During the meeting, held on Friday, the Swedish foreign minister referred to the 400-year history of the relations between the two countries. She praised the Iranian expatriates living in Sweden as well-educated and added that she has personally visited Iran.

Linde noted that Sweden seeks expansion of ties with Iran and proposed a meeting of the joint political committee of the two countries to be held in Tehran in the near future.

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian and his Swedish counterpart Ann Linde during their meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York

She also touched on the crisis in Yemen, saying her country is committed to help end the crisis. The top diplomat added that Sweden is in contact with all sides in Yemen and considers consultations with Iran in this regard as essential.

During the meeting, the Iranian foreign minister also said the volume of trade and economic ties between the two countries is currently not at a favorable level. Amirabdollahian called for measures to improve and upgrade trade exchanges between the two countries, including through facilitation of the ties between private sectors, establishment of direct flights and easing of travel between the two countries.

The top diplomat also stressed that the crisis in Yemen does not have any military solution, saying the human crisis should be addressed through lifting of the [Saudi-led] blockade.

He added that the conflict in Yemen is an unequal war in which the people of the country are targeted in acts of cowardice.

During the meeting, Amirabdollahian also mentioned the trial held for an Iranian national in Sweden. He said the MKO terror grouping is behind the fabricated case and the inhuman plot.

The foreign minister stressed that the court should pay attention to the fact that all evidence and allegations presented to the court, are fabricated by a group, which is known to engage in falsification and deceit. He said this demonstrates that the court process lacks validity and is politicized.

During the meeting, the two sides also exchanged views on the Afghan situation and the latest developments in the country.

The post MEK Invalidates Swedish Court appeared first on Nejat Society.

Campbell tried his best to make something positive for the MEK. Reviewing the one-sided nature of the report prompted Massoud Khodabandeh to address Campbell in the Comments saying that

“Good to see they have accepted a journalist inside at all. The picture would have been completed with more info about their time (Most of their active lives) with Saddam, fighting their own country.”

Inevitably the film couldn’t avoid showing some of the realities in the camp: the computer rooms showed that, prompted by this article, the MEK had made some effort to look more ‘normal’ (mugs on the tables, pictures of the leader on the desks instead of on the walls), but the plastic garden chairs, and unsuitable spectacles were still in evidence.

Later Ebrahim Khodabandeh, CEO of Nejat Society wrote an analysis of Campbell’s report, going into some details. Specifically, he pointed out that in this film they deny that they have daily confessional sessions. He said ‘this is where they are: forget about even talking about their missing leader Massoud Rajavi, they can’t admit to an audience of ordinary people what they are doing now on a daily basis. This is the sign of a cult. It is, of course, a welcome move that with no kids in the camp they have accepted to admit that they have universal divorces. They used to deny this. In Farsi, many commented that in parts of the film they could not avoid showing reality because it is so obvious. Even though it’s an advert they can’t hide it. Hence, the two young girls who looked like they couldn’t punch their way out of paper bag talking about the violent overthrow of the regime; the young man who couldn’t find Iran on a map, fooled into becoming the next suicide bomber; the elderly man on a mobility scooter which reminded everyone of the incontinence pad photograph.

Several people commented that this promotional film has backfired and has been a waste of Saudi money. The MEK had hoped to go on to advertise their brand on the back of this film. Instead, first they had to denounce that part of the film in which Campbell had tried to be even handed, the interview with ex-member Hassan Heyrani. They attacked the ex-members as though they had been responsible for making the film. Then they stopped talking about the film altogether. This prompted mockery as commentators suggested that Shahin Gobadi would have had to go into isolation and write a report since Maryam Rajavi would blame him for bringing the reporter in the first place: ‘Regrets, I have a few…’.

++ The court case of Hamid Nouri in Stockholm is an example of how a country’s judicial system can be compromised by bending to someone else’s agenda. The case is being covered daily by Saudi backed Iran International; BBC Farsi and every other anti-Iran outlet are also on top of it. It is a case in which the prosecutor has chosen 50 people to give evidence against the defendant – some are appointed as victims and some as witnesses. This week, Massoud Khodabandeh, Sara Zahiri, a reporter in Iran, and Peyman Aref, international law expert in Brussels. joined Vahid Farkhondeh, a journalist in Switzerland for an online programme called Kelid Vajeh to discuss this court case.

Zahiri explained the situation of the MEK from an Iranian point of view; what happened in the Forough Javidan operation in Iran and how Iranians consider the MEK, killing their own people. Farkhondeh and Aref examined details about the court itself. How, according to international law – or any law – the court must first prove that this defendant is the person they say he is, especially since pseudonyms have been used. Yet there is no proof except the witnesses. The defendant denies he is that person and says that he wasn’t where it is claimed he was at that time. Considering that this basic fact-checking has not been done, it is interesting that the prosecutor brought 50 people to testify against him. Choosing so many people to give evidence means that if the court works 3 days per week and each person takes some days to give their evidence, this court case will not take less than 3 years. This looks like a deliberate act. This becomes more suspicious since the court room is filmed without hindrance and broadcast to the anti-Iran media. It is then immediately amplified by the MEK who put their spin on events. The programme’s contributors said this is very strange and that the lawyers of this defendant should take note of these irregularities and question them.
Massoud Khodabandeh talked more about irregularities concerning the witnesses. Specifically relating to the judicial system in Sweden. He recalled that the same system went after Julian Assange on rape charges and when it became too obvious this was a ploy to get him brought to Sweden to be handed over to the Americans, they had to back off with the ridiculous excuse that the memories of the witnesses had faded. Yet in this case, the memories of fifty people are clear enough after three decades. So that they can state categorically that from behind a blindfold thirty years ago, I remembered that this is the same guy. Khodabandeh also said that ironically all these witnesses stand outside the court together, with MEK flags in their hands, declaring victory. The same flag they used to attack Iran with Saddam’s army. He also made the point that these people, however the Swedish judiciary thinks they are credible, are members of a cult, who will kill for their leader never mind lying for their leader. There are pictures of some of them getting ‘charity’ collections in the street (Iran Aid). Khodabandeh said, I cannot find a single one of them who had a proper job whether window cleaner of brain surgeon and paid a penny of tax to their country of residence. Whatever is the Swedish judicial bench mark for the credibility of witnesses, they have tried to choose people from MEK who are not widely known. If they wanted to, they could have brought 500. They have the numbers. If this is the case, am I allowed to bring 200 people to come and testify that each of these people and the prosecutor and the judge have a unicorn horn on their heads but don’t know it themselves. It is not a matter of whether this is a kangaroo court or not, the point is that it has been exposed to be a mockery of what it is. That is due to the ‘tools’ not doing what they should. The first and primary witness, Iraj Mesdaghi cannot keep his mouth shut and gives interviews boasting how ‘we’ fooled this man, set a trap to bring him to Sweden, offering a luxury yacht and five-star hotels to lure him here. In other words, entrapment. He emphasises that “we” paid for it ourselves. This begs the question, because Mesdaghi is an ex-member who never worked and who lives a fairly ordinary life, where is this money from? As is usual, each and every anti-Iran human rights activist claims that we don’t get paid by this one or that one, but that doesn’t address the question ‘where DO you get money from’. Is it possible for Mesdaghi to be a credible witness when he freely admits to having entrapped the defendant. Specifically, the way he gives evidence is interesting. He is allowed to simply talk for an hour or so without being interrupted or questioned. This is because the prosecutors want him to talk. They are giving him a platform to be filmed rather than acting as a witness. Indeed, they give him so much time that he runs out of material; once he ended up describing in detail how in the prison one of the taps wasn’t working properly and dripped. Mesdaghi is a wild card who seeks attention and fame and cannot be controlled. On the ‘other side’ of Mesdaghi is the MEK.

Khodabandeh said that according to sources inside the camp, the MEK are facing the concept that Iraj Mesdaghi has taken over from Maryam Rajavi in terms of importance and prominence. This concern is directed at the ones who are paying; Mesdaghi will get the money rather than us. Again, the payers cannot control the MEK any more than Mesdaghi. Although 50 relatively unknown people were chosen out of the 2000 members, they can’t help coming out and taking photos together under the MEK flag. They don’t care about the court case, they only want to out publicise Maryam Rajavi . When Maryam Rajavi agrees to talk with the Sunday Times journalist and approves publication of the programme it is in order to attach this interview to the court case. Two years down the line they will refer to this court case and Maryam Rajavi’s leadership and link it to president Ebrahim Raisi, saying next court case should be against him. So overwhelmed have the MEK become to get on top of this propaganda opportunity that they have had to divide their Farsi outlets to use this material – some propaganda outlets are for the MEK and some propaganda is specifically against Mesdaghi and his gang.

In the programme, the presenter Farkhondeh asked what the outcome of the court would be. Khodabandeh said that it is not about the outcome. Of course, for the defendant, it’s important, but the purpose of the court case is not the outcome but the journey. It is not about justice; it is about two or three years of anti-Iran propaganda. The conclusion is that the court case is about propaganda against Iran, which doesn’t take it seriously. The real damage is that done to the Swedish judiciary as in the Assange case. The message is that ‘Sweden is not impartial, we can bend our rules and regulations’. As a UK citizen I am unhappy that Sweden is going down this path of being used by those who have their own agenda.

Aug 28, 2021

The post Iran Interlink Weekly Digest – 293 appeared first on Nejat Society.

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh condemned the trial of Iranian citizen, Hamid Nouri, in a Swedish court.

“What is going on in Sweden is a plot designed by the Monafeqin (the hypocrites as the MKO members are called in Iran). Unfortunately, the Swedish court has paid attention to a series of fabricated stories, documents and testimonies, all by one group,” he told reporters on Monday.

Khatibzadeh further recalled that the MKO was responsible for shedding the blood of 17,000 Iranian citizens, and expressed regret over the holding of the tribunal in Sweden.

He further noted that the tribunal in Sweden is taking place at a time when a new administration is coming to power in Iran with the aim of putting pressure on the Iranian officials.

Khatibzadeh also stressed that Iran will use all diplomatic means to protect Hamid Nouri’s rights.

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh

“What matters is that the Swedish court and the Swedish government should know that they have become part of a propaganda campaign led by the Monafeqin, and this is disgraceful for this state,” he underlined.

The MKO is listed as a terrorist organization by much of the international community. Its members fled Iran in 1986 for Iraq, where they received support from then dictator Saddam Hussein.

The notorious outfit has carried out numerous attacks against Iranian civilians and government officials for several decades.

In 2012, the US State Department removed the MKO from its list of designated terrorist organizations under intense lobbying by groups associated to Saudi regime and other regimes adversarial to Iran.

A few years ago, MKO members were relocated from their Camp Ashraf in Iraq’s Diyala Province to Camp Hurriyet (Camp Liberty), a former US military base in Baghdad, and were later sent to Albania.

Those members, who have managed to escape, have revealed MKO’s scandalous means of access to money, almost exclusively coming from Riyadh.

The MKO terrorist group specified the targets as martyred Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani, who commanded the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), and Iranian Judiciary Chief Seyed Ebrahim Rayeesi.

The terrorist organization said it would “welcome” their assassination, adding that it desired for the ranking officials to “join” Asadollah Lajevardi, Tehran’s former chief prosecutor, and Ali Sayyad-Shirazi, a former commander of the Iranian Army’s Ground Forces during Iraq’s 1980-88 war against Iran.

Earlier in June 2019, a leaked audio of a phone conversation between two members of MKO, revealed Saudi regime has colluded with the MKO elements to frame Iran for the tanker attacks in the Persian Gulf.

In the audio, which is being released by the Iran Front Page for the first time, Shahram Fakhteh, an official member and the person in charge of MKO’s cyber operations, is heard talking with a US-based MKO sympathizer named Daei-ul-Eslam in Persian, IFP news reported.

In this conversation, the two elements discuss the MKO’s efforts to introduce Iran as the culprit behind the tanker attacks in the Persian Gulf, and how the Saudis contacted them to pursue the issue.

“In the past week we did our best to blame the [Iranian] regime for the (oil tanker) blasts. Saudis have called Sister Maryam (Rajavi)’s office to follow up on the results, [to get] a conclusion of what has been done, and the possible consequences,” Fakhteh is heard saying.

“I guess this can have different consequences. It can send the case to the UN Security Council or even result in military intervention. It can have any consequence,” Daei-ul-Eslam says.

Attacks on two commercial oil tankers in the Gulf of Oman on June 13, 2019 and an earlier attack on four oil tankers off the UAE’s Fujairah port on May 12, 2019, have escalated tensions in West Asia and raised the prospect of a military confrontation between Iran and the United States.

The US, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE have rushed to blame Iran for the incidents, with the US military releasing a grainy video it claimed shows Iranian forces in a patrol boat removing an unexploded mine from the side of a Japanese-owned tanker which caught fire earlier this month.

It later released some images of the purported Iranian operation after the video was seriously challenged by experts and Washington’s own allies.

The MKO which is said to be a cult which turns humans into obedient robots, turned against Iran after the 1979 Islamic Revolution and has carried out several terrorist attacks killing senior officials in Iran; yet the West which says cultism is wrong and claims to be against terrorism, supports this terrorist group officially.

After the Islamic Revolution in 1979, the MKO began its enmity against Iran by killing over 17,000 Iranians and terrorist activities. Several members of the terrorist group and its leaders are living in France now, freely conducting terrorist activities.

The MKO terrorist group has martyred 17,161 Iranian citizens, including late president Mohammad Ali Rajayee, former prime minister Mohammad Javad Bahonar, late Head of Supreme Judicial Council Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti, late Deputy Chief of the Iranian Armed Forces General Staff Ali Sayyad Shirazi, and 27 legislators, as well as four nuclear scientists.

The post Iran Blasts Swedish Court for Yielding to Terrorist MKO’s Plot appeared first on Nejat Society.