Seeking war and paralyzing sanctions against the Iranian people, the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/PMOI/ Cult of Rajavi) should be considered as part of the B-team.
Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif accused a ‘B-Team’ of pushing the US towards”disaster”by clashing with Iran.”President Trump believes putting pressure, bullying, will bring us to the negotiating table so he can make this ideal deal he has in mind. I don’t know what that deal is,”Zarif told the Asia Society in New York.
The so-called ‘B-Team’ Zarif named consisted of US National Security Advisor John Bolton, United Arab Emirates Crown Prince Mohamed bin Zayed, Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.
“The B-Team is pushing US policy toward a disaster,”Zarif said, decrying what he called Trump’s”obsession”with”bullying”Iran. Zarif added that the B-team has a “plot” to push for the disaster.
How is the MEK involved with the B-team?
The MEK is the link between its financial sources and the right wing western politicians. The most recent revelations on the MEK’s money laundering activities was made by Foreign Policy last week. “The upstart far-right party is unapologetically Islamophobic, but without donations from Iranian exiles, it may have never gotten off the ground,” reported Sohail Jannessari and Darren Loucaides of FP. [1]
“Documents leaked to the Spanish newspaper El País show that almost 1 million euros donated to Vox between its founding in December 2013 and the European Parliament elections in May 2014 came via supporters of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), an exiled Iranian group,”
According to FP. “The NCRI was set up in the 1980s by Mojahedin-e-Khalq (MEK) and a number of other Iranian dissidents and opposition groups. The MEK’s allies later abandoned the NCRI, making the organization functionally an alias for the MEK.” [2]
The FP correspondents who view the Vox as a racist, homophobic, Islamophobic and sexist party, interviewed some sources to investigate the motives of the MEK and its financial resources that make it capable of funding a right wing European group.
Alejo Vidal-Quadras, a now-retired Spanish politician, who previously served as one of the 14 vice presidents in the EU Parliament, has been a longtime paid supporter of the MEK and one of those lobbyists who helped the group get removed from the EU’s list of foreign terrorist organizations in 2009. “Spain’s Vidal-Quadras went on to help found Vox in late 2013. And supporters of the NCRI provided the funding needed to launch the right-wing party and contest the 2014 European elections,” according to El País. [3]
“The MEK may have just been returning the favor to a long ally, Vidal-Quadras, who has been supportive of the MEK for years,” FP authors suggest. “But as one former member of the MEK executive committee told Foreign Policy, the financial resources the group gained under Saddam Hussein have likely run out—which suggests that it may have another source of funding today.”
“Mojahedin [MEK] are the tool, not the funders. They aren’t that big. They facilitate,” said Massoud Khodabandeh, former member of the group and the Director of Middle East Strategy Consultants told FP. “You look at it and say, ‘Oh, Mojahedin are funding [Vox].’ No, they are not. The ones that are funding that party are funding Mojahedin as well.” [4]
Khodabandeh said he himself was involved in moving money for the MEK and its funders during the reign of Saddam Hussein. “I went to Riyadh and recovered three trucks of gold bars from agents of [the] Saudi intelligence agency [at that time] led by Prince Turki bin Faisal. We transferred them to Baghdad and then to Jordan. We sold the bars in Jordan,” he claimed. [5]
Khodabandeh’s account raises the question of where the MEK’s money is coming from today. Heyrani, the recent MEK defector, also handled parts of the organization’s finances in Iraq and was blunt when asked about the current financial backing of the MEK: “Saudi Arabia. Without a doubt,” he told FP. [6]
The flow of the money laundered by the MEK finds its way in the pockets of the far right politicians of the United States, too. President Trump’s national security adviser John Bolton is the most prominent figure to receive MEK’s hefty sums. “Bolton is estimated to have received upwards of $180,000 to speak at multiple events for MeK,” the Guardian reported in July 2018. “His recent financial disclosure shows that he was paid $40,000 for one speech at an MeK event last year.” [7]
Zarif also brought up Bolton’s past associations with the MEK in his interview with Bolton’s favorite news media, Fox News. Zarif said Bolton had told the group at a rally “that he would celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Islamic revolution, in Tehran with that terrorist organization.” [8]
Tom Rogan of Washington Examiner correctly suggests, “For Bolton, the priority is not a democratic Iran, but a pro-American Iran. Bolton has been flexible in pursuit of this end.” [9] He confirms that Bolton –as one of the Bs of the B team—has been the most frequent paid speaker of the MEK.
“While Bolton refused to comment when asked if he was paid for his speeches, the Wall Street Journal’s Farnaz Fassihi and Seymour Hersh have accused Bolton of receiving payments,” Tom Ragan states. ”Another source, speaking to the Washington Examiner, supported these claims.” [10]
Moreover, MEK’s connections with Israel have been denounced several times in the assassination of the Iranian nuclear scientists. MEK connections with Bolton, Bin Salman’s agents, Benjamin Netanyahou’s Intelligence Mossad simply indicates its substance as a tool in the hands of the enemies of Iranian nation.
By Mazda Parsi
References:
[1] Jannessari, Sohail & Loucaides, Darren, Spain’s Vox Party Hates Muslims—Except the Ones Who Fund It, Foreign Policy, April 27, 2019.
[2] ibid
[3] ibid
[4] ibid
[5] ibid
[6] ibid
[7] Merat, Aron, Terrorists, cultists – or champions of Iranian democracy? The wild wild story of the MEK, the Guardian, November 9, 2018.
[8] CNS News, Bolton haunted by MEK association, April 30, 2019.
[9] Rogan, Tom, John Bolton: A complex worldview that just might work for Trump, Washington Examiner, April 30 2019.
[10] ibid