of regime change in Iran and the imposition of ‘maximum pressure’ sanctions. It is the only so-called opposition group which fully and unequivocally supports this policy to push the U.S. into war with Iran.
The Trump administration is conflicted about Iran. Even as the warmongers in the White House push for war there are others who are beginning to pull back. The MEK played its role in promoting accusations about Iran’s involvement in the Saudi missile attack. But this time, unlike Chalabi’s accusations, neither politicians nor media have given credence to Maryam Rajavi’s claims. It could well be that history lessons have been learned.
Ebrahim Khodabandeh

October 14, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization as a terrorist group

Democratic cover for terrorist proxies like MEK

Back in 1981, a 3-year-old girl Zahra Nourbakhsh, was on a bus together with her family, when it was set on fire by the agents of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO, MEK, PMOI, Cult of Rajavi) in Shiraz, Iran. In that traumatic incident, she was severely injured and her two-year-old sister was killed. [1]
This was one of the many terrorist attacks of the MEK against Iranian civilians and authorities. However, Advocacy for violent groups such as the MEK, as a tool to run the agenda of superpowers, is not a taboo. Ted Carpenter, vice president for defense and foreign policy studies at the Cato Institute in Washington, D.C, analyzes this phenomenon in his book “Gullible Superpower: U.S. Support For Bogus Foreign Democratic Movements”.
In his book Carpenter focuses on ten separate case studies of times the United States gave “democratic” cover to movements that were far from deserving. These include the Islamic fundamentalist Mujahideen in Afghanistan, Nicaraguan and Salvadoran death squads, the authoritarian Jonas Savimbi of Angola, the organ-trafficking Kosovo Liberation Army, Ahmed Chalabi’s National Iraqi Congress, and the People’s Mujahedin of Iran. [2]
“Gullible Superpowers has an excellent chapter on the Iranian group Mujahideen-e-Khalq (MEK),” writes James Bovard of the American Conservative. “That organization sprang up in the 1960s and proceeded to kill Americans in the 1970s and large numbers of Iranians in subsequent decades. NBC News reported in early 2012 that MEK had carried out killings of Iranian nuclear scientists and that it was “financed, trained and armed by Israel’s secret service.” [3]
Advocacy for the MEK as the enemy of their enemy is not limited to the US and Israel. The group is also embraced by the regional rival of Iran, Saudi Arabia. However, Albanian government should also be added to the list of MEK’s friends although it has never been involved in serious political engagements or arguments with Iranian government. Actually, the motivation of Albanian authorities to receive the MEK is based on money. It was chosen as a safe haven for the group because the US wanted so.
Reza Alghurabi of the American Herald Tribune writes, “Under pressure from the Iraqi government and the country’s civil activists who demanded the expulsion of the MEK from Iraq, the U.S. government was forced to choose Albania, which was suffering from extremely weak economic conditions, as the final destination of the terrorist group.” [4]
Alghurabi explains how the US government “was forced to choose” Albania: “The Americans lured the Albanian officials into hosting the MEK by donating a $25 million package which was offered to Albania under the pretext of promoting reforms in the country. Furthermore, another $20 million was donated to the UN refugee agency by the U.S. to help resettle the MEK in Albania.” [5]
Nevertheless, this is not the only financial resource that Albania enjoys by the side of the MEK. The MEK is notoriously known for its lavish payments to its sponsors. Speakers at the MEK events are usually paid hefty sums of money for a ten-minute speech on behalf of the group. So, it is quiet natural for the MEK to fund the Albanian government and its authorities. In exchange the Albanian authorities serve them with hostile acts towards Iran.
“Edi Rama’s UN speech on September 27, 2019 in which he denounced Iran and praised the MEK, has raised speculations that the terrorist group influences Albanian officials,” Alghurabi writes. “In addition, Ilir Meta, another member of Albania’s socialist party and the Albanian president, had also visited MEK’s headquarters in Manze earlier and met with the group’s leader Maryam Rajavi.” [65]
Double standards on terrorism point to an awkward attitude among politicians in the US, Israel, Saudi Arabia and Albania. As far as a terrorist group is beneficial, it can be considered as democratic. “MEK apologists continue to portray the group as idealistic freedom fighters devoted to democracy,” James Bovard states. “A simple online search shows that the Farsi translation of the group’s name is “holy warriors of the people.” But as long as the MEK serves the purposes of the Saudi and Israeli governments and their American string-pullers, there will be plenty of Washingtonians who pretend that the Iranian people do not loathe MEK.” [7]
They can pretend anything they are willing too but the absolute truth is that the MEK is loathed by the Iranian people.
Mazda Parsi

Sources:
[1] https://www.nejatngo.org/en/posts/6767
[2] Carpenter, Ted Galen, Gullible Superpower: U.S. Support For Bogus Foreign Democratic Movements, Cato Institute, February 19th , 2019.
[3] Bovard, James, Idiocy or Perfidy? How We Get Hooked on Foreign Democracy Crusades, the American Conservative, October 2nd , 2019.
[4] Alghurabi, Reza, Why Did Saudis Decide to Expand Their Relations with Albania?, American Herald Tribune, October 6th, 2019.
[5] ibid
[6] ibid
[7] Bovard, James, Idiocy or Perfidy? How We Get Hooked on Foreign Democracy Crusades, the American Conservative, October 2nd , 2019.

October 12, 2019 0 comments

Albania

I can buy Albanian President for a thousand dollars; Maryam Rajavi

Open letter by former MEK member, Reza Sadeghi Jaballi to Albanian President Ilir Meta
My name is Reza Sadeghi Jaballi. I am a former member of the MEK and a human rights activist living in Brussels. On June 1981, I was shot and later arrested by the Iranian security services and spent five years in prison in Iran including of two years in solitary confinement. Once freed, I left Iran and worked in the MEK’s financial section in Canada and the United States. I also spent many years in the MEK’s military garrison Camp Ashraf in Iraq.
Recently you visited the MEK Camp in Tirana. As a former member, I would like to bring to your attention that the latest EU-Western Balkans Ministerial Forum on Justice and Home Affairs, held in Tirana in October 2018, recognized that terrorism and radicalization remain a common challenge for the European Union and the Western Balkan region.
The ministers representing the European Union, signed the Joint Action Plan on Counter Terrorism for the Western Balkans. It calls on Western Balkan partners and the European Union to take ambitious action in order to reach their counter-terrorism objectives. Ministers discussed their common challenges in responding to the security threat posed by violent extremism and agreed to work together to address its root causes and to build resilient and cohesive societies.
Considering the MEK’s past forty years record of assassinations and terrorist activities in Iran, Iraq and Europe, as a former member I must emphasize that the MEK presence in Tirana is and will be one of the greatest threats to your country as well as the European Union and also one of the main obstacles for Albania’s accession to the European Union.
Dear Mr President,
You have just met with Maryam Rajavi who is considered by Iranians to be one of the worst and most violent mafia-like terrorist cult leaders in Iran’s recent history.
Several incidents between members of the MEK and local communities in Albania reveal the pernicious danger of their secret activities.
Channel 4, a highly reputable British television news channel, recently travelled to Albania to find out about the daily life of the MEK members. The film crew was greeted by hostile private security forces outside the fortified camp at Manëz. Camp members physically attacked the Channel 4 camera crew (Shqiptarja.com, August 19). It was an unprecedented event that raised many questions about the activities at and inside the camp (Lapsi.al, August 19).
The event was widely reported by local media, which was also able to obtain a threat assessment on the group by Albania’s Intelligence Agency.
A prominent Iraqi politician described the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK, also known as MKO, NCRI or PMOI) as a big cancerous tumor that Iraq had been afflicted with.
Olsi Jazexhi, an Albanian writer says “We are supposed to be living in a free and democratic country. But the MEK have built a state within a state that implements its own laws”.
Olsi Jazexhi : MEK Helping Albania Slide Toward AuthoritarianismOlsi Jazexhi : MEK Helping Albania Slide Toward Authoritarianism
MEP Ana Gomes speaking during the debate on Iran’s nuclear deal indicated “we must not turn a blind eye to the provocative activities of sects such as the MEK (Mojahedin-e Khalq), which act within this Parliament, and which last week even physically assaulted an opponent just outside the Parliament. This criminal act happened when the MEK leader Maryam Rajavi was in the Parliament. I demand from President Tajani the expulsion of MEK agents who work on EP premises. This is also a security matter for all of us”.
Martin Kobler, as head of UNAMI, tried to work out a solution in Iraq, but was “miserably” attacked by the MEK. He indicated “he could not get access to the members to find out what they wanted as individuals. The MEK would not allow the normal interviews that the UNHCR conduct”.
MEK behavior in Albania is like a mafia – breaking laws, blackmailing, paying people off, beating people, threatening defectors, accusing anyone who questions them of being an Iranian agent, controlling their members in the camp through Stalinist totalitarian methodology and not allowing members to call or visit their families.
In 2003, French anti-terrorism officers raided a dozen locations northwest of Paris in Auvers-sur-Oise, the MEK headquarters, at a time the MEK was classified as a terrorist organization by the United States, the European Union and Iran (1997-2012), and initially detained 165 people including the MEK leader Maryam Rajavi who immediately ordered a few members to burn themselves in protest in the streets of Europe. The attempts at self-immolation to protest against the arrest of Rajavi are proof of a fanaticism and terrorist group that does not respect our laws and our values.
Farid_Totounchi_Mahoutchi_MEK_Iraq_AlbaniaFarid Totounchi (Real name: Mahoutchi) Commander of Saddam’s Private army forcing Somayeh Mohammadi to do a “Forced confession” session in Terror camp in Albania
Dear President Meta,
The MEK was listed as a terrorist organization for a reason. It has carried out decades of brutal terrorist attacks, assassinations, and espionage against Iran’s government and its people (according to Rajavi’s own statement, the MEK killed more than 12000 people from 1981 to 1983), as well as targeting Americans including the attempted kidnapping of US Ambassador Douglas MacArthur II, the attempted assassination of USAF Brigadier General Harold Price, the successful assassination of Lieutenant Colonel Louis Lee Hawkins, the double assassinations of Colonel Paul Shaffer and Lieutenant Colonel Jack Turner, and the successful ambush and killing of American Rockwell International employees William Cottrell, Donald Smith, and Robert Krongard.
According to Ms Ebi Spahiu, the MEK presence in Albania – which continues to struggle with endemic corruption and organized crime and the emergence of religious radicalization as a regional security threat and potential sectarian rifts – may add to the list of challenges facing Albania’s political landscape.
In 2013 Maryam Rajavi said, we are going to Albania because it is a corrupt country and we will own this country in a short period of time, we have money and instead of paying few hundred thousand dollars to buy a western politician, there we can buy their president with one thousand dollars.
This is the true face of Maryam Rajavi.
Respectfully,
Reza Jaballi – Brussels

October 9, 2019 0 comments

Albania

Advocacy for MEK, complicate Albania’s EU integration process

Why Did Saudis Decide to Expand Their Relations with Albania?

Although the presence of Islam in the Balkans dates back about eight hundred years ago to the 12th century, Takfiris’ existence in this region is rather a new phenomenon. It relates to the early 90s and the midst of the Bosnian War with the presence of the so-called Afghan Arabs. By the end of the Bosnian War, these Afghan Arabs gained Bosnian citizenship, and Wahhabism, as the central ideology of Takfirism, was promoted in the region by Saudi Arabia.

In recent days, the Saudi and Albanian media have announced the signing of a trade agreement between Saudi Arabia and Albania to develop economic relations. Head of the Saudi delegation, Ahmed al-Khumashi, said about good relations and shared interests between the two countries had and called for the development of economic and investment relations.

In February, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama had traveled to Saudi Arabia to meet with Saudi King and sign two agreements and a memorandum of cooperation in the fields of tourism and aviation.

Looking at the history of Riyadh-Tirana relations, one can find that association between the two countries is not a matter of history and dates back to recent years. As there is no significant book nor article on the relations between the two countries and the “Albanian-Saudi relation,” entry is only in Arabic. Interestingly, the content of the mentioned entry is just about the statistical comparison between the two countries is in terms of population, economics, and international organizations in which both countries are members, and there is not the slightest mention of the history of relationships.

There is a serious question that must be asked: why and how the Saudis decided to expand their relations with Albania? Especially with regard that the first and last period which Saudis seriously appeared in the region dates back to the immigration of Saudi and Arab citizens after the end of the Afghanistan war. At the same time, Saudis began a movement to build mosques and Islamic centers in the Balkans in different parts of the Balkans, especially Bosnia and Herzegovina, and many of these immigrants married Muslim and indigenous girls in the region.

In addition, trained Arab Salafi troops, who were bin Laden’s loyalists, gathered in the Balkans in 1993 under cover of the Bosnian War to establish a terrorist network inside European territory based in the Balkans.

By the end of the Bosnian War, major cities in the Balkans had become the center of Salafist extremists; for example, the Novi Pazar town in Sanjak area in Southern Serbia has become a core for Islamic fundamentalism, linked with Al-Qaeda cells. Novi Pazar was the focus of the Islamist attempt to build a land bridge from Albania and Kosovo to Bosnia.

Two decades after the presence of Arab extremists and the Saudi mosque-building movement in the region, which has been associated with the promotion of extremist Wahhabi thoughts, its effects became clear; when thousands of violent militias were deployed to Iraq and Syria to fight alongside the so-called Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS).

Along with ISIS’s seizing power in Iraq and Syria, Albanian citizens were surprised by the large volume of travel by some citizens of this country to the Middle East. Former Albanian Foreign Minister Detmir Bushati had initially said that about 300 Albanian citizens had left this country to join ISIS. In addition, some Imams in Albania used to support ISIS in their speeches.

Interestingly, the ISIS recruitment among Albanians was not limited to Albanian citizens, but it also included Albanians living in Western Europe, especially Germany and Switzerland. An issue that demonstrates to what extent is Albania influenced by imported ideas and how much is it capable of attracting such violent militia.

Furthermore, Albania’s poor economic conditions and its strategic position in Southeast Europe and the Balkans, as well as the corruption between its officials, have attracted the attention of some international actors to this country.

Under pressure from the Iraqi government and the country’s civil activists who demanded the expulsion of the MEK from Iraq, the U.S. government was forced to choose Albania, which was suffering from extremely weak economic conditions, as the final destination of the terrorist group. MEK’s history is so dark that no country was willing to take the group in as a whole. The Americans lured the Albanian officials into hosting the MEK by donating a $25 million package which was offered to Albania under the pretext of promoting reforms in the country. Furthermore, another $20 million was donated to the UN refugee agency by the U.S. to help resettle the MEK in Albania.

The MEK which had pledged to refrain from conducting any political activities against Iran in exchange for the group’s resettlement in Albania soon forgot its pledge and started massive constructions in its headquarters near Tirana where the group’s meetings with Albanian and European political figures were held later with an aim to hurt Tehran’s interests.

Albania has now turned from a fringe country to an important one for many actors. To the MEK, Albania is home to the majority of its members, to Iran, Albania is the host of its most significant opposition group, and to the U.S., it is an obedient state which has done something no other country would do; accepting a terrorist group on its soil at the request of the United States. Israel too, has fixed an eye on Albania since it would not be wise to turn a blind eye on an Iran opposition group with 2500 members enjoying notable military and security skills.

Saudi Arabia is another country with interests in Albania. Saudi relationships with the MEK became public when Prince Turki Al-Faisal, former chief of Saudi Arabai’s intelligence agency, praised the group after participating in MEK’s annual gatherings in 2016 and 2017 in Paris.

It could be argued now that after MEK’s relocation to Albania, the tiny Balkan country has turned into a playground for the confrontation of Iran and its rivals. But Iran could not endure much in this game as Tirana expelled its Ambassador and another one of Iran’s diplomats in December 2018 following a seemingly covert meddling from some rival countries or even the MEK itself.

The Iranian foreign ministry spokesman later announced the U.S., Israel and some anti-Iran terrorist groups were behind Albania’s expulsion of the Iranian Ambassador.

Edi Rama’s UN speech on December 27, 2019 in which he denounced Iran and praised the MEK, has raised speculations that the terrorist group influences Albanian officials. In addition, Ilir Meta, another member of Albania’s socialist party and the Albanian president, had also visited MEK’s headquarters in Manze earlier and met with the group’s leader Maryam Rajavi.

Obviously, the relatively peaceful Albania has now become a scene in which the Americans, Israelis and Saudis are acting. What they all share is their hostility with Iran and their tool in Albania is the MEK.

What the Albanian authorities do not consider in expanding their relations with Saudi Arabia, is that the Saudis do not hesitate to promote and spread their extremist ideology of Wahhabism among their new friends. Reports published by the Muslim World League, Riyadh’s principal tool in promoting fundamentalism globally, about its promotional activities in various regions around the world, distribution of religious books, and construction of Islamic centers and mosques, must be considered as a warning to the Albanians regarding promotion of Wahhabi extremism in their country.

Furthermore, the advocacy of Albanian authorities for the MEK, a group listed by the U.S. and the European Union for years as a terrorist group, could complicate Albania’s EU integration process.

Concerned about becoming accused of having ties with a terrorist group that has committed various crimes, including money laundering and fraud in the past, top Western officials still refuse to attend MEK events. But the Albanian officials have yet to understand how their ties with a terrorist group could hurt their public figure.

Finally, Tirana must be very alert in its dealings with the Saudis if it does not want to become a focal point for extremist ideas in the Balkans and Europe and a corridor for extremists to cross the continent. Perhaps the best option for this country is not being involved in the actors’ game.

BY Reza Alghurabi, ahtribune

October 7, 2019 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Who funded MEK-UANI Conference?

Email series suggests UAE and Saudi Arabia funded anti-Iran US lobby
October 03, 2019

A report by The Tehran Times states evidence has emerged suggesting that the governments of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) are involved in financing an anti-Iranian US lobby.
READ MORE: Thousands of JKLF marchers head towards LoC

Speaking last week at United Against Nuclear Iran’s (UANI) annual conference, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced the administration was expanding its pressure campaign, targeting Chinese entities believed to be transporting Iranian oil. “[W]e’re telling China and all nations, know that we will sanction every violation of sanctionable activity,” said Pompeo.

Although it was previously unclear who was behind UANI, LobeLog, a website operating out of ETH Zurich in Switzerland, has leaked a series of emails that suggest the”non-governmental”anti-Iran group may not be as non-governmental at all.

In the conference where Pompeo made his tirade against Iran, in attendance included Bahraini Ambassador to the U.S. Sheikh Abdullah bin Rashed bin Abdullah Al Khalifa, Saudi Minister of State for Arabian Gulf Affairs Thamer al-Sahban, Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Ron Dermer, U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell, and U.S. Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Sigal Mandelker. UAE Ambassador to the U.S. Yousef Al Otaiba was also visible in the audience. Billionaire Thomas Kaplan, who was shown to be a major funder of UANI in 2013, was also in attendance.

The emails show the anti-Iran group members attempting to connect US foreign policymakers with members of the royal families of both the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia . According to documents, 35$ million were channeled into projects that sought to increase anti-Iran and anti-Qatar advocacy pressures. The hefty capital available for the group suggests that it is an influential lobby in determining US foreign policy.

UANI has also hosted conferences involving an Iranian opposition listed as”terrorist”by both Iran and the United States, the Mojahedin-e-Khalq (MEK). The Tehran Times highlights that this fact was barely pursued by US authorities, which otherwise would have harsh consequences for non-governmental organisations affiliated with terrorist organisations. This is said to be indicative of both the power of the UANI, and the dangerous nature of it as a lobbying force.
Nation.com.pk

October 7, 2019 0 comments

Albania

Ex MEK Member warns Albanian Government

A note to the representatives of the Government of Albania

Ladies and Gentlemen of the Government of Albania

I am Mansour Nazari. I have spent over twenty years in the Mojahedin Khalq Organization but I have now left the organization. I have a great deal of experience in this organization. Why am I saying this? Because what the MEK leaders are telling you is different from anything in the real world.
A few days ago, Mr. Ilir Meta, President of Albania, went to the MEK base and met with Maryam Rajavi, leader of the MEK. But she just told him lies. Why she is afraid to tell the truth?
The MEK has never been a popular group or had much support among Iranians. If they did, they would not try to hide their history in Iran and Iraq. The MEK is a cult and a destructive one at that, and it is run like a mafia gang. The fugitive leader of the Mojahedin Khalq Organisation (Rajavi Cult) Massoud Rajavi has been in hiding for the last 15 years. We ex-members can tell you why he is hiding. But you can ask Maryam Rajavi directly yourselves. Ask her about the prisons in Camp Ashraf in Iraq. Ask her how many prisoners they kept at any one time. Ask how many were tortured, how many died. Ask how many Iranian civilians and passers-by have been killed due to their blind and indiscriminate terrorist bombings and terrorism. The questions can go on and on.
President Ilir Meta has been to visit and lobby for Maryam Rajavi in the MEK terror HQ near Tirana. At the same time, no mother, father or family members are allowed to visit their loved ones there or even have a telephone conversation with them. Is this not a tragedy? What are the MEK leaders afraid of? Why would they be afraid of the families of their members? What are they hiding? Ask yourselves. Millions of Iranians live abroad but only a few tens of them would want anything to do with them. Is this not a dangerous sign to take notice of?
I urge you. Next time they invite you. Next time you have any opportunity. Ask Maryam Rajavi what are the “weekly ablutions” [compulsory confession sessions] she has invented to suppress the victims in the camp? Why don’t the victims and hostages in the camp have the right to contact their family? Is Camp Ashraf a prison? And if not, why there is no access to it?
And as an Iranian (or for that matter of any nationality) I can tell you this: remember that the MEK has betrayed and is betraying their own country and their own people, their own members, their own masters and benefactors over and over again. Be careful, they can betray you as well.
Yours Sincerely,
Mansour Nazari
End

October 7, 2019 0 comments

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