Protests in Tehran against EU removing PMOI group from terror list
Hundreds of Iranian students, pupils and families of veterans of the Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988) staged a protest gathering in Tehran Sunday against the decision by European Union foreign ministers to remove the People’s Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI) from their list of terrorist organizations.
The crowd first gathered in front of the French embassy in Tehran and shouted slogans against France and the EU for their intention to approve the decision in favour of the PMOI at a meeting Monday in Brussels.
The official news agency IRNA reported that a similar protest gathering was to be held later Sunday in front of the German embassy in Tehran but according to the demonstrators themselves, the next protest gathering would be on Monday in front of the British embassy.
The EU move followed a ruling by the European Court in Luxembourg, which in December said the EU was wrong to keep the PMOI’s assets frozen after it was taken off a British list of terrorist organizations.
Iran regards PMOI as a terror group due to its involvement in the assassinations of several high-ranking Iranian officials, including the president and prime minister in 1980.
After the group was expelled from France in the 1980s, former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein allocated a military base to the PMOI near the border with Iran.
Before the ouster of Saddam, the PMOI frequently infiltrated Iranian territory, leading to clashes with Iranian forces and casualties on both sides.
Middle East
Europe: Safe Haven For Terrorists
The European Union routinely accuses Iran of sponsoring terrorism for their
support of the military wings of Hezbollah, Hamas and Islamic Jihad, forgetting to mention that these are the armed wings of legitimate and democratically elected political parties, who have a legal right to resist Israeli occupation under internationalal law, and are only designated as terrorists organisation by the EU for political reasons – i.e. the EU supports Israel. But what is rarely reported is the extent to which the EU supports terrorist groups. It has reportedly been agreed by EU states to remove the anti-Iranian Mujahedin Khalq Organisation (MKO) from the designated terrorist organisation list in the near future, which makes an absolute mockery of the EU supposed objection to terrorism.
The MKO cult is notorious for committing countless atrocities in Iran and Iraq. In Iran alone, their terrorist attacks have claimed over 12,000 deaths and in Iraq, as well as committing war crimes against the Kurds under the Saddam Hussein regime, they are accused by the current Iraqi government of carrying out terrorist attacks and destabilising the country, despite supposedly being in US custody. The Cult also stands accused of assassinating and torturing dissidence and human trafficking. They have also used self-immolation (suicide bombing!) as a tactic to protest against their designation as terrorist organisation in Europe.
This is why America, Canada and the EU have previously refused to remove the MKO from their terror lists, and as recently as the 12 of this month, Condoleezza Rice announced that the MKO group would remain on the US terror list. So why the change in the EU position now?
Since 2003, Camp Ashraf, the MKO HQ, which is located in Iraq’s Diyala province, along with its 3,400 inhabitants have been under American military control – the Bush regime wanted to protect the 3,400 known anti-Iranian terrorists from being taken into Iraqi custody, so granted them protected status – but since beginning of January control of the base and its inhabitants legally passed to the Iraq government, who have ordered the base closed and all MKO cult members to either return to Iran or select a third country to be deported to.
Obviously it would be politically difficult, if not impossible, for any EU state to open up its borders and welcome 3,400 designated terrorists cult members with open arms, and Obama defintely isn’t going to do it. So quietly the EU has been dropping its resistance to MKO under the pretense that the cult has been disarmed. And the group has one a series of barely contested legal cases. Now that they no longer have a presence in Iraq, it will be easy to argue that they pose no threat to Iraq or Iran, and that might well be true, but this terror cult will be a much bigger threat to Europe than al-Qaeda ever was.
The MKO is committed to the violent overthrow of the Iranian government and enforcing their own brand of fascism, despite the fact that Iranian government was democratically elected (a point often forgotten) and the MKO is universally loathed in Iran and has a long history of anti-western violence as well.
stephiblog.wordpress.com/2009/01/23/europe-safe-haven-for-terrorists
MKO with blood on their hands to be tried in Iraq and in Iran, Camp Ashraf to close within two months
Rubaie: Iraq to Extradite MKO Terrorists
TEHRAN (FNA)- Iraq plans to extradite members of an anti-Iran terrorist group who have “Iranian blood on their hands,” Iraq’s national security adviser said Friday during a visit to Tehran.
“Among the members of this group, some have the blood of Iraqi innocents on their hands (and) we will hand them over to Iraqi justice, and some who have Iranian blood on their hands we can hand over to Iran,” said Muwafaq al-Rubaie.
He was referring to the terrorist Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO).
“Over 3,000 inhabitants of Camp Ashraf have to leave Iraq and the camp will be part of history within two months,” Rubaie reiterated in a joint news conference with Saeed Jalili, Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council.
“The only choices open to members of this group are to return to Iran or to choose another country,” Rubaie said.
“We are acting under international humanitarian regulations and international laws. These people will themselves choose where they want go.”
“Iran’s security cannot be threatened by any factor inside Iraq. Iran’s security is our own security,” the Iraqi official underlined.
His words were translated from Arabic into Farsi by an official Iranian interpreter.
Rubaie said that 914 MKO members had a “passport or residence of a third country” and could leave Iraq for these countries.
“Some 914 of them have dual nationalities and others who want to return to Iran will be allowed to do so,” Rubaie said, adding he would discuss the issue with officials from 12 countries to see if they would accept MKO members.
“They will leave Iraq in a non-forcible way,” he said. “Terrorist groups have no place in Iraq.”
The Iraqi government announced on December 21 it planned to close the Ashraf camp north of Baghdad and close to the Iranian border, where around 3,500 MKO members are held.
On January 1, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said he would expel the MKO from the country.
The MKO was created in 1965 with the aim of overturning the regime of the Shah of Iran, but now is seeking the overthrow of Iran’s current government.
It was supported by Iraq’s late dictator Saddam Hussein, and it had carried out deadly raids on Iran from Iraq.
Despite being listed as a terrorist group by the United States and the European Union, the MKO receives wide support from Washington and London.
The European Court of Justice last month overturned an EU order freezing its funds.
Group members fought alongside Iraqi forces in the 1980-1988 war between Iraq and Iran and then settled in Iraq.
The MKO is behind a slew of assassinations and bombings inside Iran, a number of EU parliamentarians said in a recent letter in which they slammed a British court decision to remove the MKO from the British terror list. The EU officials also added that the group has no public support within Iran because of their role in helping Saddam Hussein in the Iraqi imposed war on Iran (1980-1988).
Many of the MKO members abandoned the terrorist organization while most of those still remaining in the camp are said to be willing to quit but are under pressure and torture not to do so.
A May 2005 Human Rights Watch report accused the MKO of running prison camps in Iraq and committing human rights violations.
According to the Human Rights Watch report, the outlawed group puts defectors under torture and jail terms.
The group started assassination of the citizens and officials after the revolution in a bid to take control of the newly established Islamic Republic. It killed several of Iran’s new leaders in the early years after the revolution, including the then President, Mohammad Ali Rajayee, Prime Minister, Mohammad Javad Bahonar and the Judiciary Chief, Mohammad Hossein Beheshti who were killed in bomb attacks by MKO members in 1981.
He added that the Iraqi government would deal with the members of the organization in a legal way, saying the MKO members should either return to Iran or select a third country.
The Mujahedin Khalq Organization, which identifies itself as a Marxist-Islamist guerilla army, was founded in Iran in the 1960s but was exiled twenty years later for carrying out numerous acts of terrorism within the country.
The terrorist group is especially notorious for the help it extended to former dictator Saddam Hussein during the war Iraq imposed on Iran (1980-1988).
The group has a 40-year history of involvement in terrorist activities and has masterminded assassinations and bombings inside Iran.
The MKO had regularly provided military training for its members on a base north of Baghdad, known as Camp Ashraf.
Earlier in January, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said that Baghdad was determined to close Camp Ashraf and expel the MKO members for the sake of Baghdad-Tehran relations.
“Iraq is determined to put an end to this Organization because it is effecting relations between Iran and Iraq. This organization participated in many operations that harmed Iranian and Iraqi civilians,”he said.”Remaining in Iraq is not an option for them,”al-Maliki added.
Baghdad announced in a statement on December 22 that MKO members at Camp Ashraf must close their training ground and leave the country within a six-month period.
After the finalization of a new agreement between Baghdad and Washington, the Iraqi government took over the country’s national security issues. Under the interim agreement, Camp Ashraf, the MKO headquarters and training site, was put under Iraqi control as of January 1, 2009.
At his Friday press conference, al-Rubaie in response to a question asking the reason for the delay in the camp’s shut down, said that before the interim security pact between Baghdad and Washington, Camp Ashraf had been under US control.
Meanwhile Jalili expressed Iran’s readiness to cooperate with Iraq on security matters through the aim of training and setting up security offices.
France says it has filed an appeal to an EU court to keep the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO) on a list of banned terrorist groups.
“Our appeal was filed the day before yesterday,”said Foreign Ministry spokesman Frederic Desagneaux Friday.
On Thursday, an EU diplomat said the bloc had decided to remove the anti-Iran group from the EU list of banned terrorist groups.
The source, who was speaking on condition of anonymity, said EU foreign ministers should approve the consensus before it can be fully implemented.
MKO terrorists, banned by many countries including the US, have claimed responsibility for numerous terror attacks inside Iran since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
The group is also responsible for assisting Saddam in the massacre of thousands of Iraqi civilians.
The EU move to remove the MKO from its banned terrorist group list has provoked widespread condemnations inside Iran as well as among the families of the terror attacks victims.
The French spokesman said Friday that Paris was pressing ahead with the appeal to keep the anti-Iran group on the list.
TEHRAN – Iraqi National Security advisor Muwafaq al-Rubaie said on Friday that Baghdad plans to close down the Ashaf military camp where the terrorist Mojahedin Khalq Organization (MKO) members are held under house arrest.
Iraq is also seeking to extradite the Mojahedin Khalq members who have taken refuge in Iraq since early 1980s, Rubaie told reporters in a joint news conference with Iran’s Supreme National Security Council Secretary Saeed Jalili in Tehran.
The Mojahedin Khalq launched a campaign of assassinations and bombings in Iran immediately after the Islamic Revolution.
The group was supported by Saddam Hussein’s regime in the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war but was disarmed after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.
Saddam also used the terror group in suppressing Shiite and Kurdish dissidents in southern and northern Iraq.
Rubaie said, “Among the members of this group, some have the blood of Iraqi innocents on their hands and we will hand them over to Iraqi justice, and some who have Iranian blood on their hands we can hand over to Iran.”
“The only choices open to members of this group are to return to Iran or to choose another country,” he stated.
The Iraqi envoy said “Some of the MKO members have expressed interest to return to Iran and we are making the arrangements for this.”
“We are acting under international humanitarian regulations and international laws. These people will themselves choose where they want to go.”
Rubaie said that 914 MKO members have a passport or residence of a third country and could leave Iraq for these countries.
He said on his return to Iraq he would discuss with the ambassadors of the United States and a dozen European countries to see if they would accept MKO members.
The top Iraqi security official stated that hundreds of MKO members have already returned to their families with the help of the Red Cross organization.
The Iraqi government announced on December 21 it planned to close the Ashraf camp north of Baghdad and close to the Iranian border.
On January 1, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki went further and said he would expel the MKO from the country.
Elsewhere in his remarks, Rubaie said Iraq is ready to take control of its domestic affairs even sooner than the 16-months deadline set by U.S. President Barak Obama.
Iraq and the United States have signed a security deal that calls for the U.S. troops to leave Iraq by the end of 2011. However, Obama, during his campaign for presidency vowed to withdraw combat forces from Iraq within 16 months from taking office.
Iraqi people and security forces are more than ever ready to take care of the country’s affairs and currently 95 percent of domestic issues are controlled by Iraqis, Rubaie said.
Jalili also stated that Iraq’s repeated announcements that it is ready to take control of the situation inside the county leaves no excuse for the continuation of occupation by foreign forces.
Turning to diplomatic relations with Iran, Rubaie said Iraq has signed a highly important agreement with the Islamic Republic after receiving “positive responses” from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
“We are leaving Tehran by achieving a very important deal because we raised important issues in our negotiations and received positive, strong and documented responses,” he explained.
Rubaie, however, did not elaborate on the content of the agreement
http://www.tehrantimes.com/index_View.asp?code=187569
HONOROBLE MEMBERS OF EUROPEAN- PARIAMENT AND EUROPEAN- COUNCIL,
We are the victims of PMOI( People’s Mujahedin Organization of Iran) who 
could rescue ourselves from the blood- smeared clutches of RAJAVI’s cult after almost two decades , and finally after putting lots of hurdles and obstacles behind , despite of PMOI’s operatives and leaders ‘ unwillingness of our departure from IRAQ ,we arrived to European countries safe and sound.
We have spent more than twenty years of our lives in this inhuman cult and we have experienced lots of pain psychologically and physically as a result of inhuman treatment and savage attitude of the PMOI’s operatives during those breath taking years. We are live witnesses of cruelty and brutality of this cult upon the people of IRAQ during SADDAM HOSSEIN’s dictatorship.
This cult which tries its best to hide its horrendous and horrific past , wants to take advantage of freedom and democracy in European and Nordic countries to propagandize its cultish thoughts and beliefs among people. Their nature is compatible and well matched with violence and peaceful solution is not their favorite ,so they can be very dangerous for European people and the PMOI’s dissidents who are currently living in European countries and they are very vulnerable and defenseless.
We as victims of this notorious cult ,are very surprised and insulted that the leader of this brutal cult ( MRS.MARYAM RAJAVI) whose hands are smeared with blood is allowed to participate in your parliament and even make speech in front of distinguished members of parliament which is going to happen in 26th of January ,2009 in Brussels . The conference will be implemented by the committee of sanitation and social affaires .
How do you allow such a person( MRS. MARYAM RAJAVI) whose hands are smeared with blood of Iraqi people and the dissidents of ASHRAF garrison to make speech for your honorable members? In our point of view , the presence of MRS. MARYAM RAJAVI in EUROPEAN parliament and making speech is the biggest insult to your prominent and distinguished members , the mournful people of IRAQ , and to the victims of this cult .
We are all long time members of this cult with more than twenty years record of service and we declare officially that we are completely ready to share our horrifying experiences and point of views which we obtained in this cult, with the honorable members of European parliament , European council and others whenever and wherever is possible .
At the end we urge you not to allow the leader of this inhuman cult to participate and make speech in your honorable and distinguished parliament . Please do not forget that the leader of this cult wants to take advantage of your global reputation to hide and conceal the crimes that her cult has done against the KORDS of IRAQ and against her political and ideological dissidents in ASHRAF garrison.
SIGNATORIES
MR.NAZARI/ MANSOUR ( WITH MORE THAN 20 YEARS RECORD OF SERVICE)
MR . SARAFPOUR/HAMED(WITH MORE THAN 20 YEARS RECORD OF SERVICE)
MR.PIRANSAR/HASSAN (WITH MORE THAN 20 YEARS RECORD OF SERVICE)
MR. SIAHMANSOURI/HAMID (WITH MORE THAN 20 YEARS RECORD OF SERVICE)
MR. BAZIARPOUR / MOHAMMAD ( WITH 20 YEARS RECORD OF SERVICE)
MR. RAZAGHI/ MOHAMMAD ( WITH 17 YEARS RECORD OF SERVICE)
MR. NADERI / NADER (WITH 17 YEARS RECORD OF SERVICE)
Pers et Avenir association, Paris, January 22, 2009
The Iraqi government this week accused an Iranian opposition group of planning a suicide attack against Iraqi troops, a possible prelude to decisive government action to close the group’s camp in Iraq and expel its members.
The Mujaheddin-e Khalq, or MEK, on Tuesday denied Iraqi national security adviser Mowaffak al-Rubaie’s allegation that it was planning an attack. Rubaie, who made the charge Monday during a visit to Tehran, offered no evidence to back up his assertion.
The fate of the MEK has long been an irritant in relations between the government of Iraq, which has built close ties with Iran, and the U.S. government. The MEK received support from Saddam Hussein’s government and has been designated a terrorist organization by the State Department, but the U.S. military has protected the group’s base in Iraq, known as Camp Ashraf, since the 2003 invasion. U.S. officials credit the MEK with providing information about Iran’s nuclear program.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki wants to expel the MEK. Iraqi officials have said the group’s continued presence has a destabilizing effect and hinders relations between Iran and Iraq.
The United States handed nominal control of the outer perimeter of the camp to the Iraqi government Jan. 1, when a new security agreement between the United States and Iraq came into effect. The agreement gives Iraq greater say in security matters, but U.S. officials said they intend to keep a military contingent at the camp to help the Iraqi government honor its commitments to treat the group’s members humanely.
In 2003, the U.S. military reached an agreement with the group that offered its members protection in exchange for their disarmament.
Rubaie told reporters Monday in the Iranian capital that”the Iraqi government has made a serious decision to expel”the 3,500 MEK members who remain at Camp Ashraf, according to a report on the Tehran Times Web site.
Rubaie’s statement said a member of the organization had turned himself in to Iraqi security forces and told them that group leaders had instructed him to detonate explosives at the headquarters of the Iraqi security forces. The goal of the reported attack was to embarrass the Iraqi government, the statement said.
Maj. Neal Fisher, a spokesman for the U.S. command that has soldiers stationed at Ashraf, referred questions about the alleged plot to the Iraqi government.
The National Council of Resistance of Iran, the MEK’s political wing, called the allegation a”blatant fabrication”that was part of a”conspiracy”between the Iranian and Iraqi governments to build a stronger case for the expulsion of the group.
Maliki reiterated his intension to shut down Camp Ashraf during a speech Jan. 1, saying the group’s continued presence is a violation of the Iraqi constitution and troubles Iraq’s neighbors.
The MEK was formed in the 1960s to oppose Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the autocratic ruler who fled a 1979 revolution led by Shiite clerics. In the 1980s, many MEK leaders moved to Iraq, where they were welcomed by Hussein, who mobilized them in his war with Iran.
Meanwhile on Tuesday, three Iraqis were killed and two U.S. soldiers wounded in an explosion in Mansour, a district in eastern Baghdad, the U.S. military said in a statement. An Iraqi police official said the explosion was caused by a car bomb that was detonated as U.S. soldiers were leaving a meeting at a government building. The U.S. military, citing”intelligence sources,”accused the Sunni insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq of carrying out the attack.
Earlier in the day, two Iraqis were killed in Karrada, in southern Baghdad, after a roadside bomb exploded near a convoy transporting officials from the Education Ministry.
By Ernesto Londoño
Iraqi security forces are in charge of the MKO training center at Camp Ashraf.
Details of an attempted attack on the Iraqi security center have been brought to light after the would-be perpetrator surrendered himself.
A member of the Mujahedeen Khalq Organization (MKO), who was to carry out the attack, turned himself in to Iraqi security forces and disclosed the details of the suicide attack, Mehr news agency reported.
The would-be suicide bomber is one of the residents of Camp Ashraf, the MKO training center and headquarters in Iraq.
The main objectives of the attack were targeting Iraqi security forces who took over the camp’s security on January 1, 2009 and dissuading the members of the terrorist group from leaving the compound or surrendering to Iraqi forces.
The Iraqi government has been seeking the expulsion or relocation of MKO, as it believes the group to be responsible for attempting to destabilize the country by carrying out terror attacks.
Earlier in January, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki vowed to expel the members of the terrorist cell from Iraqi soil.
The MKO "is a terrorist organization and thus cannot operate in Iraq because it will create a political crisis in contradiction with the (Iraqi) constitution," Maliki said, adding that the group will be dealt with "based on the international laws".
The MKO has been blacklisted as a terrorist organization by many international organizations and countries including the United States.
The terrorist group targeted Iranian government officials and civilians in Iran and abroad in the early 1980s. The group also attempted an unsuccessful invasion of Iran in the last days of the Iraq-Iran war in 1988.
The MKO was also involved in the massacre of Iraqis under the Ba’athist regime of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.
PressTV – Tue, 20 Jan 2009
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=83055§ionid=351020201
In a letter released in POAC’s ruling on November 2007, the UK Secretary of State is quoted saying “Mere cessation of terrorist acts do not amount to
renunciation of terrorism. Without a clear and publicly available renunciation of terrorism by the PMOI, I am entitled to fear that terrorist activity that has been suspended for pragmatic reasons will be resumed in the future”. And he is right since just on 17 June 2003, two years after the claimed date that MKO had conducted no military activity of any kind since August 2001, the group’s members launch a series of most appalling self-suicide operations.
It began when Jean-Louis Bruguière, France’s anti-terrorism investigative magistrate at the time, first targeted the terrorist cult of Mojahedin-e Khalq (MKO, MEK, NCRI, PMOI, NLA), officially designated as terrorists organization by the US and the European Union, in a European country since its settlement there and issued warrant for the arrest of Maryam Rajavi and a number of her accomplices for a multitude of terrorist charges. The officials in DST, French counter-intelligence, were well aware of the group’s terrorist nature when its HQs were raided. But hardly anybody expected that the group would engage in immediate cult-like reactions against the arrest of its she-guru.
Although the case is still under investigation by French justice system for a final judgment, those who are familiar with the nature of cults and their techniques of brainwashing were neither shocked nor surprised by the widespread self-burnings of MKO’s members, male and female, that left two deaths and others deformed. It was all done as a cult order to protest the arrest of the she-guru Maryam Rajavi who is steering the cult in the absence of her husband whose whereabouts is still unknown. And it worked well, since soon the French police surrendered to the wills of the protesters and set the leader free.
Not only has the group failed to present evidences to acquit itself of terrorist charges, distribution of new evidences such as reports of abusing its own insiders, repeated assertion of its re-designation in the US and the EU terror lists, its failed lobbying efforts to be removed from the terrorist lists, legal complaints of defectors and families to prosecute the organization for its anti-human activities against the members, and its glorification of terrorism are all proven facts that convince any country, where its members are settled, to take precautionary measures against any possible terrorist plots.
Intrinsically a terrorist organization, MKO has never denounced violence and terrorism publicly. In fact the group’s glorification of violence and terrorism remains as a major security threat and an appropriate means of accomplishing its cultic ends and safeguarding its HQs. In a few messages delivered from his hideout in the past recent years, Massoud Rajavi has particularly provoked continuation of suicidal operations as an emergency exit from the raised crisis. The self elected leader of Mojahedin has mainly focused on the preservation of two cult dynamics as the strategic guidelines in his messages, namely, Maryam Rajavi and Camp Ashraf. Rajavi in his message of March 25 stated:
At the present, it is a national duty on any Iranian and especially on our victorious opposition forces throughout the world to preserve two things which have turned to be two sides of the same coin. On one side rests a portrait of Maryam and on the other side, a perspective of Ashraf. I urge you one by one to struggle like Maryam and along with her day and night to mint the coin and achieve the end. 1
The expulsion of MKO from the Iraq and Nouri al-Maliki’s reiteration that the group is no longer welcome in Iraq following the expiration of the UN mandate for the international forces is of the greatest crisis the group has ever faced. It has to do something to come out and as usual, application of violence seems to be the best choice for the organization. In the past there came the order for the members to self-immolate for Maryam. Now it is Camp Ashraf that is under threat of being closed down and they already have the orders what to do.
According to an issued statement by the Iraqi national security adviser Mowaffak al-Rubaie, MKO sent one of its members on a mission of suicide operation to target Iraqi national security forces in charge of the camp. The operation came to absolute failure when the attacker turned himself in to Iraqi security forces and disclosed the details of his mission.
As it is typical of MKO, it denied claims stated by Iraqi officials that a member of the group was planning a suicide operation. But one thing is right for certain that the group has to leave willingly or unwillingly. It can no more beguile Iraqi government as it did with France through the push of its suicidal operations. For sure it is good news for the camp residents who have long been looking forward to being released from the bonds of the abusive cult.