++ An article by Mojtabah Rashidi explains why Rajavi now knows that the new government of Iraq is no different from the previous one as far as the MEK is concerned. Rashidi says it is ridiculous that Rajavi believes he can create a new Vatican by having Camp Liberty guarded by UN blue helmet peacekeepers as though that would automatically make it an independent enclave. Shortly after this article was published, the Head of UNAMI, Nickolay Mladenov, announced that the new Iraqi government has introduced a plan to speed up deportation of the MEK. Some days later, the MEK published some pdf files – which it claims are from inside the Iraqi government – purporting to show that Iran and Iraq are eavesdropping on MEK conversations and phone calls, etc. A couple of analysis about this situation demonstrate why the pdf files are clearly false. Three documents allegedly from the same office all have different logos and page headings and there are no signatures or stamps on them, which is not what government documents look like. One of them is also half in Farsi. Website Mojahedin.com commented that ‘as a terrorist organisation, did Rajavi expect the Iraqis wouldn’t follow what you are doing, or did you imagine in your dreams that the MEK is the government of Iraq and the government of Iraq is a terrorist organisation?!’ And that ‘after all his cries of victory when it was formed, Rajavi has now given up on the new government being any different. [Editor: Had Rajavi been reassured by agencies trying to manipulate the make-up of the new government, but whose plans failed?]
++ Shahpour Bastansiah, an orchestral conductor, announced his defection from the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI aka MEK) last week. J. Saalvar found and exposed the names of two other NCRI members who have left but who didn’t make their decision public; they are Morteza Barjasteh and Mohammad Shams, both artists. After these three defections, Rajavi and the MEK held a new session with remaining NCRI members during which they were both placated and reprimanded. The NCRI proclaimed ‘there is a difference between those who leave legitimately and mercenaries. The NCRI accepts that people leave if they do it legitimately. We will not conduct character assassination if, firstly, you leave without saying anything at all about anyone or anything. (A hint to Bastansiah to keep quiet.) Secondly, only leave according to a programme made for you by the MEK which will tell you the right time and place and will coach you how and when to leave. Several reactions in Farsi commentary say this lowering of expectation is an indication of the collapse of the NCRI, that it doesn’t matter who is in or out of it, what matters is no one should expose the internal situation.
++ Hanif Heydar Nejad, an internal critic of the MEK, wrote a short article questioning ‘now that Daesh is only 10 km from Baghdad airport, what is Rajavi’s policy and what action will he take, or is he keeping his fingers crossed that the MEK all get killed by Daesh?’ Massoud Khodabandeh is visiting Baghdad and will publish a full report after concluding his meetings this week. In the meantime, he posted on his Facebook that with two car bombs in Baghdad and Daesh so close to the airport where Camp Liberty is situated, it is interesting that Massoud Rajavi has sent a message to MEK commanders at the camp saying that he has been reassured (he didn’t say by whom), that ‘Daesh will not interfere with our camp when they overrun the area’. It is surprising because no one in Baghdad has any doubt that Rajavi’s endgame is to kill all the residents of Camp Liberty.
++ Fars News reporting from the Frankfurt Book Fair, in which the IRI participated, published pictures of the MEK placing anti-Iran pickets in tents outside. The report says, ‘this time there were no logos of Massoud and Maryam Rajavi’. Fars commented that this was probably the first time the MEK have accepted to do this, and we hope it is just the start of them getting rid of the leadership and their logos and becoming a normal organisation.
++ Zahra Sadat Mirbagheri and Hamed Sarrafpour, former leading MEK members, were married in Iran last week. A week before, another famous defector, Ali Khatami, got married. People congratulated them and say these marriages are Rajavi’s worst nightmare because they contradict his rotten ideology.
++Iraq based Sahar Family Foundation published a short article about Ghorban Ali Hossein Nejad. Since the time he left and owing to the vicious character assassination conducted against him by Massoud Rajavi there has been a growing awareness inside Camp Liberty of the mismatch between the person they knew and these attacks, which has led many to reject them. Rajavi has been forced to perform some damage limitation. He has now issued several messages which, while still attacking Hossein Nejad, backtrack on the more vicious lies.
In English:
++ IRNA reports: A professor in Rome University and Chairman of World Study Institute Nicola Pedde, who has written a book about the activities of MKO terrorist group, says the group will never have a place in Iran. The Italian author in his book ‘MEK’ has, in detail, underlined the terrorist nature of MKO and has written about their historical background and development of the group since 1965.
++ Ehsan Roshanzamir, Iraian Pen club (Ghalam), wrote an Open Letter to UK MEP Emma McClarkin alerting her to the true face of the Mojahidin, and warning, “please don’t let your political consciousness be humiliated by them”.
++ Mazda Parsi in Nejat bloggers identifies the MEK as one of several proxy forces used by America and the West against Iran and in other arenas. Listing various scenarios and collating reports about these events, Parsi’s article demonstrates this, but warns, “US support for the MKO does not seem to be productive for both the MKO and the US because of the group’s lack of popular backing in Iran. [Antony] Cartalucci asserts that the West’s “mystery gunmen” are found in Iraqi Camp liberty, Libya and Syria, Egypt, Ukraine, Thailand and now Hong Kong. As a matter of fact, he should notice that the same pattern probably cannot be operative in case of the MKO because the majority of Iranian nation do not care about the MKO if they do not detest it.”
++ Writing in RT, Caleb Maupin, a political analyst from New York City and an activist with the International Action Center and Workers World Party, critiques an article published ealier in October by The Associated Press entitled “Iran Dissident: Tehran Continues Nuke Arms Work”. According to Maupin, “The forgotten history of a group of “Iranian dissidents” being promoted in Western media shows the hypocrisy of the so-called “War on Terror.”… the piece quoted Mujahadeen-e-Khalq (MEK) members, who insist that Iran is developing nuclear weapons. Maupin identified other media such as FOX News in which the MEK are being promoted in spite of their past and that they are universally hated by Iranians.
++ Former MEK member Mohammad Karami, resident in Paris, writes an Open Letter to Polish MEP, EyszarCzarnecki, asking why he would have solidarity with a terrorist cult? “You are aware of the Great Purge conducted by Joseph Stalin in the 1930s. Massoud and Maryam Rajavi have turned the Mojahedin Khalq Organisation into a destructive cult. The existing organisation is exactly like the NKD of Stalin. Massoud Rajavi in his internal meetings has over and over referred to the crimes of Stalin as «revolutionary actions». I can tell you clearly that Stalin is a role model for the Mojahedin Khalq leaders and Massoud and Maryam Rajavi themselves. Many disaffected members have been arrested, imprisoned and interrogated on the direct order of Massoud and Maryam Rajavi.”
October 17, 2014