Paid advocacy for MKO

Iranian anti-terror activists slam US support for MKO

A group of Iranian anti-terrorism activists have slammed some US officials’ support for the terrorist Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO).

A group of representatives of the Association for Defending Victims of Terrorism (ADVT) meet Swiss Ambassador to Iran Giulio Haas (C) in Tehran, on May 8, 2017 (Photo via ADVT)

At a meeting with Swiss Ambassador to Tehran Giulio Haas, who represents the US interests in Tehran, a group of representatives of the Association for Defending Victims of Terrorism (ADVT) presented an account of how their loved ones had been killed in different terror incidents in Iran, particularly the terror operations conducted by the MKO.

“All the families of the victims of terrorism are shocked by how [US] senators and officials are linked with and support the MKO leaders and consider it as a blatant support for terrorism in the international arena,” an ADVT member said at the meeting.

Another activist underlined the important role of international organizations in alleviating the problems of the victims of terror and stressed that the issue should turn into a matter of grave concern for the global community.

The Swiss envoy, for his part, expressed sympathy with the victims of terrorism and noted that he will convey their message to the US officials.

The MKO, the most hated terrorist group among the Iranians, has carried out numerous terrorist attacks against Iranian civilians and government officials over the past three decades.

Out of the nearly 17,000 Iranians killed in terrorist assaults since the victory of Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, about 12,000 have fallen victim to MKO’s acts of terror.

The terrorist group also sided with the former Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein, during Iraq’s eight-year imposed war against Iran in the 1980s. The group also helped Saddam in his brutal crackdown on his opponents.

May 10, 2017 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

McCain palling around with MKO terrorists

Weeks after Senator John McCains’s visit to the newly established base of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO) in Albania, the ripple effects still continue. McCain’s support for a cult-like group with a dark history of violence and terror causes a wave of reactions that do not seem to end soon. The most recent has been by the side of an opposition figure against the Islamic Republic, Mehrdad Khonsari. He writes an open letter to the Senator criticizing his act of sponsoring the terrorist cult of Rajavi. He asserts, “It was quite a shock noting that a personality of your background and status had emulated the feat carried out by others much less informed about Iran and generally motivated by greed.” [1]

Following Senator John McCains’s trip to the Balkans (courtesy to US taxpayers), he was received by Maryam Rajavi in the newly established base of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO) in Tirana, Albania. Rajavi offered McCain bouquet with a wide smile on her face in a luxurious hall full of so called cheerful audience – perhaps McCain did not expect such a warm reception.

The leader of the MKO cult who was so enthusiastically motivated by the presence of an American hawkish figure could not conceal her happiness. She seemed to have found the savior of her declining organization. “The Iranian people and the resistance are more determined and prepared than ever to overthrow the ruling theocracy and to establish democracy and national sovereignty in Iran”, she claimed.

As a matter of fact the leaders of the MKO cult put their anti-American, anti-imperialism past behind and eagerly count on the United States new administration to change the Iranian government. However, the issues are not as simple as the naïve MKO leaders have always supposed. Their alliance with the enemies of the Iranian nation has not been so productive for them that they can prevent the collapse of their organization.

Besides, the MKO cult is notoriously known among the majority of American scholars, journalists and politicians, even those who are known as anti-Iran figures. Michael Rubin who is a critic of the Islamic Republic’s policies wonders: “what is John McCain thinking?” Reviewing the violent and cult-like background of the MKO, he affirms that the American advocates of the MKO are not supporting the enemy of the Iranian government but they are assisting the enemy of the Iranian people. [2]

Dr. Munr Kazmir of the Huffington Post states, “The enemy of my enemy is NOT always my friend”. He explains that the act of John Mccain and his hawkish colleagues to sponsor the MKO is the exact definition of “insanity”. He refers to other similar experiences of the US: “There was a group in Afghanistan led by a fellow named Osama Bin Laden whom we armed during the cold war. There are rebels in Syria to whom we have given arms. These are just two examples of many instances where the strategy of backing the “enemy of my enemy” blew up in our faces.” [3]

Dr. Kazmir challenges Rajavi-Republican agenda for regime change in Iran: “Regime change. Just like Nicaragua. Or Afghanistan. Or Iraq. Or Libya. Or countless other nations we made unquestionably worse with our involvement.” [4]

Furthermore, as Kazmir and Rubin warn about the destructive consequences of supporting the MKO cult for both the United States and the Iranian people, former member of the MKO, Arash Sametipour believes that both McCain and the MKO are not favorable entities in the world so their alliance does not work for them. Moreover, the MKO is hated in Iran. “It can be argued that MKO gains nothing by organizing meetings with warlords, right-wing activists, and Saudis,” He concludes. “A group which is unpopular in Iran has proven that will not be accepted as a player in Iran.”

By Mazda Parsi

Sources:

[1] https://www.nejatngo.org/en/posts/6903

[2]Rubin, Michael, What is John McCain thinking? , IAE.org, April 17, 2017

[3] Kazmir, Munr, The Enemy of My Enemy is NOT Always My Friend….., The Huffington Post, April 18, 2017

May 6, 2017 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Mehrdad Khonsari: Dear Senator McCain!

“Dear Senator McCain,

I have intentionally waited several weeks before writing this letter in order to eradicate any notion that my objection to you giving validation to cult figures such as Mrs. Maryam Rajavi and hailing her and her followers as promoters of democratic ideals and values, is merely a knee jerk reaction to a behavior I have found reprehensible.

As a former Iranian diplomat who has been injected into political activism as a consequence of the Iranian revolution, I have had the misfortune of watching my country’s decline over the years as it has shifted from one crisis into another. I have repeatedly witnessed the emergence and disappearance or decline of numerous political figures – mostly honorable and well intentioned individuals with democratic agendas – whose well intentioned and noble efforts have simply fallen short of what is required for making any kind of meaningful impact with our people at home or loosening the foundations of the regime that has presided over them since 1979. Over the years, despite a constant plethora of perhaps justified but mainly self serving ranting aimed at the Iranian ruling establishment, I do not recall witnessing personalities of your caliber ever make public appearances or deliver any kind of meaningful messages in support of these true proponents of democratic values in my country.

At the same time, we have sadly witnessed a number of ‘has been’ and inconsequential political figures in your country as well as some in other places compromise their reputations for unusually generous fees and associated perks – totally incompatible with their status as public speakers, in a futile endeavor to bestow legitimacy to what is otherwise a much hated and bloodstained cult organization.

Having said all this, it was quite a shock noting that a personality of your background and status had emulated the feat carried out by others much less informed about Iran and generally motivated by greed.

Given the respect I have had for you over the years, I write not to condemn you but to ask you to consider your future actions more thoroughly. I am of no doubt that you did not receive sound advice in accepting the invitation advanced to you by Mrs. Rajavi, just as I am sure you would never accept an invitation by the KKK or ever contemplate labeling followers of the late ‘Reverend Jim Jones’ and fascists as proponents of democracy.

I will end by urging you to give due consideration to the points I have raised. I seek nothing from you, as our own people irrespective of what anyone says will decide the future of Iran. But to help bring Iran into the community of peaceful nations and restore sanity and prudence in its behavior, your prescription can only aggravate matters and offer an alternative which is by far worse than the worse we have seen from Iran’s present rulers in the last 38 years…….

Mehrdad Khonsari, Facebook,

May 4, 2017 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

MKO Terrorists Working in Collusion with CIA: US Commentator

An American political commentator said the anti-Iran Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO also known as MEK) is in league with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), noting that the terror group has been an agent for Washington since the late 1970s.

“The MEK has been an agent of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and represents the single most expensive US covert foreign operation since the inception of the CIA at the close of World War II. From 1979 to 1989, the US, UK, and Saudi Arabia provided at least $3 billion dollars in funding to the MEK for the purpose of destabilizing Afghanistan subsequent to the Russian invasion. It is from this history that observers today should consider claims made by the MEK as lacking in credibility,” Mark Mason told the Tasnim news agency.

Dr. Mason offers analyses of United States domestic and foreign policies for the international news media. He was trained as a biological anthropologist educated at the University of California, Berkeley. Mason has appeared on Al-Etejah TV, Russia Today, Voice of Russia radio, as well as on Life News Russia, AcTVism Munich News, Nuestra Tele Noticias NTN24 Colombia, The Real News Network, and Radio 786 Capetown, South Africa, and KQED Forum in San Francisco, California.

Following is the full text of the interview:

Tasnim: The terrorist group Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) recently claimed that the Islamic Republic is violating the 2015 nuclear agreement between Tehran and world powers by secretly conducting research on nuclear weapons components at the Parchin military site in Iran. The spokesman for the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) strongly dismissed the allegations by the terrorist group against Tehran’s nuclear program, saying the claims are of no value for the Islamic Republic. What is your take on this? What is behind such bogus claims?

Mason: Examining what the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) is, and is not, will assist in understanding claims made by the MEK. Some observers have characterized the MEK as a Leftist political organization, even a Marxist revolutionary group. Much could be written about how Leftist political ideology, and particularly Marxism, has come to have almost no meaning in modern usage. As Leftist politics applies to the MEK, such labeling is a diversion from facts. The MEK has been an agent of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and represents the single most expensive US covert foreign operation since the inception of the CIA at the close of World War II. From 1979 to 1989, the US, UK, and Saudi Arabia provided at least $3 billion dollars in funding to the MEK for the purpose of destabilizing Afghanistan subsequent to the Russian invasion. It is from this history that observers today should consider claims made by the MEK as lacking in credibility.

As for the question regarding Iranian nuclear technology programs, world peace and security would best be facilitated by all nations in the Middle East and South Asia convening under the auspices of the UN for the purpose of creating a regional nuclear-free zone. Focusing on the activities of one nation is not means to develop regional cooperation. Regional efforts to reduce tensions through diplomacy is the rational and effective approach to conflict resolution. Keep in mind that the USA thrives on creating conflicts and chaos, and thus the USA should not be expected to promote regional peace. Regional and global cooperation and security would be fostered by a regional agreement to remove all nuclear weapons and for all nations to sign the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). To question Iranian nuclear programs while it is known that Israel, Pakistan, India, and the USA have nuclear weapons is not a means to produce regional cooperation. Respect for decentralized, popular, community direct democracy will enhance regional cooperation. An arms embargo will enhance regional cooperation. Unfortunately, regional and global peace and security cannot be achieved as long as the US military and US money dominate the region. An effective strategy for reducing regional violence perpetrated and funded by the USA though such organizations as the MEK would be to revive the formal Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). The NAM is comprised of nations committed to diplomatic conflict resolution while avoiding efforts by the USA to drag the Middle East into a revived Cold War between the US-NATO and Russia-China.

Tasnim: It seems that the new US administration has breathed new life into the terrorist group. Republican US Senator John McCain praised the head of the MKO, in a recent meeting in the Albanian capital, Tirana. What do you think? What is terror group looking for under Trump?

Mason: US Senator John McCain should be in prison for war crimes committed in Vietnam. Through his actions in the US Senate, Senator McCain has lent monetary support for ISIS in Syria, and additional support for other US foreign criminal operations since the illegal invasion of Vietnam. Senator McCain supports US military violence and proxy terrorists throughout Northern Africa and the Middle East. The US government, with or without President Trump, is the successor to the British Empire since the collapse of British colonialism following World War II. The British Empire was bad. The American Empire is bad. Human suffering created by Euro-American colonialism achieves planetary proportions. Release from imperialism is promoted by examining what it is about Euro-American culture that drives their brutality and denial of human rights. The problem of empire goes far deeper than the frightening, open belligerence of President Trump. To resolve the problems presented by the MEK and other violent organizations, let us examine the social and economic factors that drive modern violence. We have a problem that goes deep beyond the MEK, and McCain, and Trump, and the CIA. If we want a decent planet for our children, we would be wise to examine our acceptance of the fictitious global money system: paper money, computer money, chasing dollars, funding the MEK with dollars, the Petrodollar, and our belief in money, profits, and private wealth, instead of people. The MEK would have no money, and the US would have no power to terrorize the Middle East without this fictitious thing called money. Money does not exist in the real world. It is a product of the human imagination that destroys human social relations. The problem is not the MEK, nor even the USA. The problem is the belief in the power of concentrated wealth, and the denial of human social relations outside of money. Without money, we are left with diplomacy, and diplomacy is a fancy word for mutual aid and mutual respect.

Tasnim: As you know, more than 17,000 Iranians, many of them civilians, have been killed at the hands of the MKO in different acts of terrorism including bombings in public places, and targeted killings. Why do Saudi Arabia, US, and certain European countries continue to support the anti-Iran terror group despite its heinous crimes?

Mason: One answer: money. The US, Western Europe, and the criminal client operation in Arabia called “Saudi Arabia” are chasing dollars. Dollars means wealth. Wealth means power. Power means more chasing dollars. To chase dollars begins with state violence used to steal natural resources and to steal human labor. All wealth arises out of human labor as applied toward converting the Earth biosphere and lithosphere into raw materials, and to convert raw materials into commodities that can be converted into dollars. Dollars is domination. The dollar is the means by which the US and all centralized powers dominate and control others. Continued worship of the Almighty Dollar, and the dollar chasers and dollar collectors, the USA, the MEK, Saudi Arabia, and Western Europe will continue their colonial theft of natural resources and their subjugation of other human populations to enslavement. We are enslaved by a fiction: the money system.

If these ideas seem unknown or impractical, I think it is true that the Middle East can be a more humane and cooperative region. To move towards peace and cooperation will require thinking and acting outside of conventional thinking and conventional action. New ideas—not new military weapons, new border fences, or new presidents—are needed.

April 30, 2017 0 comments

Iran

Iran’s people care about elections. Pahlavi/Rajavi doesn’t

Iran’s people care about elections. The so-called democratic fringe doesn’t

Trump’s hard talk has buoyed Iran’s exiled opposition, like the son of the late Shah and the shadowy MEK. But these intemperate voices are not to be trusted

In Donald Trump, opponents of the Iranian establishment bent on regime change have identified a new hope. The US administration, which often talks tough on Iran, has rejuvenated fringe exiled Iranian opposition groups who are irrelevant to modern Iran, yet appeal to gullible Americans.

One such group is led by Reza Pahlavi, who gets attention mainly because he is the son of the late Shah, who was exiled during the revolution in 1979. An “advocate of secularism, human rights, and parliamentary democracy in Iran” as he puts it on his Twitter profile, he reached out to Trump to congratulate him when he won the election, asking him to to engage “with the ‎secular and democratic forces” to defeat “political Islam”.

In his letter, he wrote that the Islamic Republic was promoting a “regressive ideology [that] has spread like a ‎cancer across the globe: from the Middle East to Asia and Africa, and even to Europe and the ‎Americas”. With such overblown rhetoric, Pahlavi sounds like war-mongering Republicans and Israeli hardliners who seek to portray Iran as a bigger threat than Isis.

“Iran’s exiled crown prince wants a revolution,” is how AP began its interview with Pahlavi in April, in which he says “this regime is simply irreformable because the nature of it, its DNA, is such that it cannot”.

“My focus right now is on liberating Iran, and I will find any means that I can, without compromising the national interests and independence, with anyone who is willing to give us a hand, whether it is the US or the Saudis or the Israelis or whomever it is,” he told AP.

In February, Pahlavi told Deutsche Welle that “the Iranian regime from the very beginning has been the root cause of practically every problem we see emanating from that region … The majority of the Iranian people, I would say easily 90% of Iran’s society, is against this regime and wants this regime to go.”

The other group calling for a revolution is the MEK (the People’s Mujahedin of Iran), a shadowy group characterised by many observers – including former members – as cult-like. Earlier this month, Senator John McCain travelled to a conference in Albania to meet with the group’s leader, Maryam Rajavi. Speaking in a packed room of MEK supporters, many wearing identical clothes, McCain praised the group and said: “This is an example of the support you are able to get in the United States of America, in the world, to get you to get to freedom.”

Rajavi, who has led the group for almost as long as Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has been the supreme leader of Iran, said during the conference that “experience has shown that this regime is incapable of changing its behaviour. Thus, regime change in Iran is necessary for peace and stability in the region and for global peace and security.”

Contrary to what you might expect, these two opposition forces do not get along. “It’s pretty much a cult-type structure,” Pahlavi said of MEK in his AP interview. He’s absolutely right.

It’s not long ago that the MEK, described by US thinktank Rand as a “skilled manipulators of public opinion”, was listed by the US and the EU as a terrorist organisation. (When it was delisted by the US in 2012, the US government acknowledged that the organisation had renounced violence and had committed no terrorist acts for more than a decade. It was also delisted by the EU in 2009). The group fought alongside Saddam Hussein against Iran in the eight-year war in the 1980s. That itself should explain its immense unpopularity inside Iran. According to state department and FBI assessments, the MEK was behind the killing of Americans in Iran in the 1970s, though the current MEK leadership disavows those killings. Rajavi has also been barred from entering the UK.

In recent years, the MEK has paid many senior American officials to speak at their events, including former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, and Elaine Chao, Trump’s secretary of transportation, who received a $50,000 honorarium to speak at an MEK event.

A strong supporter of the MEK is Saudi Arabia. In July 2016, Prince Turki al-Faisal, the former Saudi intelligence chief, spoke at MEK’s rally in Paris.

In a not-so-subtle reference to Saudi Arabia, the Iranian foreign minister, Mohammad-Javad Zarif, said: “In most countries in our region election is a dream … You are talking about a region where people don’t have a constitution for God’s sake.”

Zarif has a point. In a few week’s time, Iranians yet again go to the polls to choose their next government. Groups such as MEK have portrayed Iranian elections as futile. In reality, elections do matter in Iran. While they are far from being fair, given the extent of the vetting of candidates, they are still competitive and are taken seriously by the electorate.

There’s a constant battle in Iran between the elected faction of the establishment, and the unelected faction. In 2013, Iran’s majority pro-reform population threw its weight behind Hassan Rouhani. Iran has indeed drastically changed under the moderate cleric.

[…]

Nevertheless, the Iranian people by and large still believe in gradual change, however slow the pace of reform might be. Huge turnouts for elections represent a rejection of the sort of things that Pahlavi and Rajavi have to offer.

In their constant mission to demonise Iran, the US, Israel and Saudi Arabia have heavily relied on groups such as MEK. The fact of the matter is that they remain out of touch with the realities on the ground. Both groups have used human rights as a casus belli, and have simplified the complexities of politics on the ground to suit the foreign audience. So long as reform-minded Iranians are working hard to generate change from within, the intemperate voices of Pahlavi and Rajavi, and their attempts to build political capital in the west, should be dismissed.

By Saeed Kamali Dehghan

April 29, 2017 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

McCain does not help the MKO

A Dutch friend of mine who has recently returned from a business trip to Iran, asked me, “Why many taxi drivers in Tehran are interested in international politics?” In fact, after asking him where he is from, some drivers who could speak English began discussing issues such as the rise of right-wing in Europe, Syrian war, and Trump.

I tried to explain to him that Iranians, in general, are interested in political issues which are probably because of the important geopolitical location of the country. However, we should not ignore the impact of too many media which broadcast politics in a daily basis. He was long enough in Iran and had contact with diplomatic community Iran which provided him with a clear image about the country. So I asked him about the people`s interest in opposition abroad. He glanced and said, No chance at all. Any reform would begin from inside.

I agree. The groups like MKO (aka Mojahedin Khalq of Iran) are never forgiven by Iranian people for their betrayal to the motherland and supporting Saddam Hossein during Iran-Iraq war. It is well known that the group consists of a bunch of older fanatics and a few younger robots. A long time ago they lost their respect and support. But can Senator John McCain help them to change their poor image?

Recently in a trip to Albania, which also hosts MKO members as refugees now, he paid a visit to them and to the group’s leader Maryam Rajavi. However, I have reasons to believe that McCain`s visit to MKO does not bring popularity or credit for the group with a notorious terrorist background.

1- McCain and people like him who visit MKO and attend their events (like the Saudis or other retired American officials) are not popular people themselves. They do not support human right, pluralism or political development. Even worst, among these types of MKO supporters, many have clearly demanded a war on Iran! So how this gang of politically incorrect people can add value to MKO?

2- People like McCain consider MKO as a tool to pressure Tehran, in favor of the rival Saudis. They are fully aware that the group is unpopular in Iran. Thus despite what MKO wants to show in its propaganda, McCain uses them to send a message to Tehran. MKO is only a channel of communication! Therefore it can be concluded that the American and Saudis who participate in MKO meetings are not supporting the group but opposing Tehran. Personally, I think that they have been making the same old dumb mistake.

3- Iranian people have historically shown that they are not in favor of changes from abroad, nor from foreign powers getting involved in their issues. This is a fact that has been confirmed by the more rationale employees of the state department. Therefore such lobby programs are not appreciated by Iranian people and reformist opposition. As a consequence, these types of meetings do not accredit MKO.

In conclusion, it can be argued that MKO gains nothing by organizing meetings with warlords, right-wing activists, and Saudis. A group which is unpopular in Iran has proven that will not be accepted as a player in Iran. My Dutch friend also agreed and added: “Iranians hebben een hekel aan MKO. Which means Iranians hate MKO.”

Arash Sameti Pour

http://www.Irangids.nl

April 22, 2017 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization as a terrorist group

The Enemy of My Enemy is NOT Always My Friend

They say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

I’m starting to think John McCain may fit that definition.

All due respect to the Senator from Arizona, whose military service during Vietnam was both brave and heroic, but it completely escapes me why he continues to support “rebel” organizations who many times end up being just as dangerous as the despotic regimes.

There was a group in Afghanistan led by a fellow named Osama Bin Laden whom we armed during the cold war. There are rebels in Syria to whom we have given arms. These are just two examples of many instances where the strategy of backing the “enemy of my enemy” blew up in our faces.

McCain recently held a meeting with the head of MKO – a rebel faction opposed to the current Iranian regime – where he sang the group’s praises.

While I understand McCain’s dislike and distrust of the Iranian regime and Assad, MKO may not be quite so innocent, either, as they stand accused of thousands of deaths.

In fact, as recently as 2012, MKO was listed as a terrorist organization by both the United States and the European Union. There are many questions about what they may or may not have done, but there is no question about what they want.

“Today, there is a consensus in the Middle East about the clerical regime’s destructive role and that the religious fascism ruling Iran is the primary source of war, terrorism and crisis in the region,” said Maryam Rajavi, MKO’s leader.

“Regime change is not only indispensable to ending the egregious violations of human rights in Iran but also to establishing peace and tranquility in the region. As long as the clerical regime is in power, it will not abandon the export of terrorism and fundamentalism.”

Regime change. Just like Nicaragua. Or Afghanistan. Or Iraq. Or Libya. Or countless other nations we made unquestionably worse with our involvement.

Of course, McCain is by no means alone in his insanity.

According to Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh, U.S. intelligence has been working with MKO for quite some time. Bin Laden had worked with U.S. intelligence for quite a while as well, when we were fighting the Soviets and saw him and his group as an asset.

If you aren’t sure how that turned out, go ahead and read about what happened on 9/11.

And that’s really the point here: The “enemy of my enemy is my friend” philosophy simply does not work. We have been slapped in the face with this fact over and over again, but like a battered wife who keeps returning to her abusive husband, we keep thinking that next time will be different.

But as we know all too well by now, this always plays out the same in the end. Today’s ally is tomorrow enemy. Today’s freedom fighters are tomorrow’s terrorists. And vice versa.

You would think we would have learned our lesson by now, but apparently, we still haven’t. I don’t know what it is going to take, but through their constant repeating of the same mistake, I’m pretty sure that if the government were a person, they would be wearing a strait jacket at this point.

Dr. Munr Kazmir, Contributor Doctor, businessman, entrepreneur, and philanthropist

April 22, 2017 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

McCain hails head of anti-Iran terrorist group, MKO

US Senator John McCain met the head of the terrorist Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO), Maryam Rajavi, in the Albanian capital of Tirana on April 14, 2017.

Republican US Senator John McCain has praised the head of the terrorist Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO), Maryam Rajavi, in a meeting in the Albanian capital, Tirana.

McCain, who is on an official visit to Balkan states, met Rajavi and some other members of the notorious MKO group in Tirana on Friday.

He congratulated the terrorist group’s “successful transfer” from Iraq and praised its members for what he described as “sacrifice.”

“There is no doubt that people in this room have suffered not only themselves, but in the loss of their loved ones,” he said.

“You have stood up, fought, and sacrificed for freedom, for the right to live free, for the right to determine your future,” he added.

The MKO has carried out numerous terrorist attacks against Iranian civilians and government officials over the past three decades.

Out of the nearly 17,000 Iranians killed in terrorist assaults since the victory of Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, about 12,000 have fallen victim to MKO’s acts of terror.

Massoud Rajavi (L), Maryam Rajavi’s husband and the former ringleader of the anti-Iran terrorist group, Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO), meeting with the executed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. (File photo)

In 1986, the terrorist group’s members fled Iran for Iraq, where they received support from the then Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein, and set up Camp Ashraf, now known as Camp New Iraq, in Diyala Province near the Iranian border.

The terrorist group also sided with the former Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein, during Iraq’s eight-year imposed war against Iran in the 1980s. The terrorist group also helped Saddam in his brutal crackdown on his opponents.

A file photo of, Massoud Rajavi (L), Maryam Rajavi’s husband and the former ringleader of the anti-Iran terrorist group, Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO), shaking hands with the executed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein. (File photo)

In December 2011, the UN and Baghdad agreed to relocate some 3,000 MKO members from Camp Ashraf to Camp Hurriyet. The last group of the MKO terrorists was evicted in September 2013 and relocated to Camp Hurriyet to await transfer to third countries.

April 17, 2017 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

CIA Veteran examines the myth of regime change using MEK cult

On the occasion of the Iranian New Year Celebrations, the Cult of Mujahedin Khalq (the MEK, MKO, Cult of Rajavi) once more found the opportunity to launch its massive propaganda. This year, the group’s Albanian headquarters was announced as the new base to receive its paid sponsors.

Former US ambassador in the United Nations, John Bolton is one of the most prominent figures in the Republican Party who supports the MKO ardently. He is received at the New Year celebration in Tirana. Bolton is known as one of the hawks of President Bush; a warmonger figure who is now one of the closest politicians to Donald Trump. “I am here to stay with the Iranian opposition to celebrate the Iranian New Year, Nowruz”, he addressed the MKO ceremony. “Glad to meet you here, I have every confidence that one day we meet again in a free Iran.”

Paul Pillar, a CIA academic and veteran explains how certain American think tanks, particularly in the Bush and Trump administrations are stuck in the “myth” of changing the Iranian government by supporting the Cult of Rajavi. His recent article on the National Interest titled “Evolution, Not a New Revolution, in Iran”, analyzes the futile efforts of the MKO sponsors for regime change:

Some hardline myths about Iran never seem to die. One myth especially pertinent to U.S. policy is that revolutionary regime change in Iran is a significant possibility in the near future and that with a bit more of a push from the outside, the Islamic Republic will collapse and be replaced by something much more to our liking. This illusion was prevalent in much of the George W. Bush administration, which accordingly adhered to a policy of refusing to deal with Iran and instead of trying to isolate it and to inflict economic pain through sanctions. Several years of lack of results in the face of ever-increasing sanctions demonstrated the fecklessness of that policy. The sanctions became useful only when the next U.S. administration began to negotiate with Iran and sanctions were used as a bargaining chip to conclude an agreement that blocks all possible paths to an Iranian nuclear weapon.

The myth often is connected to a faith in exile groups as instruments for quick transition to a completely different type of regime. Many of those hoping for regime change in Iran look in this way to the Mujahedin-e Khalq, a cult-cum-terrorist group that actually has almost no popular support within Iran. Some of the same people had placed a similar faith in Iraqi exile Ahmed Chalabi, whose qualities as a huckster more than as someone who could father a new Iraqi republic became increasingly apparent after the U.S. invasion of 2003.

Today there evidently is another expression of the old myth about Iran, with talk about regime change, among Trump loyalists at the White House and National Security Council staff. According to these individuals, increased pressure and kicks from the outside can bring about positive results in Iran, rather than, as expert analysis both inside and outside the national security bureaucracy explains, merely eliciting hostile responses from a firmly implanted Islamic Republic. It is unclear whether holding of the myth represents genuine misbelief or instead is a rationalization covering other reasons the holders want to maintain Iran as a perpetually isolated bête noire. Either way, the myth leads to damaging and ineffective U.S. policy.

Pillar warns the US warmongers that the policy of violence including regime change and revolution is far from Iranian’s aspirations. The bottom line of his argument can lead the audience to the conclusion that opposition groups such as the MKO lack the support of the Iranian people.

Iran is not at all close to any political upheaval that could be described as a new revolution or a counter-revolution, even with more pressure and pushes from the outside. Iranian politics certainly exhibits plenty of disagreement and controversy, with the possibility of significant policy change coming out of that political competition. Despite the substantial defects in the Iranian political system, there is a political robustness missing from, say, the Arab monarchies on the other side of the Persian Gulf. But most Iranians do not have an appetite for making a new revolution.

Both the regime and the people in Iran have demonstrated an ability to withstand hardship much greater than what U.S. sanctions can inflict. They did so during the extremely costly eight-year Iran-Iraq War, which Iran doggedly continued for some time even after Saddam—who started the war—began seeking an armistice. Certainly if pressure or punishment from an outside power is involved, both the regime and the people exhibit determined resistance.

He describes the natural social and individual evolutions that has happed to the Iranians during the past decades compared with the extremely prejudicial and sexist ideas ruling the communities of other Gulf countries:

There already has been much evolution in the direction and nature of the Islamic Republic during its nearly four decades of existence, although probably not as much as there would have been without the ostracism. The large majority of Iranians today were born since the revolution. Hijabs have inched above hairlines, and domestic life has become looser and freer. Especially for the female half of the population, looking across the Gulf does not instill any ideas about better alternatives.

According to Paul Pillar the policy of engagement and diplomacy will be more fruitful in the interactions between Islamic Republic and the West.

Further evolution of the Islamic Republic of Iran and its policies in the years ahead will correlate directly with the extent to which it has normal political and economic interaction with the rest of the world. Isolation and punishment would strengthen Iranian hardliners’ arguments that there is neither a possibility of, nor a payoff to be expected from, such interaction. Bolstering of the hardline position in turn would mean diminished prospects for further liberalizing political change in Iran. Conversely, increased commerce, foreign investment, and the economic development that go with them would strengthen the political position of those favoring normality in foreign relations, would increase the Iranian stake in even more peaceful normality, would loosen the grip of those in Iran whose economic and political power depend on isolation, and would increase Iranian exposure to ideas and examples of still more change.

The contributing editor of the National Interest advises the US warmongers to engage in peaceful talks paving the way for the West to achieve its goals in Iran and this is what the MKO’s nature cannot accept at all. The MKO leaders run their multi-million-dollar lobbying campaign to buy the support of US hawkish politicians just because they are not able to buy the support of the Iranian people. The MKO has no way to gain power in Iran except by a forceful military intervention by the side of the Iranian enemies.

Those in the United States seeking, or at least talking about, regime change in Iran should face up to how the best way to achieve such change is to let these processes that already are in train play out, and to encourage them with increased interaction and commerce between Iran and the West. The change may not be sudden enough or violent enough to be described as a revolution with a capital R, but the change is even more likely than anything sudden or violent to be in a direction favorable for Western interests. This will be the course of Iranian history as long as we do not screw up the process with mindlessly applied isolation, economic punishment, and attempted subversion.

March 26, 2017 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Nasty deals with MKO terrorists

What makes a terrorist who has assassinated your country fellow men a dear trustworthy friend?

The beginning paragraph of the extensively published article of Jon Gombrell of the Associated Press indicates how controversial is the affairs between the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO) and the United States: “An official in U.S. President Donald Trump’s cupboard and no less than considered one of his advisers gave paid speeches for an Iranian exile group that killed Individuals earlier than the 1979 Islamic Revolution, ran donation scams and noticed its members set themselves on fireplace over the arrest of their chief.”[1]

This short statement of the article is enough to learn that the MKO is a cult-like group with deceptive methods of fund raising and brainwashed members who set themselves on fire to protest against the arrest of their She-guru; it has assassinated some US citizens while it is donating large amounts of money to some other US citizens!

A few cases of the MKO’s paid sponsors are discussed in Gambrell’s report while the MKO’s pay roll is full of bipartisan US politicians who intentionally or unintentionally ignore the true nature of the MKO as a destructive terrorist cult. The group has the blood of the Iranian people, Iraqi people, US military personnel and civilians on its hands. The group has also been involved in massacring it own members who disassociated themselves and did not go along with the attitudes and approaches of the Cult during different periods.

Donald Trump’s aggressive policies against Muslim countries, particularly Iran, is warmly welcome by the MKO. The group’s propaganda machine is evidently pleased to see the perspective of further sanctions the US might impose on Iranian people. But, Are the Iranian people deserved to be treated like this? Are they deserved to be banned from entering the US?

Michael Jansen of the Jordan Times writes about Trumps’ hostile acts against Iranians, “Trump needlessly and heedlessly included Iran in the group of seven Muslim countries when imposing his hasty, poorly prepared and ill-conceived ban on US entry on citizens from these countries holding visas.” [2]

“Although federal judges issued restraining orders, temporarily rescinding Trump’s ban, Iranians are upset and confused by this measure, as it is meant to apply to citizens of countries involved in “terrorist” incidents in the US.,” She adds. “There have, in fact, been no attacks by Iranians on US citizens in the US and only one in Iran itself.” [3]

And then, she ironically points to nasty deals that are based on hypocrisy. “This took place in 1975, when two air force officers were killed en route to an air base,” She reminds the audience. “This was before the 1979 overthrow of Washington’s ally, the shah, by the Islamic Revolution.” [4]

She explains that the American terror victims of the MKO were serious to pursue the case of their murdered loved one. “The family of Lt. Col. Jack Turner, one of the victims, filed a lawsuit, arguing his death was in revenge for the killing by the shah’s intelligence agency, Savak, which was supported by the US and Israel, of nine anti-shah elements fleeing arrest,” Jansen repeats what Gambrell had ended his article with. [5]

“The commander and members of this group [anti-shah elements], the Mujahedin e-Khalq, were executed in 1976,” Jansen links the MKO terrorist background to their today’s paid sponsors. “It does not make sense that the Turner family is suing Savak, which is long gone, or the Mujahedin, an enemy of the current Iranian regime and the friend of some senior members of the Trump administration.” [6]

By Mazda Parsi

References:

[1] Gambrell, Jon, Clarification: Trump-Iranian Exiles story, The Associated Press, February 16, 2017

[2] Jansen, Michael, Keeping Iran a bogeyman to further destabilise the region, The Jordan Times, February 8, 2017

[3] ibid

[4] ibid

[5] ibid

February 27, 2017 0 comments

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