The MEK; the Hypocrites

The Vain Struggle to Keep Ashraf Open

The ground reasons for the closure of Camp Ashraf are more than enough

All the current evidences indicate that the story of MKO is nearing its end in Iraq and closure of its The ground reasons for the closure of Camp Ashraf are more than enough bastion and the consequent expulsion of its insiders from Iraq are unquestionable. And the Rajavis themselves have come to learn the bare fact despite their advocates’ struggle on their behalf. Whatever we see coming out of the organization’s propaganda apparatus drumming up support for the insiders and recognition of their rights is nothing more than a shrewd play by the leaders, with Rajavi at the top, to distract the outsiders from a different episode that is to occur in the future.

The ground reasons for the closure of Camp Ashraf are more than enough to present. The Iraqi Prime Minister, Nuri al-Maliki, made it clear that the camp had to be closed simultaneous with the exit of the American forces from Iraq. America also left the decision for the group’s future to the Iraqi government. However, under outside pressures and to show its good-will for humanitarian reasons, the Iraqi Government agreed to extend the deadline for another six months, beginning October 2011 to the end of April 2012.

However, a big bulk of MKO’s propaganda machine is still concentrating on the issue of recognizing the rights of Camp Ashraf residents and strives on progress to keep the camp open and active in Iraq. Why is Rajavi on a struggle of securing his organization’s stay in Iraq while he knows the efforts are foiled for certain reasons? Neither the Iraqi political potentiality allows the group to live nor does the organization itself feel safe to survive on the Iraqi soil, especially after the leaving of American forces. An idle organization with many imposed limitations would mean a rapid political and strategic deterioration and structural disintegration. The Iraqi government substituting the fallen dictator totally disappointed MKO’s hope of having a replaced reliable patron.

For clear as well as untold reasons Rajavi can neither continue his organization’s stay on the Iraqi soil nor is Iraq willing to let it on its soil. In fact, further stay in Iraq is tantamount to an idle lingering that guarantees no political and strategic development for the organization. Besides, the heavy investment on some former American personalities and paying them thousands of dollars to speak in MKO’s behalf in the group’s occasionally held luxurious events resulted in much less than the least expectations. Above all, Rajavi came to the reality, particularly after the exit of American forces and handling the control of Ashraf to Iraq itself, that none of the orchestrated squawks and protests against the Iraqi Government and demonization of Nuri al-Maliki to prolong his organization’s stay in Iraq could deter Iraq’s decisiveness to expel the group.

However, MKO has proved to be the untrusted party in any contract, the side that refuses to comply with the other side when there is a dispute to be settled peacefully. It spends big sums to challenge and its tone is hostile and threatening when called to parley. Typically, it is a shock and prepared to strike when you never expect it and double speaks when everything seems resolved and concluded. At least it is what has been going on during the past two months of the arrived agreement to move residents from Ashraf to Temporary Transit Location TTL. The deadline is nearing, less than two months, and still Rajavi is dillydallying. Probably, he is gambling on another trick to disappoint the Iraqi Government; but he has to be also alert to the possibility of a shock he never expects.

March 28, 2012 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

MKO’s supporters throw party in U.S. Congress

It’s not every day that groups supporting a State Department-listed foreign terrorist organization hold a party in the U.S. Congress, but that’s exactly what happened today when the friends of the Mujahedeen e-Khalq (MEK) threw their Nowruz party in the hearing room of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
"Members of Congress will join Iranian Americans in wishing the Iranian people a Happy Nowrouz and address the humanitarian rights of Iran’s main opposition in Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty, in Iraq," reads the flyer for the party, which was held Thursday at the Rayburn building in room 2172, where the foreign affairs committee holds all of its public events.
The flyer says that the event is sponsored by "Iranian American communities" from around the United States, but the mention of Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty is a clear reference to the MEK, a group designated by the State Department as a foreign terrorist organization that has about 3,000 members living in the secretive Ashraf compound in Iraq.
The U.N. and the State Department are working to move them to Camp Liberty, a former U.S. military base near the Baghdad airport, but the MEK is resisting that move, and has enlisted its many supporters in the United States to decry the conditions at the former military base. Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani even went so far as to call Camp Liberty a "concentration camp."
House Foreign Affairs Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL) spoke at the event and discussed human rights in Iran, but did not mention the MEK by name. Former Homeland Security secretary and Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge, a paid advocate of the MEK, also spoke.
"The event was not sponsored by the MEK," Ros-Lehtinen’s spokesperson Brad Goehner told The Cable. "The room was requested by the Iranian-American Society of South Florida and sponsored by the Iranian-American communities of 39 cities for an event commemorating the Iranian New Year. Space in Congressional office buildings is routinely made available to organizations wishing to hold events on issues important to members of Congress."
The flyer doesn’t say the party is being thrown by or for the MEK, and aides who attended told The Cable that there were no MEK signs or banners at the event, as one usually sees wherever the MEK is camped out.
That could be a result of the revelation that the Treasury Department’s counterterrorism unit has issued a subpoena to former Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell for records related to his paid advocacy of the MEK, as part of an investigation into the web of organizations that support the terrorist group.
There is a long list of Iranian-American organizations that fund pro-MEK events and pay speakers fees to MEK supporters. Many of these organizations – such as the "Global Initiative for Democracy, whose homepage is entirely devoted to the MEK’s concerns and who hosted an MEK conference in January — seem to have no other function other than to advocate for the MEK, and the actual sources of their money is unclear.
Receiving funding from a terrorist organization or even providing it with "material support," which could include advocacy, is a crime.
The campaign by the MEK’s supporters to disparage Camp Liberty and lobby for the MEK’s removal from the State Department’s list of foreign terrorist organizations has included huge rallies outside the State Department, massive sit-ins at Congressional hearings, and an ongoing vigil outside the State Department’s C Street entrance.
Those supporters, many of them paid, include Giuliani, Rendell, Vermont Governor Howard Dean, Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz, John Lewis (D-GA), former FBI Director Louis Freeh, former Sen. Robert Torricelli, former Rep. Patrick Kennedy, former National Security Advisor Gen. James Jones, former Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Richard Myers, former White House Chief of Staff Andy Card, retired Gen. Wesley Clark, former Rep. Lee Hamilton, former CIA Director Porter Goss, senior advisor to the Romney campaign Mitchell Reiss, retired Gen. Anthony Zinni, and former Sen. Evan Bayh.
Congressional aides attended the event on Thursday in the hearing room both out of curiosity and hunger for free food. But multiple aides told The Cable the event was bizarre, even by Congressional standards.
"Looks like you just have to be the ‘right’ terrorist organization to hold a fancy party in the halls and hearing rooms of Congress," one House aide told The Cable. "Hope everyone who ate their kabobs doesn’t get hit with material support subpoenas."

Josh Rogin, Foreign Policy

March 26, 2012 0 comments

The MEK Expulsion from Iraq

Martin Kobler in the European Parliament on the MKO

On Wednesday, 21/03/2012 Martin Kobler, the UN Special Representative for Iraq and Head of the United Nation Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI), reported to the meeting of the Foreign Affairs Committee on the work of the UNHCR and UNAMI in Iraq and the current situation of the Iranian Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) in Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty.
As part of his description of the problems of resettlement of the Ashraf residents Kobler said that it demanded a cooperative attitude from the residents.
The infrastructure at Camp Liberty was indeed improved, but the basic services are guaranteed. The capacity of the camp was for use by 4000 – 5000 U.S. soldiers and UN staff. This has been sufficient and would offer ample space.
The medical care at Camp Ashraf, although confined to two doctors and six nurses, but also including use of hospitals outside of Liberty, is guaranteed. The establishment of a clinic inside the camp had, however, until recently been refused by the residents, said Kobler.
In addition, there are ultra-modern kitchen facilities in accordance with U.S. standards, but these were rejected by the occupants.
The U.S. special envoy for Camp Ashraf, Daniel Fried, said that the information that the United States has of the situation in Camp Ashraf and Liberty is consistent with Kobler’s descriptions. The conditions at Camp Liberty are not nearly as bad as described by the MEK.
Kobler appealed to the MEK, to refrain from propaganda and complained that the constant, unnecessary rhetorical attacks by the MEK and its supporters are hindering the UN and the Iraqis in their work.
Fried said the key to success is not discussions about the conditions at Camp Liberty, but the progress of the work of the UNHCR.
In a conversation with Mr Kobler following the meeting, we had the opportunity to inform him of our "Back to the Family" initiative and asked him to work to ensure that in individual discussions with the UNHCR the Ashraf residents are made aware as soon as possible that contact with their family members is available.

March 24, 2012 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

The Hired Recruits of a Terrorist Cult

MKO hires businessmen to start a bargain over the suffering residents of Ashraf

Once the Nazi Propaganda Minister, Joseph Goebbels, said “The rank and file are usually much MKO hires businessmen to start a bargain over the suffering residents of Ashraf more primitive than we imagine. Propaganda must therefore always be essentially simple and repetitious. The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly… it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over”. And it is really a recipe for disaster if a terrorist cult clings onto this Nazi precept in its propaganda activities.

The recent revelations concerning the speaking fees paid to the former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell as a supporter of a designated terrorist group MKO, only one of a group of senior former American officials and military commanders walking on the same line, are sad news to hear especially when you come to realize that these advocates have been a part of an administration that voiced a global war on terrorism. It is hard to believe that they did not know how a military base, Camp Ashraf, emerged out of a desert in the dictatorial reign of Saddam and how it was turned into a cult bastion. And both sides know well what the other side needs and demands.

MKO is looking for the middlemen and businessmen to start a bargain and voice what has been gone unheard for its inclusion in the terror list. The leaders of MKO living in Paris have a low opinion of Ashraf residents as the members of the organization but the best levers to bargain. Being the victims of a terrorist cult for at least 25 years, now the residents enslaved in Ashraf are hostages for a bargain to impose the will of being removed from the terrorist list and the American and European paid middlemen have volunteered to voice it. In fact, the cliché phrases and sentences they parrot in arranged conferences and rallies are exactly what their employers, and the manageresses in particular, have dictated to them. They are confined to two points; “remove MKO from the terrorist list, help Ashraf residents”.

Out of presenting justifications for receiving huge sums of easy money or being conned by an incredible MKO lobbying effort carried out through a series of front groups, none of these nearly two dozen high-profile speakers can justify how they happened to volunteer for bargaining the lot of some hundred suffering souls. Through any taken opportunity in the past, there has been an attempt by ex-members and other experts to tell the world of the concerns about the members not living but enslaved and held in Camp Ashraf against their own will. Maybe the world couldn’t but they could see how the organization was exploiting insiders as human shields to safeguard its own entity rather than being the least concerned about the members themselves.
There has come an opportunity for these enslaved residents to taste freedom after their relocation from Ashraf cult bastion to Temporary Transit Location TTL. But the power of money along with the cultist tactics of MKO is impeding their freedom. The very those people who claim to be a defender of human rights, oppressed people and women in particular are now turning their back on suffering residents and walking against their principles and slogans. Somehow they seem to have been influenced by the brainwashing mechanisms of MKO, demands and principles instilled into them by the force of money. The job was done. They had nothing more to do but to mount the propaganda stage of MKO to enthusiastically repeat and repeat the words put into their minds and months. Under such influence, nobody is ever permitted nor thinks of the predicament of whom, under the hollow slogans of being the pioneers and heroines of freedom and democracy, suffer crushing physical and psychological pressures even worse than those enslaved in the outside world. It is a pity that the so-called advocates of freedom and democracy chant anti-human, pro-cultist and pro-terrorist slogans under the dollar shower of a terrorist cult.

March 18, 2012 0 comments

Human Rights Abuse in the MEK

Women, the Scapegoats of Rajavi’s Cult

Female MKO members are easy scapegoats to be victimized by the cult of Rajavi
Women, the Scapegoats of Rajavi’s Cult
It is a global responsibility to support women vulnerable to any form of threat and the international woman’s day is the best occasion to remind the responsibility. But it is much discouraging when you see that the she-guru of a notorious terrorist cult takes advantage of the occasion to conceal her group’s ill-mannered, undemocratic fashion.

In a conference held in Paris on March 10, Maryam Rajavi made a speech in the presence of women gathered from several continents and called for support of female members of the group settled in two locations in Iraq, the military camp of Ashraf and the Temporary Transit Location TTL. The conference was held at a time when the majority of the group’s female members, nearly one third of it, are suffering the harsh conditions and treatments of the recognized terrorist cult.

In her speech, Rajavi said: “Women in MKO suffer crushing physical and psychological pressures under the hollow slogans of being the pioneers and heroines of freedom and democracy”. There is no doubt about the first phrase of her sentence, but, alas, the bare truth about MKO is that “freedom and democracy” have no meaning and place.

In the contemporary history, no cult has overexposed women using them instrumentally as much as MKO. Although Mojahedin have adopted the false ideological and strategic slogan of setting women free form social, conventional, religious, and historical bonds, yet in practice women have been subject to a kind of modern slavery under the cover of freedom through mental and physical convincing mechanisms. Massoud Rajavi, the absent leader of the group, has focused all his efforts in recent years to misuse various social, cultural, religious, and ethical backgrounds to subjugate women. In this regard, he has exploited the emotional attachments and nature of women as well as their ethical, religious, and traditional constraints to increase their dependence on the organization preventing their leaving from the organization.

Meanwhile, promoting women in leadership cadre of the organization is one of the tricks for intensifying the various aspects of this slavery. In the context of a modern slavery bastion, as MKO leaders acknowledge, the main role of MKO’s female rank and file is to be used as human shields for protecting leadership. The published expose and memories by the separated members indicate that the women in MKO have been abused as easy and accessible instruments in the hands of Rajavi to be victimized whenever necessary. Up to that time their role is safeguarding the military bastion of Ashraf as the ideological and strategic container of MKO.

However, the issue of misusing MKO female members has been ignored due to Rajavi’s covering it under the banner of the emancipation of women. The former members have repeatedly referred to the significance of women for Rajavi. He is well aware that the special characteristics of these women like their emotional attachments, lack of support and ethical and religious constraints has excluded the possibility of their leaving from the organization. Besides, they are under the instilled spell of an imaginary threat if they leave the organization. Maryam Rajavi is right when she says “Women in MKO suffer crushing physical and psychological pressures”, yet here the question arises that who poses these pressures and threats?

During the earlier events and conflicts in camp Ashraf, it was observed that these women were used as human shields to prevent the entrance of Iraqi police to camp and also to win the sympathy of the world toward the residents. What is of the significance in the full-scale propaganda blitz of MKO is the insistence on the necessity of saving the life of women members, while hardly you can see any move by the organization to guarantee the welfare, security and freedom of female members. And how many women have been spotted among the two relocated groups from Ashraf to TTL while, as asserted by almost any international convention, the sick people, women and children have the priority of any relocation from a harsh to a better location?

As the female MKO members are easy scapegoats to be victimized, Rajavi seems to be determined to preserve them as human shields for defending Ashraf. In this regard, taking necessary measures for setting Rajavi’s victims free from cultic relations is of highest priority for Iraqi government and the international bodies. And our main responsibility is making the public opinion and the concerned bodies aware of this imminent disaster. MKO female members have been the most ill-fated and vulnerable stratum of the cult of Mojahedin in the past and recent years and now after years of suffering and misuse, they are supposed to be used as Rajavi’s bargaining chips out of any encountered impasse.

March 15, 2012 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Mojahedin Khalq, True Mercenaries

The media spotlight having uncomfortably focused on the MEK’s alleged involvement in Israeli linked assassinations of Iranian scientists in recent weeks, the MEK has given up for the time Mojahedin Khalq, True Mercenaries being on advertising for their original purpose of killing and martyrdom. Instead they have turned up the volume on what France 24 dubbed their ‘battle by press release’.

There can be few journalists in the world who have an interest in Iran and have not been subjected to the MEK’s famous confetti, or ticker-tape, campaign of press releases. After terrorism, the MEK’s expertise is in propaganda. (Being ridiculously well funded is of course another, lesser investigated area of this group’s range of expertise.)

Over in Iraq, long term home to the MEK’s foreign terrorist base, the group’s members – formerly known as Saddam’s private army – are being moved from Camp Ashraf to Camp Liberty(TTL) before they are removed from Iraq altogether.

In response to this imagined affront, the MEK has pursued two tactics in its battle by press release – the first was to demand they be sent to a defunct refugee tent camp at the Jordanian border – and in direct contradiction to this to bleat about the terrible inhumane conditions at Camp Liberty (TTL) – former home to up to 5,000 US army personnel, which must surely earn the MEK the new soubriquet of the ‘MEK Princess Corps’.

But as the pleas for help have fallen on deaf ears and its camp looks set for closure, the MEK has more recently woken up to the need to distract from this existential crisis.

They have turned up the volume of press releases. But that is not all, taking a cursory look at the articles and stories engendered by this exercise, we see that the MEK is apparently advising anyone and everyone on what should be done about Iran. You would imagine the MEK is the expert of choice on everything to do with Iran.

But on closer scrutiny it is clear that none of this advise has come from the MEK’s own analysis or knowledge or from any verifiable or valuable information sources inside Iran – which the MEK simply does not have.

Instead the plethora of messages all contradict one another.

In one article the MEK swears at Nouri al Maliki accusing him of being an ‘agent of the Iranian regime’. Then in another article they refer to him as ‘brother al Maliki’. On one hand the MEK are aligned to Israel, at the same time they are associated with Saddamists from the former Iraqi dictatorship regime. The MEK have been linked with Mossad and the CIA, and also allegedly work with Iran’s ultra right intelligence gangs.

In Washington D.C. the MEK cosy up to the neoconservatives, Israeli lobby and regime change pundits to press for military strikes and war against Iran. The MEK’s black/white version of events infects the Republican electoral campaign with a crass warmongering stance.

Conversely, in Europe and the Persian Gulf States, where such a stance is highly unpopular, the MEK instead claim that the sanctions are working and that they should be given a chance to work further. The Democrats must be pleased to hear such posturing echoing way over across the ocean.

The MEK vilify the Green Movement but praise them as well.

If these contradictions arose from a clever manipulation of world politics they might be worthy of note. But this must be the only mercenary group in the world which offers its services to all sides of the equation, including those which are deadly enemies. Instead of the soft hum of smooth politicking, all we really hear is the loud ‘kerching’ of more money landing in Rajavi’s coffers.

Maybe this is why the MEK have so rapidly lost credence and relevance in the Iran debate – even those who use them are discovering they really can’t be trusted.

Anne Singleton, Author of "The life of Camp Ashraf" and "Saddam’s Private Army"

March 13, 2012 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Are the MEK’s U.S. friends its worst enemies?

For years, a slew of advocates – many of whom have been paid for their services — have flooded U.S. airwaves on behalf of the Mujahedeen e-Khalq (MEK), a State Department-designated foreign terrorist organization opposed to the Iranian regime.

After months of difficult negotiations, the MEK has finally begun moving out of its secretive Iraqi home near the Iranian border, called Camp Ashraf. But the group’s American advocates have now become a major obstacle in the international effort to move the MEK to a new home in Iraq and avoid a bloody clash with the Iraqi military, officials say.

U.N. special representative in Iraq Martin Kobler, with help from the U.S. Embassy in Iraq and the State Department, has organized efforts to relocate the MEK to Camp Liberty, a former U.S. military base near the Baghdad airport. The first convoy of about 400 MEK members arrived there last month. The second convoy of about 400 MEK members arrived Thursday at Camp Liberty, Reuters reported.

The United Nations and the U.S. government have worked tirelessly in recent months to avoid a violent clash between the MEK and the Shiite-led Iraqi government, which is determined to oust the MEK from Camp Ashraf, where more than 3,000 members of the group, many of them suspected to be armed, have lived for years. Two previous attempts by the Iraqi government to enter the camp resulted in bloody confrontations.

But the U.N. and the State Department’s efforts have been made exponentially more difficult due to the MEK’s surprisingly strong base of support in Washington. In recent weeks, retired U.S. officials and politicians — many of whom admit to being paid by the MEK or one of its many affiliates — have mounted a sophisticated media campaign accusing the U.N. and the U.S. government of forcing the group to live in subhuman conditions against its will at Camp Liberty[Temporary Transit Location] , an accusation U.S. officials say is as inaccurate as it is unhelpful.

"This is tough enough without paid advocates making it worse," one official told The Cable.

"Camp Liberty: A Prison For Iranian Dissidents in Iraq," reads a March 3 full-page ad in the New York Times, leveling the surprising accusation that the former U.S. military base is unfit for human occupation. The ad quotes former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani calling Camp Liberty[Temporary Transit Location] "a concentration camp" — a charge Giuliani made at an MEK-sponsored conference late last month in Paris. The ad also quotes former Democratic National Committee chairman and Vermont Governor Howard Dean, former Homeland Security secretary and Pennsylvania Governor Tom Ridge, and Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz trashing Camp Liberty[Temporary Transit Location].

However, according to an Obama administration official who works on the issue, it’s actually the MEK that is trashing Camp Liberty [TTL] — literally. According to this official, the U.N. has reported that MEK members at Camp Liberty[TTL] have been sabotaging the camp, littering garbage and manipulating the utilities to make things look worse than they really are. While there are some legitimate problems at the camp, the official admitted, the U.N. has been monitoring Camp Liberty’s[TTL] water, sewage, and food systems on a daily basis and the conditions are better than the MEK is portraying.

The New York Times ad is only the latest in a years-long, multi-million dollar campaign by the MEK and its supporters to enlist famous U.S. politicians and policymakers in their efforts to get the group removed from the State Department’s list of foreign terrorist organizations and resist Iraqi attempts to close Camp Ashraf, which the new government sees as a militarized cult compound on its sovereign territory.

The campaign has included huge rallies outside the State Department, massive sit-ins at congressional hearings, and an ongoing vigil outside the State Department’s C Street entrance. MEK supporters there tout the support of a long list of officials, including Congressman John Lewis (D-GA), former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, former FBI Director Louis Freeh, former Sen. Robert Torricelli, former Rep. Patrick Kennedy, former National Security Advisor Gen. James Jones, former Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Richard Myers, former White House Chief of Staff Andy Card, retired Gen. Wesley Clark, former Rep. Lee Hamilton, former CIA Director Porter Goss, senior advisor to the Romney campaign Mitchell Reiss, retired Gen. Anthony Zinni, and former Sen. Evan Bayh.

The administration official told The Cable that, as delicate negotiations between the U.N., the United States, the Iraqis, and the MEK continue, the role of these often paid advocates is becoming even more unhelpful and potentially dangerous.

"The Americans who ought to know better and claim to be on the side of good solutions are really damaging it. Either they are too lazy or too arrogant to actually do their homework. They don’t spend the time to learn facts, they just pop off. They accept the MEK line without question and then they posture," the official said. "We have a plan that has a chance to work and the Iraqis want it to work. The MEK … it’s not clear. And in this situation they are being badly advised by the people whose names appear in these ads."

"Whether the MEK wants a resolution or wants a confrontation is something we’re still debating. It’s that bad," the official said.

The relationship between the American advocates and the MEK leadership, led by the Paris-based Maryam Rajavi, has led both to pursue strategies that neglect the dire risks of sabotaging the move from Camp Liberty[TTL] to Camp Ashraf, the official said. Rajavi is said to have created a cult of personality around herself and to rule the MEK as a unchallenged monarch.

"The not-too-stable Queen [Rajavi] hired a bunch of court flatterers to tell her that she’s great, which is fine, except that she has now forgotten that these are hired court flatterers. She thinks they are actual advisors," the official said. "Meanwhile her wise counselors are being marginalized by those who are saying ‘Oh Queen, your magnificence will cause your enemies to fall on their knees.’ And she’s beginning to believe them."

"By enabling Rajavi to indulge her worst instincts and encouraging her to think she has more power and leverage she does, they may precipitate a crisis, which is exactly what we are trying to avoid," the official said.

Another example of the American advisors’ unhelpfulness was the MEK’s recent public call to be relocated en masse to Jordan, an idea the U.S. official said came from the group’s American friends. There was just one problem: Nobody had asked the Jordanians.

"To announce it publicly as a demand without checking with the Jordanians is the sort of thing you do to destroy it," the official said. "Why the hell should the Jordanians buy trouble like this by giving these people an autonomous militarized camp?"

U.N. and U.S. officials had been hoping to keep discussions open with Jordan about the possibility of hosting some MEK members in the event of an emergency, such as a renewed outbreak of violence. But U.S. officials now think that the MEK’s actions have made that much more difficult.

"Whoever advised them has done actual demonstrable damage to a possible humanitarian solution. They’re not helping. It’s remarkable," the official said.

The arrival at Camp Liberty Thursday of the second convoy may signal that the MEK is coming around to the realization that the Iraqi government will never allow it to stay at Camp Ashraf. But the U.S. official warned that the group may have more tricks up its sleeve.

"The MEK will delay, confuse, deny, and spin until faced with an imminent disaster, and then they give only enough to avoid that disaster," the official said. "And the problem is: If you play chicken enough, eventually you will get into a head-on collision."

Foreign Policy

March 11, 2012 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

MKO’s weapon: nonstop propaganda campaign in media

“Dirty, unusable, water shortage, power outage, highly controlled prison equipped with espionage cameras”; these are the alleged imperfections of Temporary Transit Location that are widely launched in the Mujahedin Khalq Organization’s hues and cries, these days. The first group of 397 members of the MKO moved to TTL on February 18.

The MKO’s slanderous statements on the so-called defects of the new location soon came after their resettlement. The group primarily accused the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) which in January said Liberty (Temporary Transit Location) met” international humanitarian standards “ of misrepresenting conditions there, according to AFP.[1]

AFP calls the MKO’s propaganda campaign in the media as “statement issuing ire”. W.G Dunlop of AFP writes,“the PMOI[MKO]’s focus on public relations campaigns marked by frequent statements to the media and cultivating well-known western politicians to speak on its behalf differs dramatically from its past activities,”.[2]
The report states that the MKO’s spokesman Shahriar Kia sends emails accusing the UN of telling ”lies" and filing “unrealistic report” on condition of TTL as well as forcing residents of Ashraf to move to it.

It is far and wide known that TTL (formerly called Camp Liberty) had previously housed 5000 American troops and as Martin Kobler the UN representative ,told AFP” it should be possible to have the infrastructure ready for these 400 persons who are now living there.”[3]

But, it seems that the MKO’s “flurry of statements” speaking of conspiracies, aims to acheive something extra.

On March4, Assasicated Press also reported of a statement issued by the MKO that proposed “to temporarily move to the Jordanian border instead of Camp Liberty near Baghdad.” The group once more criticized the alleged poor conditions of TTL.”None of the minimum assurances that Ashraf residents had sought has been met”, the statement said. And, Maryam Rajavi offered her golden suggestion: “camp residents are ready to relocate temporarily to the Jordanian border this month in an area once set up as a tent city to house asylum seekers after the outbreak of the Iraq war in 2003”, AP reported. [4]

According to the group’s statement, it would handle expenses for the move. [5] What motivation makes Rajavi to propose such a suggestion?

The history of the MKO’s foreign relations includes Jordan as one of the allies of the group especially during Saddam Hussein’s era. In 2008, some members of the House of Representatives of Jordan accepted the group’s invitation to attend its conferences in European capitals. [6]

A day after Rajavi proposed her impudent plan, Jordan authorities in their turn rejected the suggestion.”Jordan is committed in its obligation that it should not interfere in the affairs of other countries,” a source in the Jordanian Interior Ministry told AL Arab Alyawm Newpaper. [7]

It seems promising to conclude that the MKO leader is highly confused about how to handle her cult of personality after the closure of camp Ashraf. She hopes to be able to gather her forces together in a tent city but out of Iraqi control. She might hunt for building another “Camp Ashraf”, this time in Jordanian territory!

By Mazda Parsi

References:
[1] Dunlop, W.G, Iran exiles in Iraq do battle using press release, AFP, March 5, 2012
[2]ibid
[3]ibid
[4]Associated Press, Iranian opposition group eye Jordan relocation, March 4, 2012
[5]ibid
[6]BBC, Jordanian MPs advised not to attend PMOI conference, December 11, 2008
[7]Kuna, Jordan confirms rejection of building a camp for MEK to its territory, March 5, 2012 (Originally Arabic, Translated by Iran-interlink)

March 8, 2012 0 comments

The cult of Rajavi

Beware of another Cult Colony Formation

The people who are familiar with the characteristics of cults will easily spot one when they encounter it. MKO is not an exception when you come upon the cult leader’s latest remarks and The world will not tolerate formation of another Jamestown colony demands in a struggle to preserve the whole structure of the cult. Recognized as a dangerous terrorist cult still on the US’s FTO’s list, MKO is now facing a crisis of being forced to leave Iraq, where it was given a safe haven at the time of the country’s fallen dictator with whom it had formed a close collaboration to act as his mercenaries.

According to a MoU signed by the Iraqi Government, UN and MKO, and asserted by the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI), all the residents in the long occupied military base of MKO, Camp Ashraf, have to be transferred to a Temporary Transit Location TTL near Baghdad’s airport to be processed within two months to be transferred to third countries. The UN’s refugee agency (UNHCR) is tasked with immediate determination of the residents’ refugee status as soon as they are stationed in TTL. But there is a big problem: UNHCR can only process refugee determination and seeking for the residents’ asylum in other countries one by one and individually. As the UNHCR commissioner, Antonio Gutierrez, stressed in a meeting with Iraqi Minister of Human Rights, “The commissioner doesn’t grant asylum to groups and organizations, rather asylum is granted to individuals under the condition of abandoning violence”.

That is where the problem arises. MKO is a cult and dispersion of the members under any cause means total disintegration of the cult. A cult and its leaders seek to isolate his/her followers from outsiders to ensure that the followers will only hear the cult’s propaganda. The isolation from influences outside protects the cult’s internalized belief system and keeps them away from the outside critical thinking that threatens the cult’s integrity. And MKO has since long been engaged in such cultist activities keeping the members inside the heavily controlled, physically and psychologically, military camp of Ashraf.

As the TTL is planned to be under full control of the Iraqi Government and UNHCR, absolutely in contrast to MKO’s complete control over Camp Ashraf, one of the options to safeguard the integrity of the cult is a quest for any location anywhere to transfer the members all together. Now you can well understand why Maryam Rajavi, the cult’s acting surrogate for her absent husband, appealed to Secretary Clinton, the UN Secretary General and other western personalities demanding that the residents be relocated temporarily to a site near the Jordanian border instead of being relocated to Temporary Transit Location TTL.

Interestingly, the camp she demands for is a piece of bare desert that was set up as a tent camp to accommodate asylum seekers after the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. And of course, she announces to accept all the expenses of the relocation and other expenses such as “flattening the land, installing tents, providing logistical support, services”, as she proposes. For sure, the world will not tolerate formation of another Jamestown colony, this time on Iraq-Jordan border. A global move deems necessary to accomplish the relocation of the residents to break the spell of the cult and to save the spellbound members by exposing them to the reality of the outside world, where their families have been long waiting for them.

by M. Nelson

March 6, 2012 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

MEK terrorists in Iraq battle using press releases

An Iraq-based Iranian opposition group that is fixated on conspiracy theories allegedly carried out attacks in Iran and elsewhere for decades, but now relies on a different weapon: the press release. UNAMI has been the latest target of MEK's statement-issuing ire.

The United Nations mission here, which has been attempting to facilitate the exit of some 3,400 members of the opposition People’s Mujahedeen Organization of Iran (PMOI) from Iraq, where they have been based for decades, has been the latest target of the group’s statement-issuing ire.

Iraq wants the PMOI out of its territory, and signed an agreement with the UN in December to that end.

On February 18, the first group of 397 exiles moved from their long-time base of Camp Ashraf in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad to Temporary Transit Location (Camp Liberty), a former US military base near the Iraqi capital, as part of that process.

But soon after arriving, the group began complaining about conditions in Camp Liberty and accusing the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI), which in January said Liberty[Temporary Transit Location] met “international humanitarian standards,” of misrepresenting conditions there.

The PMOI’s focus on public relations campaigns marked by frequent statements to the media and cultivating well-known western politicians to speak on its behalf differs dramatically from its past activities.

The leftwing group was founded in the 1960s to oppose the shah of Iran, but took up arms against the country’s new rulers after the 1979 Islamic revolution.

The U.S. State Department, which blacklists the PMOI as a terrorist organization, says it has carried out attacks that killed a number of Iranians, as well as American soldiers and civilians, from the 1970s into 2001.

Now-executed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein allowed the PMOI to establish Camp Ashraf in Iraq after he launched the 1980-88 war with Iran in which the group reportedly fought alongside his forces, and provided financial backing to the group.

But the PMOI said it renounced violence in 2001 and its members in Iraq were disarmed following the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, leaving it in need of other tactics.

It successfully campaigned to be delisted as a terrorist organization in Europe and is working to do the same in the US too.

However, it is not always clear what the group aims to accomplish with its media campaigns.

A day after the first group of the exiles moved to Liberty, PMOI spokesman Shahriar Kia sent a statement by email alleging a U.N. expert who assessed the camp told “lies” and apparently “was compelled to file an unrealistic report,” with “necessary modifications” made by “political authorities” from UNAMI.

“The bungalows and toilet facilities” were “dirty and unusable,” and “there is serious water shortage and electricity is cut off, as in prisons, after 10.30 pm.”

A statement emailed the next day described Camp Liberty as “a highly controlled prison,” referring to the presence of Iraqi security forces in the camp.

Iraqi forces carried out two deadly raids on Camp Ashraf in 2009 and 2011, leaving dozens of people dead.

But the statement continued: “Everything shows that at the behest of the Iranian regime, the Iraqi government has turned this camp into a prison and regretfully, UNAMI and (U.N. envoy) Mr. Martin Kobler himself … assist in this prison-making by confirming it as a refugee camp.”

Another email from Kia on February 27 referred to the “lies that Martin Kobler made to the residents of Camp Ashraf for a forcible relocation to Camp Liberty.”

When asked about the PMOI statements, Kobler told AFP that Camp Liberty “was host of 5,000 American soldiers, so it should be possible to have the infrastructure ready also for these 400 persons who are now living there.”

“I do not think that the infrastructure problem is the problem,” he said.

“If there is garbage, the garbage can be removed and should be removed, and the government of Iraq stands ready … to have garbage trucks available, but they have to enter the camp to remove the garbage,” he said.

“The aim of the whole exercise is to have the … refugee status determination moving,” he said, referring to a process which must be completed before the exiles can be resettled.

The PMOI meanwhile says it is facing “conspiracies.”

“The whole plan for the relocation of the residents of Camp Ashraf to Camp Liberty is an Iranian plan, and the mullah’s regime’s plan, and nobody else,” Kia said in a telephone interview with AFP, referring to the cleric-led government in Tehran.

He also said in the interview that “espionage cameras and … eavesdropping devices” in Liberty give information “to the Iranian embassy and to the agents of the Iranian regime.”

When asked about the purpose of the flurry of statements on the U.N., Kia referred to demands over Camp Liberty.

These include the removal of Iraqi armed forces from Liberty and freedom of movement for residents, but also, despite numerous statements accusing the U.N. of lying about conditions there, a demand for around-the-clock U.N. monitoring.

By W.G. Dunlop

March 5, 2012 0 comments

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