Greetings to all dear sisters, brothers, fathers, mothers and former member friends separated from the Rajavi Cult and affected by this cult. I am Mahmoud Dashtestani, one of the witnesses in the court, which, of course, is a unique and unprecedented court.

The Rajavi Cult did not expect at all. We challenged the Rajavi Cult. The case is being pursued and has gone to The Hague. Of course, first of all, the Rajavi Cult must respond to the damages we have suffered, whether former members, families, fathers, mothers, sisters and brothers who have been in the cult for 10 years, 20 years or 30 years, or prisoners who are currently in the cult. This is something that is inevitable.

Mahmoud Dashtestani ; one of the plaintiffs in the case and one of the cult’s former members

We complained against them and we went to the court and the case was followed up and is being followed up now, and we will do anything necessary about it. What about those of us who have been separated and lost our past, and also our future is uncertain, and waiting families, old fathers and mothers, who failed to see their children and they passed away. Those who shed tears for their loved ones. MEK should be held accountable for all this in the international courts. I hope that all parents will see their children and their loved ones, and we will reach the results we are expecting with our complaints.

This is not an economic issue at all, it is not a treasure issue at all, it is an issue of a very large lawsuit regarding Rajavi’s humanitarian crimes, in connection with deceives. It is related to the betrays against human beings there. They have to be accountable mentally, emotionally and psychologically. We are in any court with all our former member brothers. This case will reach the desired result that we are all looking for. I hereby express my full support for this case and this complaint, and I support all the brothers who are behind this case, and we will be together step by step to the end.

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He clarified the ways the families could help their beloved ones release themselves from the pawns of the cult.

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He was deceived by MKO due to two reasons .First because he was not informed enough and second was MKO’s dirty recruitment tactics and the mind control system that enhanced and abused that lack of information.

Mr. Mahmoud Dashtestani succeeded to release himself from the bars of Rajavis’ Cult and returned to his homeland and joined his family.

On Monday, January 18, 2010, Nejat Society Shiraz Branch proudly received another defector of Rajavi’s destructive cult.

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Falling in a well called Ashraf

Interview with Mahmoud Dashtestani a recently defected member of Mujahedin Khalq Organization.

–        You mean in your ideological meetings where you could discuss your problems and doubts, you couldn’t ask the question?

–        No. when in 2003, Massoud went to conceal, they held 16 or 17 ideological meetings via telephone or the internet. We could only hear his voice. We were seriously scared to ask via which site we could hear the brother {Massoud]’s voice. We didn’t have the courage to say that it looked like the brother’s voice was coming from near hear.

You can never ask about two things in MKO. Money and Massoud Rajavi.

-did you ever see someone ask about Massoud? If yes, how did they respond?

You don’t have to ask or see anything. The psychological atmosphere ruling Ashraf has been created in a way that you never let such questions cross your mind.

In MKO, there is a hierarchy in its security structure, where small mistakes are discussed in lower ranks. There are also two security sections; internal security and intelligence security. There is also a section called counter-intelligence. When you ask about MKO’s financial resources and where Massoud is, you will deal with the counter intelligence section.

–        Did they mention any reason for Massoud’s disappearing?

–        In a large meeting held in 2003 after the disarmament of the group, Massoud Rajavi himself told us that he would conceal himself because he didn’t want more pressure on Ashraf and members.

Well, naive –minded people may believe this reason but the bottom line is that if anything happens to Rajavi whether he is arrested or whatever, his cult will collapse. He says that his successor is Maryam but I believe that Massoud Rajavi himself is the main axis of the cult. The entire group and its substance only depends on Massoud Rajavi.

But the truth is that Rajavi sees himself as more important than the organization.

–        How do you analyze all the cult’s efforts to maintain Camp Ashraf?

–        Good question! I don’t analyze. I say the fact I witnessed. In Iran they call Ashraf, “Camp” or “garrison” but in the group the cult it “strategic center of struggle”, that’s why they say even cleaning Ashraf streets is a holy fight. They claim that “Ashraf is the hope of heroic Iranian people!”

–        Since I returned to Iran, I have hardly ever seen people who have little information about Ashraf. People do not know where Ashraf is and who mujahedin are? People don’t care about MKO or Camp Ashraf but in the group they claim that in Iran, at least 90% of people watch MKO TV channel. They claim that 90% of Iranians support MKO and hope that Ashraf will release them!

Suppose you are walking in a street in Tehran and you say “I am a Mujahed-e-Khalq” [a member of MKO], you will be hit and crushed by those Iranians of whom some might oppose the IRI.

Ashraf is a symbol in the Rajavi’s cult. MKO has based its activities on protection of this symbol, but the proper symbol links them to their terrorist background which was justified by “armed struggle”. After the disarmament of MKO and gradual defection of forces Ashraf symbol, turned into an abandoned prison.

Translated by Nejat Society

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In their mind control system they had to prevent the members’ minds getting into sexual or emotional thoughts. If you think of your ex-wife, you should write it and then read your confessions in your brainwashing meetings where your comrades will attack you, insult you saying that “you are wrong”, “damn you”. “That woman is not your wife any more”. “She is your ideological sister”. “She belongs to the leader”.

The weekly brainwashing meetings are obligatory. You must confess a sin -a sexual one. It will be even worse if you do not confess anything. They take you to a place called Bengali where they talk to you for several days, putting you under too much pressure. They say that you definitely have some sexual thoughts that you are concealing.
Their arguments and sometimes quarrels in the meetings were justified as “human science”! What a human science! They call it monotheist “Anthropology” in which they use peer pressure as weapon. They say peer pressure is just like the leader.

They always label the members as “ogle”. For instance, when you watch CNN news on Mujahedin’s TV, they accuse you of watching the female speakers with sexual desires!
According to MKO, all the cults’ members are melted in Maryam’s revolution that was anti-bourgeoisie and anti –exploitation.

Her revolution begins with “the value of women”. So men should divorce their wives so that they are not exploited by their husbands any more. If they are really sure that all members have been melted in Maryam’s revolution, why are they so worried about any mistake made by members and they try to keep them under their control?

In Ashraf there are various security units such as street patrolling, regional protection, road security, gates security, Ashraf security,… if they claim that members have been unified with Maryam’s revolution, why these too many bars?

During the past six months, I travelled through half of Iranian territory, I was never asked a question but in Camp Ashraf if you want to go outside – to the streets in front of your unit- to do some exercise or to go for a walk, you have to ask at least three superior officials for permission and also you cannot go alone, you have to go with a superior member who monitors you.

We were about one thousand and 300-400 hundred people who joined Ashraf after the war[Iran – Iraq] ended and at the time of Gulf war. Today there might be less than 300 people who daren’t leave the camp because of their fear not because of being faithful to MKO.

When I escaped the camp and went to the hotel I saw some of those members that Massoud had told about them,” they were killed while escaping “or” they are now wandering in Iraq looking for a piece of bread to eat.” I saw them, living a normal life in the hotel waiting for their return to Iran or their immigration to Europe.

A few days ago, a family called me saying that they were afraid if their brother – who is in Ashraf – returned to Iran, he would be arrested. I told them that nothing would happen to him. I am living in Iran right now.

– Mr. Dashtestani, Massoud Rajavi has been hiding since 2003. Have the members ever asked where he wass or why he disappeared?

– You can never ask such a question in camp Ashraf, because you will be seriously tortured mentally and psychologically.”What do you mean?”,”Do you mean Massoud Rajavi?”,”Your brother?”,”Why do you ask such a question?”

My best friend was Akbar Mohebi. We were captured together in 1979. He is really my intimate friend but I didn’t dare to ask him the question even when we were both alone.

Translated by Nejat Society

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Dashtestani was a 16-year old teenager when he was captured by Iraqi forces in his way from Abadan to Mahshahr [two towns in SouthWestern part of Iran where Iraq invaded in 1979].in 1988 after ten years of imprisonment in Iraqi prisons when Mujahedin offered him help return to Iran ,he admitted their offer.
He was deceived by MKO due to two reasons .First because he was not informed enough and second was MKO’s dirty recruitment tactics and the mind control system that enhanced and abused that lack of information.
Q: Please introduce yourself and explain how you were recruited by MKO?
Dashtestani: I am Mahmoud Dashtestani. I was born in 1965. I was captivated as a civilian when I was commuting from Abadan to Mahshahr in 1979. I was then imprisoned in Iraqi Camps for about ten years.
In the late years of my imprisonment when Iran and Iraq had both admitted a ceasefire, too much propaganda was launched by MKO in POW camps. They persuaded the prisoners to join their organization. Anyway, under too much pressure and due to lack of information on the group I was deceived by MKO and then I joined Camp Ashraf. I was hopeful to return to Iran by the possibilities that MKO would provide for me.
– How could you manage to leave the group?
– After two months, we asked why they did not return us to Iran. They told us that they had recently sent some people to Iran and all of them had been executed or sentenced to long-term imprisonment.
Then, Massoud Rajavi held a meeting for us to repeat the above mentioned lies. Terrified of returning to Iran, we were pulled into the cult. We were supposed to attend ideological meetings six hours a day. We were gradually so manipulated that we thought the whole world was consisted of Mujahidin and Ashraf.
Between the years of 1993 and 2002 people could rarely succeed to leave Camp Ashraf. If you wanted to leave the camp, you would have to go to Abu-Quraib prison first and you would stay there for seven or eight years, otherwise you would have to stay in the camp’s prison, called “departure gate”, for two years, so that all your information would be wiped out of your mind.
Since 2003, after the US invasion to Iraq, until 2009 when I succeeded to return to Iran, I asked several times for leaving Ashraf but each time they held longtime ideological meetings where my old and intimate friends made an emotional atmosphere to convince me to stay in the Camp. Any way I was dissuaded by them.
But now that I am in Iran, if you ask me how I feel, I tell you that I have one precious thing here; freedom. Here, my mind, my sole, my emotions, my feelings, my life are free. I am free to choose what to eat, what to wear, where to go. You are totally free in your life and that’s what you can never imagine in Camp Ashraf where everything begins and ends in the leader and his will.
– Do you have any regret of leaving Ashraf?
– Not at all. I just regret why I didn’t return to Iran earlier, because Iran is not like what they publicized in MKO. I don’t mean that there is no problem in Iran but it is entirely different from what their propaganda says.
– What do they say about Iran? Let us know!
– There is an obligatory program on Monday afternoons. They show the members some films of social issues like poverty, addiction, courts, divorce, suicide, immoral relations, prostitutions, and then they say that’s the whole thing which exists in Iran. they say,” This is Iranians’ routine life”.
In Ashraf garrison no emotion or feeling is found. Emotions towards your family, parents, brother, sister, wife and kids are meaningless. Everything is meaningful under will of the leader. In such an atmosphere, when we saw those so-called films of Iran, we thought that we really had a good life in Ashraf. We thought that we were really struggling for a monotheist classless society.
When I returned to Iran, I expected to see all men and women addicted in the streets! I thought I would see people hung on every square! I was seriously anxious about such scenes in Iran.
When I was first faced by Iranian authorities, I really got hopeful. They visited me in a hotel in Iraq where a room was allocated to me by Iranian Embassy. They asked me if I wanted to get back to Iran or to go to a third country. I answered “Iran” although I was in fear of those films I had seen in Camp Ashraf.
MKO leaders say that you shouldn’t think about family because it leads you to emotions. If such thinking crosses your mind, you should write in your daily record and then read it in the brainwashing meeting, every week. Thinking of emotions will decrease your love for leader, according to Rajavi. If you think of your mother, she is then called IRI’s mercenary.
– Even mother and father?
– Yes, absolutely .”Mother” is definitely a permanent case in brainwashing meetings.
When Rajavi launched those brainwashing meetings, he proudly told us that he granted them as gifts to his members.
The subjects of the meetings were mostly about sexual issues.

Translated by Nejat Society

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Mr. Mahmoud Dashtestani succeeded to release himself from the bars of Rajavis’ Cult and returned to his homeland and joined his family.

Mr. Dashtestani became prisoner of war in 1980 during Iran- Iraq War. In 1989 Mujahedin deceived Mr. Dasahtestani into recruiting him and sent him to Camp Ashraf, Iraq. He had been a member of the so called National Liberation Army for about 20 years.

Mr. Dashtestani’s parents are active members of Nejat Society and in cooperation with other members of Nejat dedicated their entire efforts and energy for the release of their beloved son from this hellish organization.

Nejat Society welcomes Mr. Dashtestani and wishes him success in all aspects of his new life and free of MKO cult isolation.

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