Page 225 – Nejat Society

Mujahedin Khalq Organization members' families

Latest news on the situation of Somayeh Mohammadi

rightThe struggles of the parents of Somayeh Mohammedi to free their daughter, and the public beating some Mojahedin members made against her parents have frightened the Mojahedin who are housed in Camp Ashraf 3 in Manza in Durres.

Maryam Rajavi, the old cult leader living in Paris, has sent a message on behalf of the mystical cult leader, Massoud Rajavi (who died long ago, but the Mojahedin members are misled into believing he is still alive) to the Mojahedin members. In this false message, the Mojahedin, who believe that Massoud Rajavi is the Imam Mahdi, have been commanded not to leave the camp except in urgent cases. The Mojahedin are reminded that they will win the war against Iran and overthrow the mullahs quickly.

Mojahedin commanders tell the members that they face the threat of Iranian terrorism and kidnapping if they emerge from the organization. There are full provisions inside Manza camp so that there is no excuse to go outside the camp and the Mojahedin are no longer allowed out.

The Mojahedin leadership is exercising a reign of terror against members who have secretly plugged-in phones or tablets in the camp and communicate with their families. Mojahedin members’ use of phones is strictly controlled and if someone is caught using a phone they are punished severely. If someone gets caught talking on the phone or using the Internet, they are forced to sign a document stating that the member admits to being an Iranian agent and working for the Iranian Intelligence Ministry.

The camp commanders have issued orders that anyone who, in exceptional circumstances, leaves Manza camp must be strictly controlled. Women or men who go outdoors are searched for items [photos, documents] when they leave and strip-searched when they return to the camp to check for phones or bugging devices.

The Mojahedin High Command has been fully mobilized to prevent Somayeh Mohammadi from meeting her parents. They spend all their time with Somayeh, congratulating her privately and praising her publicly in front of the Mojahedin members for rejecting her family – who are described as a family of Iranian agents. The Mojahedin members are required to cheer and praise Somayeh as a hero of the revolution and martyrdom and jihad.

Somayeh is praised as a hero who is making great sacrifices for jihad and is refusing to be seduced by Iranian agents. The jihadist command have set Somayeh up with management duties at the General Mojahedin Headquarters, in Mozhgan Parsaii’s office, in order to motivate her and make her believe she is an important jihad leader. She no longer eats meals with the other camp rank and file but is given special treatment and has lunches and dinners with the supreme command.

The Mojahedin’s comanders hold meetings every day for the rank and file members in which they denounce and condemn the presence of enemies of the revolution, Mostafa Mohammadi and Mahboubeh Hamza, Somayehs’s father and mother, in Albania. All the members are required to condemn the presence of the two parents, who are described as mullahs and terrorists. The Mojahedin tell each other that Somayeh’s mother and father have come to commit terrorist acts against them and that they are not in Albania to meet with Somayeh.

In this situation, Somayeh is confused. She is suffering from depression and mental problems. She is kept isolated from her close friends. High ranking Mojahedin have asked her to make a video recording and denounce her father and mother as Iranian agents. Yesterday, on 30 July 2018 she was finally persuaded to attend at the police station in the district in Durres, accompanied by a group of Mojahedin, where she told the police officer that her father is an enemy, a terrorist and she will not meet with him.

While making her statement to the judicial police officer at the district police commissariat, Somayeh was accompanied by a Mojahedin commander who supervised and recorded her so that Somayeh would not go wrong and say ‘yes, I want to meet my family’, and not to escape from the police commissariat.
On 30th July 2018, Somayeh’s father and mother were contacted in Tirana by a LSI activist who offered help to mediate for the family in order to meet Somayeh. However, when she contacted the staff at the Interior Ministry, they told her that this was not possible.

Prime Minister Rama is frightened by the physical assault that the Mojahedin made against Somayeh’s father. Rama has built a reputation for Interior Minister Fatmir Xhafa and has asked the police to prevent MEK and anti-MEK from having any further incidents with each other.

The Rama government is afraid of the whole situation with the Mojahedin. As is Pandeli Majko, who is embarrassed by the exposure of the terrible terrorist cult that he supports. On one hand, the Albanian government is determined not to intervene to liberate Somayeh from the jihadist prison because it is afraid of the Americans. Sander Lleshi, Agron Sojati, and the anti-violent extremism office close to the Prime Minister seem unable to see all the jihadist scandal that has plagued the country. On the other hand, support for Somayeh’s family in public opinion has created another embarrassment for the government. Unfortunately, the Democratic Party and its leaders, who are following the situation from afar, are afraid to attack Rama’s government for abandoning Somayeh in the jihadist camp as they know that it would infuriate the Americans.

The situation seems desperate. In the days ahead, the Mojahedin may persuade Somayeh to appear in a video recording in which she will denounce her father and mother as terrorists and agents of the Iranian regime. The Mojahedin High Command is doing its utmost to stop Somayeh from meeting with her family as they fear that if this meeting does happen, Somayeh would abandon jihad and leave their Manzas jihadist prison for freedom and for Canada.

Translated by Iran Interlink,

August 2, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

American support for MEK in Albania alienates Iranian public opinion

Trump’s supposed policy of bullying Iran into begging for talks has stalled after his all-caps Twitter rant was batted back by General Qassem Soleimani’s kick-ass retort. Time for a re-think of the whole approach perhaps. Indeed, many of the tactics used by the US to bring Iran into line over the past forty years have actually enabled and strengthened the ruling establishment there. It’s not that Iran has got better, but the US has made avoidable blunders.

Not least of these is to threaten to bomb the country to destroy its (so-far peaceful) nuclear capabilities. Allied with cruel economic sanctions, the discriminatory Travel Ban and overt support for violent regime change, this aggressive approach only alienates Iranian people.

But while there is disagreement between the various organisations and factions who oppose the Iranian government on any number of issues, there is one thing which unites almost all Iranians and that is the unaccountable American support for the Mojahedin Khalq terrorist cult.

Since the 1980s, the MEK has been facilitated as a terrorist entity and propaganda outlet by the US establishment specifically because of its violent extremism and regime change agenda. These supporters have no illusions – MEK is unreliable and untrustworthy and has no support whatsoever among Iranians. However, intelligence agencies and the military are amoral institutions; they make no judgment about the ethical or moral value of an asset. So, as long as politicians find the ‘MEK threat’ useful to buttress their regime change agendas, the arrangements for MEK’s continued survival remain largely unchallenged.

Because of this complicity, US Secretary of State Pompeo’s claim that “the Trump administration dreams the same dreams for the people of Iran as you do” was met with derision among the Iranian diaspora. If the US at any time had wanted to help the Iranian people, it would have dismantled the MEK. For years, successive US administrations have squandered opportunities to remove MEK from the equation. This failure has contributed to the sterility of US policy toward Iran.

What looked like a genuine process to de-list, transfer and de-radicalize the MEK, initiated by Hillary Clinton in 2012, proved simply to be a pragmatic move which allowed continued US support for MEK in a third country after Iraq increased demands for its expulsion. A $9m deal struck with Albanian Prime Minister Berisha included American funding for a De-Radicalization Institute in Tirana. This was advertised to reassure the Albanian people; MEK members would be re-integrated into society and allowed to take up residence as ordinary citizens to live out their lives in peace and security.

Instead, the US facilitated the re-grouping of MEK in a closed terrorist training camp in rural Albania, where MEK leaders continue their horrible human rights abuses against the members. Apparently, neoconservatives find the group’s promise of regime changeirresistible, even in the face of such evidence. However, above all other considerations, the MEK members in Albania are living, breathing souls and it behoves us to pay attention to them as individuals.

The MEK is described as a destructive cult because it poses the greatest threat to its own members. Many hundreds have been killed and continue to be killed by the leaders. The latest example came only weeks ago with the unexplained death of MEK member Malek Sharaii. Sharaii’s family in Iran say that he had wanted to leave MEK but had incriminating information about the September 2013 massacre at Camp Ashraf which MEK didn’t want to be made public. The family allege that he was murdered because of his past. Due to MEK pressure, the police investigation was halted, Sharaii’s body was apparently ‘discovered’ after two weeks and buried without any post mortem because the MEK claimed this was against their religious practices. He joins a long list of disappeared and mysterious, unexplained deaths of MEK members.

Unsurprisingly then, over four hundred people have managed to escape the cultic clutches of MEK while they are in Albania. The latest escapee, Hassan Shahbazi, described his membership with MEK as “slavery”. There is no doubt, that MEK keeps all its members in a state of modern slavery. Former members confirm that many, many members would like to leave but are trapped and afraid. MEK has hired a private armed security group to keep members inside and everyone else, including the Albanian security services, out.

This enforced entrapment and isolation are compounded by the MEK’s refusal to allow families to be in contact with one another – this is as true for related people inside the camp as for the desperate families outside who, since 2003, have come searching for their loved ones in MEK, offering them help and succor.

One such family, Canadian citizens Mostafa and Mahboubeh Mohammadi, have recently come to Albania to try to rescue their 38-year-old daughter who is still unable to meet with her parents. MEK goons are experts in intimidation techniques including threats of physical and verbal violence, actual violence. More significantly, their claim to have CIA and MOSSAD backing has been enough to silence most Albanian media, who do not want their careers or businesses ruined for this group.

Since its arrival in the small Balkan country, MEK has caused nothing but controversy in Albania. Its citizens rightly fear them. Neither its politicians nor its police can control them. And families like the Mohammadi’s must bear the brunt of MEK violence.

So, while American politicians can feign ignorance, Iranians themselves know the truth. And they know that the Hardliners in Iran are the biggest benefactors of this situation. Not only was the terrorist MEK disarmed and imprisoned in Iraq for a decade at American expense, the group is still used as a bogeyman by Iran’s security services to quell protests and rebellion in the name of counter-terrorism. As a first principle, opposition activists in Iran are careful to distance themselves from MEK in every shape and form.

In this context, using the MEK name as lazy shorthand for ‘violent regime change’ can only be counter-productive; it is guaranteed to unite Iranians against you. If President Trump really seeks to change what his predecessors have done and to shake up politics, his most effective move would be to dismantle MEK. Such a move would be a radical departure from the sterile policies of the past. Trump would take the credit for something that should have been accomplished years ago.

ANNE KHODABANDEH

Anne Khodabandeh, is an expert in anti-terrorist activities and a long-standing activist in the field of deradicalization of extremists. She has written several articles and books on this subject, along with her husband, who is of Iranian origin.

August 2, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Attempts to Rebrand Iran’s MEK Are Far From Convincing

Someone is paying a lot of money to make the controversial Mojahedin Khalq group, (better known by their initials MEK), look like a democratic opposition to Iran’s Islamic Republic. And whoever they are, they have not set themselves an easy exercise. Rebranding a once U.S. proscribed terrorist group, with a reputation for acting like a cult will be quite the uphill struggle.

The MEK was once a leftist group opposed to the rule of the Shah in Iran. Their ideology was a blend of Marxism and Islamism, and they ran a bombing campaign in Tehran in the 1970s. They joined the chants of “Death to America”, and are thought to have been responsible for the deaths of six Americans in this period. They initially supported the Islamic Revolution, although they soon fell afoul of the newly established Supreme Leader. They were later responsible for the deaths of 101 officials and members of parliament in 1981 after attacking the party headquarters of the Islamic Republic.

They fled Iran for France, and then for Iraq, where they were sheltered by Saddam Hussein. Saddam armed and funded the group, and the MEK began conducting raids in Iran towards the end of the Iran-Iraq war. This alliance with Saddam has earned them an unsavoury reputation in Iran, as hypocrites and even traitors.

But after the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, the MEK vocally distanced themselves from Saddam and insisted to the Americans that they were democratic freedom fighters. Even by the standards of rebel movements, this was a deeply cynical switch of alliances. The MEK clearly sensed the advantages of adopting the “democracy” label. But the behavior of its own leaders was quite the opposite of democratic.

The MEK leaders in Iraq, husband and wife Masoud and Maryam Rajavi, ran the group through obsessive control over its member’s behavior – enforcing total sexual abstinence, making use of torture, and encouraging lethal violence against any perceived enemy, including members’ families. According to a Human Rights Watch report, dissenters who criticized the Rajavis or expressed an intention to leave were subject to torture. Two of their members were tortured to death.

This extreme behaviour persisted after 3000 group members were resettled in Albania at the behest of the Americans, who apparently hoped the group would undergo a de-radicalization program. Masoud Rajavi seemed to disappear during the invasion of Iraq, and he is now thought to be dead. Maryam Rajavi took over sole control of the MEK leadership.

She retained tight control of their members’ lives in Albania as well, reportedly doling out minimal money to each of its members to allow them to buy rations of food. She continued to forbid them from speaking to their families or leaving. At the same time, she began effectively courting anti-Iran American politicians, selling herself as a democratic opposition-in-waiting to the Islamic Republic. Many Iran hawks seemed to buy it, despite the fact that the MEK had been proscribed as a terrorist group by the Clinton administration, a designation that was not lifted until 2012 after extensive lobbying by Rajavi. Rajavi has now incorporated the MEK into an organization called the National Council of Resistance in Iran (NCRI), which bills itself as “the one and only democratic alternative to the Iranian regime”. Since then, she seems to have won the backing of some powerful, and rich international allies.

Whoever the MEK’s financier, they are not alone in wanting this rebranding to work. The Trump administration has no shortage of Iran hawks who are desperate to see the back of the current Iranian regime, and are happy to tout the MEK as a replacement. But it is critical to question what the MEK’s backers really see in the group.

Do they genuinely believe that the MEK is a legitimate democratic alternative? Or do they see the group as a cosmetic prop, one they know Iranians will inevitably reject, but that serves for now as a hypothetical opposition, in a consequences-be-damned game of regime change? Whichever it is, they are playing a very dangerous game.

Those looking for the MEK’s financial backers tend to point the finger at Iran’s old enemy Saudi Arabia. There is no conclusive evidence that Riyadh is the group’s piggy bank, but there are some suggestive signs. For a start, whoever is funding the group has an impressive budget.

The MEK’s annual conference in Paris has reliably featured high-profile American politicians. They are mostly Republicans on the far right of the party. John Bolton, currently President Trump’s National Security Advisor and previously American Ambassador to the United Nations under President Bush, has addressed the MEK annual conference in Paris for several years now, and has received speaking fees of up to $40,000 for an appearance.

Newt Gingrich and Rudy Giuliani have also taken the MEK’s stage for $25,000 each. And another guest at their 2016 conference was Saudi Prince Turki al-Faisal, himself a former Saudi ambassador to America and the UK. While there, he declared “I, too, want the downfall of the Iranian regime.”

There is no question that the current regime in Tehran has a poor claim to democracy, and an even worse record of respecting civil liberties and human rights. But it is misleading to speak of the Iranian state as a single entity. Iran’s government is split between the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei and his clerical judiciary, the Revolutionary Guard’s security apparatus, and the Presidency. The President of Iran is the only arm of the central state that is elected.

Elections in Iran are troublesome affairs, and allegations of fraud are not uncommon. Nor can the President act unimpeded. His plans will be actively undermined by the clerical and the security establishments when there are disagreements. However, the Iranian peoples’ selection of presidents for the past few years have been telling. Since 2013, religious hardliner candidates have lost every local and national election. They were defeated by more pragmatic candidates, who have pushed for greater engagement of the Islamic Republic with the outside world.

Current President Hassan Rouhani is one of these. He staked both of his election campaigns on selling Iranians the benefits of the 2015 nuclear deal with America. This does not mean Rouhani is a democratic liberal. He believes in the Islamic Republic, and even if he were able to reform to the extent he would like, he would still fall short of the hopes of many. However, he is still the closest thing Iran has to a democratically elected leader right now – not a product of total freedom of choice, but a peoples’ choice nonetheless. And despite the group rebranding itself as a beacon of democracy, the MEK is currently focused on attacking the elected Rouhani, and his pragmatist and reformist allies.

A reformist strategist and activist in Iran who wished to remain anonymous told Al Bawaba:

“If you look at tweets of the organised supporters of regime change in Iran, including MEK and parts of the Iranian opposition who support some sort of military intervention against the regime, you can clearly see that as of about six months ago, the main target of their tweets has been the reformists. Their analysts, speaking on channels like BBC Persian and VOA Persian, have repeatedly said that in order to overthrow the Iranian government, we need to first overthrow the reformists, because the reformists are the main barrier to overthrowing the government, because they are keeping the public hopeful about some sort of change in the future.”

The American government appears to have joined their fight; Reuters reports that they have begun a targeted messaging campaign against the Iranian regime, although did not specify which elements of the regime the effort was attacking. Nevertheless, such a campaign further undermines Washington’s claim that they are only seeking behavior change from Tehran, and not regime change.

Whether the Islamic Republic’s reformists can ever offer the meaningful change their supporters hope for is a legitimate line of questioning. And it is perfectly true that any other alternatives to the Islamic Republic are few. But it is troubling that the supposed “democratic alternative” has taken it upon itself to attack the only part of the Iranian establishment that is democratically elected.

And it is particularly worrying when that own organisation’s claim to being “democratic” is paper-thin, founded on nothing but its own claim to be so, and with a record of past behavior that suggests quite the opposite. Rajavi’s current claim to being “democratic” comes from her “Ten Point Plan”, and her claim that if the MEK were to assume power in the event of regime change, they would ensure parliamentary elections within six months. Her Ten Point Plan is not in itself objectionable. It outlines commitments to secularism, democracy, gender equality, human rights, a free-market economy, and a foreign policy based on “peaceful coexistence” – objectives that many Iranians likely share.

The problem is that Rajavi’s history shows her adopting whatever label is politically convenient at the time, usually without living up to it. The 10 Point manifesto itself is quite an about-turn for a group that began as Islamist Marxists. And if the description of Rajavi as an autocratic “cult leader” is even somewhat justified, then taking her word that she will give up power after six months would be foolish indeed. Cult leaders crave power, and will invariably find a reason to cling on to it.

The MEK’s reputation precedes them. And however much Iranians may dislike the Islamic Republic, they appear to have neither forgiven nor forgotten the Rajavis’ bombing campaign whilst they were still in Tehran, their siding with Saddam Hussein during the war, or their reputation for controlling and abusive behavior. An analyst who wished to remain anonymous told Al Bawaba: “

“The fact that the MEK is highly visible abroad doesn’t mean that they are popular within Iran – I’ve never seen compelling, credible evidence that they are regarded with anything but contempt.”

The Iranian-American Washington Post journalist Jason Rezian, who was himself jailed for over a year by the Islamic Republic, said that in seven years of living in Tehran, he never met an Iranian who supported the MEK.

Ali Alfoneh, a visiting scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington D.C., told Al Bawaba:

“The Islamic Republic has effectively managed to annihilate all organized opposition to its rule. Whatever opposition manifests itself against the regime is spontaneous outburst of public anger and dissatisfaction. Concerning the NCRI/MEK, I have yet to see a meaningful manifestation of democratic practices within the organization before I believe in their democratic aspirations for Iran.

Based on their past record, NCRI/MEK rule over Iran is more likely to resemble the Khmer Rouge’s rule in Cambodia. I can’t measure the level of their popularity within Iran, but if their level of popularity among émigré Iranians is any guidance, they probably do not enjoy significant popular support within Iran.”

What is critical to note is that the MEK’s unsavoury reputation is common knowledge among Iran observers. Their foreign backers can only be aware that the majority of Iranians would never embrace the MEK as a “democratic” alternative. And this begs the question of why they are billing the group as such anyway. Perhaps they sincerely do think, against all evidence, that the MEK could be all that they claim. But if Bolton, Gingrich, their fellow travelers and the MEK’s financial backers do not really think that, then why are they presenting them as such?

The most plausible answer is that the MEK, rebranded as a “resistance council”, could help to legitimize a push for regime change, by at least appearing to fill a hole where the regime’s replacement should be. If so, it reaffirms concerns that those pushing for regime change in Tehran at any price have little or no regard for the consequences, or for what the Iranian people actually want.

Albawaba.com

Also:

Albania: MEK rebrands by assassinating unwanted members

August 1, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Nejat Society Gilan office visit Hassanzadeh family

Reza Hassanzadeh was a war prisoner when he was recruited by the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi). He has not been allowed to contact his family for over 30 years.

Hassanzadehs went to Camp Ashraf, Iraq several times but they were not allowed to visit their loved one, Reza and even they were assaulted by the MKO agents at the gates of Camp Ashraf. Reza’s big brother Jaafar was wounded by the group agents.

Nejat Society’s representative at Gilan office explained for the Hassanzadehs that the MKO’s declining situation in recent years has made its leader Maryam Rajavi resort to the American warmongers pointing out the recent gathering of the group in Paris where a number of American paid speakers addressed the audience in favor of the group.

“The Villepinte show has just an internal feedback for the group in order to keep the miserable members as hostages in the cult-like structure of the group,” told Nejat official Pourahmad.

Jaafar Hassanzadeh called the MKO leaders’ claims for ruling Iran as ridiculous. “The Rajavis tell a lot of lies,” he said. “I traveled to Ashraf several times so I got to know them better. In response to my absolute right to visit my brother for only a few minutes, they threw rocks at me and broke my head.”

“A group with no democracy in its relations cannot bring democracy to Iran, they are just flattering for their American, Israeli and Saudi masters,” he added.

Nejat Society Gilan office look forward to the salvation of the hostages of the MKO.

July 31, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Khuzestan office explain the conditions inside the Cult of Rajavi

Nejat Society Khuzestan office received the brother of an MKO member on Sunday July 22^nd, 2018.

Adel Keshmiri

Adel Keshmiri whose brother Nader has been taken as a hostage by the Mujahedin Khalq cult was welcome by the officails of Nejat office in Ahvaz, Khuzestan.

Representatives at Ahvaz office described the latest situation of the MKO members in Tirana, Albania. They suggested that the increasing trend of defection from the group has made the group leaders impose more pressure on their hostages. They have enhanced the controlling and monitoring tactics in order to prevent defections.

Appreciating the efforts of Nejat society, Mr. Keshmiri said, “I’m sure that the members of the MKO are not interested in the group at all but they are so brainwashed that they cannot imagine any prospect for themselves outside the group.”

July 31, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Family of MEK’s hostage at Nejat Society, Zanjan office

Two brothers and a sister of Habibollah Qasemi visited Nejat Society representatives at Zanjan Province.

Habibollah Qasemi

Habibollah has been taken as a hostage in the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MEK/ MKO/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi) for years. His family has made efforts to meet him but they even have not been able to make a phone call to him.

Habibi’s older sister Roqayeh has recently died. The other siblings told Nejat Society how much the deceased sister had missed her brother on the late days of her life.

Nejat Society representatives at Zanjan explained the latest news on the situation of the MEK in Albania to the Qasemis.

The Qasemis asserted that they would never quit their efforts to help their brother release from the Cult of Rajavi.

July 31, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

The 17-year-old girl left for war

DURRES / A couple of Canadian citizens, who are Iranian nationals, are asking the Albanian state to allow them, after 21 years, to meet with their daughter who, according to them, is in the Manza camp where the Mojahedin (MEK) are resident.

The couple arrived in Albania at the beginning of July, but after 20 days of trying, are still unable to meet with her. They say that she left the family, aged 17, without their knowledge and went to Iraq to join the MEK organisation. The daughter, called Somayeh Mohammadi, was born on September 8, 1980. She joined the Iranian Mojahedin MEK in 1997. They learned that their 38-year-old daughter is in Camp Ashraf 3 in Manza, where the Mojahedin are hosted in Albania. Her parents, Mostafa and Mahboubeh Mohammadi, claim that the girl is held in this camp against her will and want to meet her and take her home to Canada.

Mr Mostafa, why are you in Albania?

We are in Albania to find our daughter who left the family 21 years ago. We are a couple with Canadian citizenship, but with Iranian ethnicity. 21 years ago, aged 17, our daughter left Canada to join activists in Iraq to overthrow the regime [in Iran].

How did she leave Canada, with or without your knowledge?

Of course without our knowledge. We didn’t know anything about her leaving. When she arrived in the Middle East, she contacted us and told us that she was there for this purpose, to join the activists. We were very worried because we knew what was happening in Iraq in 1997, the country was at war.

When she left, who was waiting for her?

I don’t know what to say. After she arrived in the Middle East, we only spoke with her a little. She just told us she had left for this reason without any details, not about to whom she had departed, nor who was waiting for her. She was only 17 years old. She could be manipulated easily. Probably through online contacts.

Was that the last contact you had with your daughter after she arrived in the Middle East?

After she arrived in Iraq, she no longer contacted us. We had no opportunity to find her anymore. As I said, we were worried that the country was at war and as time passed, the days, months, years passed, we didn’t know what had happened to our daughter.

How long have you been in touch with your daughter?

About six years after the US took control of the camp [in 2003]. The US armed forces and authorities identified the people in the camp. We had lost hope that she was alive. Then, at one point we were informed by the Canadian authorities that our daughter was in this camp, which was under US supervision.

Do you think your daughter is in the Mojahedin camp in Manza?

Yes, yes, we are sure. We are confident because all the members of the camp, which was under the control of the US authorities, were transferred here to Albania and are now in Camp Ashraf 3 in Manza, where the Iranian Mojahedin refugees arrived in Albania from Iraq after they were originally taken to Iraq.

What is your daughter called and how old is she?

Her name is Somayeh Mohammadi, she was born on September 8, 1980. She joined the Iranian Mojahedin in 1997. The girl is being held at Camp Ashraf 3 in Manza against her will by these Mojahedin.

You said you were not in contact with your daughter for years, how do you know she is being held against her will?

She is being held against her will because the mission is accomplished. The regime has changed and this was her aim. Already she prefers to join her family in Canada, where her parents and two brothers are waiting.

You came to get your daughter and return to Canada?

Yes, that’s why I came, along with my wife. But not only can we not take her home, we can’t even meet with her. We came specifically from Canada to find our daughter because we discovered that she is in the Mojahedin camp in Durres (Manza). We have joined with Albanian and international institutions and we have not finished our task. We seek nothing but to meet with our daughter who we have not seen for 21 years. This meeting will only be possible if it takes place in the presence of the police or other authorities.

July 30, 2018 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Resorting to the MKO marks the America’s confusion over Iran

The US secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s speech on his administration’s foreign policy towards Iran at Reagan Library seems to be another sign of determination of the US administration to topple the Iranian government. His speech might have cheered up the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi) more than anyone else because Pompeo’s words were was just as aggressive as the speeches the MKO’s American advocates made in the group’s annual gathering earlier this his month in Paris.

However, the essence of Pompeo’s speech should be analyzed to conclude to what extent, if any at all, benefits the MKO. There is a big doubt that it benefits them at all.

The retired Foreign Service Officer John Limbert asserts Pompeo’s speech in California on Sunday night “reveals some basic facts about the administration’s approach to Iran” but it does not indicate what the administration wants beyond the end of the Islamic Republic. “It knows what it does not want,” writes Limbert. “It has no idea what it does want.” [1]

“It has no coherent message on Iran,” he adds. “On the one hand, Pompeo says that people in Iran should have the same freedoms that Iranian-Americans enjoy. On the other hand, President Trump, in his midnight tweet, threatens to annihilate millions of them.” [2]

Ali Vaez, the director of Iran Project at the International Crisis Group (ICG), says Pompeo’s outreach effort is “an exercise in futility.” [3]

“Iranian opposition in exile is too fractured, too disconnected from the country’s realities, and basically beyond repair. Any alternative to the Islamic republic should be homegrown, not engineered in the Golden State (California),” Vaez said in an e-mail to RFE/RL. [4]

Limbert points out the MKO as the alternative that the US administration may think of. He recounts the reality of the MKO and the ambiguity of the group and its advocates in the US administration. He confirms the hypocrisy of the MKO as an anti-American political group that has turned out to be the ally of the US President’s security advisor John Bolton and his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani. Limbert initiates his argument with a very famous Persianslogan of the MKO:

“The angry Mojahed lies in ambush in the alley,

American, come out. Your blood will flow on the ground.”

“Thus sang the militants of the Iranian opposition group MEK(Mojahedin-e-Khalq) to a catchy Kurdish folk tune,” he describes the MKO’s true face. “Now the same group—rebranding itself as democratic and pluralistic—presents itself as the best alternative to the current reactionary theocracy. In so doing, it has purchased support from Americans on both left and right, including the current national security advisor, the president’s personal attorney, and the former speaker of the House of Representatives.” [5]

He suggests that the overthrow of the Islamic Republic will leave Trump’s administration in bewilderment and those who advocate the Mujahedin will be left with a notorious group which is not desired in Iran. “John Bolton and his friends, would end up backing the above-noted MEK, a group hated by most Iranians and resembling a combination of the Jonestown cult and the Khmer Rouge,” he writes. [6]

Limbert approves that Pompeo and his partners do not know enough about the realities of the Iranian society. “I keep wondering who is feeding him this information,” Limbert told the NPR of Pompeo’s remarks. “It’s clear from his speech that he understands nothing about the internal dynamics of the country.” [7]

Pual Pillar of Lobelog has a good response to the question. He states that the US administration has resorted to the policy as a last resort to a terrorist group that in its long list of victims even there are American citizens, in his meager policies. “Even if the regime in Iran were to change significantly in the next couple of years, that leaves the question of the direction of change,” he writes. “The bankruptcy of the administration’s thinking on this subject is underscored by the role that the cult-cum-terrorist-group known as the Mujahedin-e Khalq (or MEK)—which was invited to Pompeo’s speech—plays in that thinking. The MEK has American blood on its hands, and it lost almost all support it once had in Iran when it became an auxiliary to Saddam Hussein’s security apparatus during the Iran-Iraq War. Trump’s national security adviser, John Bolton, and his lawyer, Rudolph Giuliani, are among those close to the president who have sung the praises of the MEK in exchange for fat speaking fees.” [8]

By Mazda Parsi

References:

[1] Limbert, John, Pompeo and Iran: A Bizarre Mentality, Lobelog, July 24th, 2018

[2] ibid

[3]Esfandiari, Golnaz, Pompeo Reaches Out To Iranian-Americans Amid Hard-Line On Iran, Radio Farda, July 20th, 2018

[4] ibid

[5] Limbert, John, Pompeo and Iran: A Bizarre Mentality, Lobelog, July 24th, 2018

[6] ibid

[7] Kelemen, Michele; Leff ,Alex Trump Administration’s Support For Iran Protests May Backfire, Experts Warn, NPR, July 28th, 2018

[8] Pillar, Paul R., The Ugly Destination of Trump’s Iran Policy, lobelog, July 23rd, 2018

July 29, 2018 0 comments

The cult of Rajavi

Secretive MKO Cult Member Refuses to Talk to Peace Activists in DC

A secretive member of the US-backed MKO terrorist group refuses to talk about the nature of their organization to the members of CODEPINK, a women-initiated grassroots peace and social justice movement in the US.

Medea Benjamin and National Director Ariel Gold two members of social justice movement faced an uncommunicative member of the US-backed Mojahedin-e Kahlgh (MKO or MKE) when they try to have an interview about the nature of the group at the terrorist organization’s headquarter in DC.

https://dlb.nejatngo.org/Media/Interview/Safavi_CODEPINK.mp4

The women-initiated group tried to talk to the MKO member, asking him about the group’s legitimacy and what he does at the headquarter, but the man who calls himself Ali refuses to give them even the simplest information about the MKO and when he is asked about the Saudi money that is being given to the group he says that it is all Iranian propaganda while the previous reports revealed that the goup are financially supported by the Saudi Arabia.

“As you can see, they were not receptive. Bolton wants to attack Iran & put these folks in power? It’s a repeat of the Iraqi National Congress debacle after the US invaded Iraq,” the CODEPINK group wrote on their twitter account refereeing to the hostile nature of the group.

The MKO – listed as a terrorist organization by much of the international community – fled Iran in 1986 for Iraq and was given a camp by former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

They fought on the side of Saddam during the Iraqi imposed war on Iran (1980-88). They were also involved in the bloody repression of Shiite Muslims in southern Iraq in 1991 and the massacre of Iraqi Kurds.

The notorious group is also responsible for killing thousands of Iranian civilians and officials after the victory of the Islamic Revolution in 1979.

More than 17,000 Iranians, many of them civilians, have been killed at the hands of the MKO in different acts of terrorism including bombings in public places, and targeted killings.

From the Medea Benjamin FB Page

July 29, 2018 0 comments

Missions of Nejat Society

Why did Iranian Mojahedin physically assault Mostafa Mohammadi?

Since July 5, 2018, two old Canadian citizens have wandered around Tirana; Mostafa Mohammedi and Mahboubeh Hamza. These two elderly people who have wandered the streets of Tirana for more than three weeks, desperately knock on the doors of Albanian institutions and ask for help. They want to meet their daughter, Somayeh Mohammadi, who was abducted when she was 17 years old by the Iranian Mojahedin terrorist organization.

The Mojahedin who kidnapped Somayeh from Canada 21 years ago in 1997, promised her a free visit to Iraq, but then didn’t allow her to return home. In 1999, when Somayeh’s brother Mohammad went to Iraq to rescue his sister, he was also abducted by the Mojahedin and was forced inside Camp Ashraf. Somayeh’s father, Mostafa Mohammadi, who has left no stone unturned in his efforts to rescue his children, finally, in 2004, with the help of the American marines, saved his son Mohammad from the jihadist camp. However, he failed to save Somayeh.

From 2004 until today, Mostafa and Mahboubeh have visited Iraq, Jordan, America and France to find their daughter, who, like a few hundred more young men and women, is held captive by a frightening terrorist organization.

When the Iranian Mojahedin arrived here in 2016, Mohammadi finally had an address where he could look for his daughter. For this reason, on 5 July 2018, after gathering money for his visit, he finally came to Tirana. He went to the UNHCR’s office, Ramsa, the Interior Ministry, the police, etc. and explained that he wanted to find and meet his daughter. While the Interior Ministry and the charity office headed by Sokol Sheti, said that his daughter does not exist, other organizations informed Mostafa that his daughter was alive in Albania and in Manëz. They showed him his daughter’s file but told him he could not access the file because that privilege was only for Sokol Sheti, who had lied. The fact that Somayeh was alive was marvellous for Mostafa and gave him hope.

But the Iranian jihadists who are protected by the Albanian state and who have many child soldiers – that is, soldiers who have been kidnapped as children and kept for years – when they learned that Mostafa had finally discovered that his daughter was alive, panicked. Three days after Mostafa arrived in Albania, ie on July 8, 2018, they wrote a letter on behalf of Somayeh – which they distributed to the media on July 22 only after Mostafa discovered his daughter was there. In the letter written on behalf of Somayeh, the Mojahedin portray Somayeh as their devotee who does not belong to her father. In the letter which the Mojahedin issued to the media on behalf of Somayeh, they write that Somayeh will not meet her father and mother because, the letter claims, they are agents of Iran.

Media from Anila Basha’s newsbomb to Lapsi have published the MEK leaflet which demands that Minister Xhafaj deport Mostafa and Somayeh’s mother. But Mostafa, who is not afraid of the MEK leaflet, responded to Minister Xhafaj by explaining that he is a Canadian citizen and construction worker who wants only for his daughter to be taken home – taken to Toronto and not to Tehran.

But even if Mostafa Mohammed was an Iranian agent, again, no son of a bitch has any right in this world to stop a mother and a father from having the right to meet their child. Maryam Rajavi and her terrorists sheltering in Manëz at the Ashraf 3 paramilitary camp are using every stone and tool to frighten Mostafa and Mahboubeh and not let them meet their daughter. They are using ‘foreign agents’ accusations, fake news, money, threats and their ties with the Albanian government to get Mostafa deported from Albania so as not to meet his daughter. Some media outlets that publish the copy-paste libel of the MEK jihadists – who label Mostafa as an Iranian agent – have also fallen into this propaganda trap.

But Mostafa is brave. He will not surrender and does not get frightened. On July 24, 2018, he talked about the MEK kidnapping and illegal detention of his daughter. The criminal proceeding that was issued in Durres has led the criminal police to enter the Manëz camp, find, identify and meet the girl. Although the meeting with Somayeh at the police station took place in the presence of the MEK Gestapo – who do not leave their members alone for even a moment and threaten them if they express any desire to leave the cult, sooner or later Somayeh will meet with her father and mother, on her own, free and without fear of MEK commanders, who, if Somayeh for even a moment now dares to say, “I want to meet my mom and dad”, will seriously condemn and possibly kill her!

Some former Mojahedin who have abandoned the MEK jihad and live in Tirana, and also some of Somayeh’s friends who are now Denmark and the US, testify that Somayeh loves her mother and father very much and dreams of living with them one day. She is not a devotee, like the devotees who created the Labor Party in Albania, who abandoned their mothers and fathers for the sake of the Party. Somayeh will meet her parents, but she is just scared and for now she cannot do this because she is isolated by MEK. For 24 hours a day under the MEK Gestapo Somayeh does not watch television, does not read the internet, does not have a phone, does not read the newspaper, is not allowed to leave the camp and has no idea what her mom and her dad are doing in Tirana. The only thing that the MEK commanders say to her, is that Iran has brought some agents who want to kill her and the holy Maryam Rajavi. Somayeh has been totally isolated for 20 years and has no idea of the outside world.

Hassan, a former Mojahed who lives in Tirana and has abandoned jihad, describes why Somayeh is afraid to leave the camp and meet her parents. ‘The Mojahedin threaten you and tell you, if you meet your mother and father, Iranian agents will kill you. On the other hand, the camp at Manëz is guarded by private armed police who are used as a threaten Somayeh and her friends who are thinking of abandoning jihad. The Mojahedin commanders say to those who they think want to escape from the camp, that if they do such a thing they will be hit and killed.’

Mostafa Mohammadi, who understands how his daughter is being held hostage, does not surrender. He is following legal remedy and hopes that one day when he does see his daughter – away from the Mojahedin Gestapo which threaten her all the time – Somayeh will fall on her parents’ neck and tell them: Mom and Dad, I want to go with you in Canada! Get me out of this disgusting terrorist camp that has held me hostage for 20 years. Mostafa and Mahboubeh have built Somayeh a new home in Toronto and are eagerly waiting for their daughter to abandon jihad, complete her college education and then go to university. For her to find a good job and then marry, as have her brothers and sisters living in Canada. Mohammad, her brother who lives and works in Ottawa, tells their father, please do whatever you can to save Somayeh.

Somayeh’s freedom terrifies the Mojahedin. If Somayeh abandons the MEK’s Manëz camp and goes to Canada she will be followed by several hundred other Mojahedin who have been isolated from their families for 20 years. Families who have lost their children in the MEK camp (and who the Albanian state prohibits from entering the country on the pretext that they are Iranian agents) will flood Albania and seek the freedom for their children without being afraid that MEK will accuse them of being Iranian agents.

Many witnesses who have left the MEK narrate horrific stories. Members there are not only kept in terrible conditions, but there are many women who have been raped by Massoud Rajavi, leader of the cult.

For this reason, the Mojahedin went crazy today and attacked Somayeh’s father in the streets of Tirana. They think they live in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq and that by slandering and accusing the elderly Mostafa of being an Iranian agent, they will be able to frighten and deter Mostafa from his demand for justice.

Today, under the command of jihadist Commander Behzat Saffari, the Mojahedin attacked and beat Mostafa Mohammadi, striking him and calling him a terrorist. Later, after Tirana police escorted these Mojahedin to Police Commissariat No. 4, the Mojahedin surrounded the police station with 50 Mojahedin who protested against Mostafa and his lawyers, who they labelled terrorists.

Police at the Regional Commissariat No. 4, who were offended by the Mojahedin attack, finally saw with their own eyes the threat that violent jihadism constitutes for Albania. Although the Mojahedin thought that by beating Mostafa they would frighten him, things went differently. Tirana police acknowledged Mostafa’s denunciation of the violence against him and the case has already passed to the court. Mostafa is free and will continue with the prosecution against hostage-taking by the jihadist group in the serious crimes tribunal.

The Mojahedin’s beating of Mostafa has not scared him at all. Mostafa and his wife will continue the legal battle to the end. They will release Somayeh from the horrible Mojahedin cult and take her to Canada.

This fact terrifies the Mojahedin. And this is the reason they beat Mostafa on the streets of Tirana today.

May God not allow the Mojahedin to kill Mostafa, Somayeh, or the people who are working to release her!

Translated by Iran Interlink

July 29, 2018 0 comments

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