US forces have relocated leading members of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO) after Iraqi authorities took control of their camp. Following a decision by the Iraqi government to take over the security of the MKO headquarters, the US forces relocated selected members of the organization. According to an informed source in the Iraqi Foreign Ministry, the move was 
aimed at preventing the MKO leaders from falling into the hands of Iraq’s government. Earlier in August, Iraqi army took control of MKO’s Camp Ashraf in Diyala province, 60 kilometers north of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad. Iraqi government officials believe the MKO is playing a significant role in fueling violence and insecurity in the country and have announced plans to activate judiciary petitions against the members of the terrorist cell. The foreign ministry official added that the MKO members, currently residing in the camp, are those who have been deceived to join the terrorist cell and are considering leaving the organization. "Therefore these members are not helpful for the American forces to achieve their goals," the source said. The group has so far claimed responsibility for several terrorist attacks inside Iran and it cooperated with former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein in the massacre of Iraqi civilians. The cell has been blacklisted as a terrorist organization by many countries including Iraq, Iraq, Canada, the United States, and the European Union.
Iran Policy Committee: Pentagon or Terrorist Funding?
Promoters of Communist Terrorists
The Iran Policy Committee (IPC) promotes the Iranian Communist MEK (MKO, PMOI, NCRI, Rajavi Cult, or Pol Pot of Iran) terrorists, the murders of American military officers, Rockwell International employees, and large numbers of Iranians and Iraqis. The United States State Department has listed the MEK as a Marxist terrorist organization since the administration of former President Bill Clinton. In 2003, American and coalition forces attacked the MEK at Camp Ashraf, Iraq, killing some of the communist terrorists. Then, the American government ordered the American military to protect these terrorists.
So, who would promote the evil Rajavi cultists?
Professor Raymond Tanter, IPC President
Bruce McColm, Empowerment Committee Chairman
Captain Charles Nash, Military Committee Cochairman
Advisory Council:
General Thomas McInerney, chairman
Attorney William A. Nitze
Ambassador Richard Schifter
Professor Raymond Tanter
Ambassador R. James Woolsey
Military Committee:
Captain Charles Nash, Military Committee Cochairman
Major General Paul Vallely, Military Committee Cochairman
General Thomas McInerney
General Edward Rowny, Military Committee Cochairman
Diplomacy Committee:
James Akins, Diplomacy Committee Chairman
http://www.iranpolicy.org/
Who funds the Iran Policy Committee?
The IPC operates as a public charity:
Not-for-Profit Status
Contributions payable to the Iran Policy Committee (IPC) are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law. The Committee is a 501(c)(3) not-for-profit organization and is publicly supported as described in 509(a)(1) of the Internal Revenue Code. The Committee’s IRS identification number is 20-2883425
To maintain this not-for-profit status, the Iran Policy Committee must disclose its finances in the details required in annual Form 990 disclosures. Members of the public may request copies of the Form 990 disclosures from the accountant for the Iran Policy Committee:
Margaret Bartel
Bartel & Associates
911 Duke Street
Alexandria, VA 22314
Telephone: (703) 548-4250
Email: mbartel@bartelassociates.com
The Virginia Board of Accountancy shows her Certified Public Accountant (CPA) license number 31623 as expired as of March 31, 2008.
Iran Policy Committee’s 2007 Financial Disclosures
R. Bruce McColm and Margaret Bartel signed the 2007 Form 990 on August 14, 2008.
The Iran Policy Committee claimed to have received $454,450 during 2007 in direct public support. Form 990 does not include the individual disclosures of large sources of support.
In 2007, the IPC used its Washington, DC address (instead of Margaret Bartel’s address): Alban Tower, Suite L34, 3700 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20016.
The Employer Identification Number is 28-2883425.
The IPC claimed to have operated at a deficit of $247,191. Claimed compensation for officers, directors, and key employees was $118,750. Raymond Tanter, President = $87,500
R. Bruce McColm, co-chair = $15,625
Chuck Nash, co-chair = $15,625
Salaries and wages of unnamed employees = $50,701.
Professional Services = $191,812
There were no disclosures that any of these amounts included wage claims in a divorce case by Constance Andresen-Tanter.
Accounting fees = $21,548
Legal fees = $89,976
Travel reimbursements were $22,077.75 for Tanter and $6,476 for McColm.
The IPC claimed that Professor Raymond Tanter loaned $169,904 to the IPC to pay bills. Professor Tanter is a retired professor who serves only as an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. Professor Tanter has failed to honor agreements to make monthly payments to Constance Andresen-Tanter. Where is the documentation from the divorce case judge that such claimed loans were approved?
Who is Margaret Bartel?
For an overview of some of Margaret Bartel’s other activities, see:
http://www.politicalfriendster.com/showPerson.php?id=1493&name=Margaret-%22Peggy%22-Bartel
She was involved with persons and organizations promoting Ahmad Chalabi and the Iraqi National Congress (INC).
For example, Boxwood, Inc. was used as a corporate vehicle for several years. Disclosures are available from the Commonwealth of Virginia State Corporation Commission for corporate ID 0589920-8. The 2004 and 2005 annual reports to Virginia for Boxwood, Inc. showed an address of 911 Duke Street, Alexandria, Virginia 22314. This is the same address used for the Iran Policy Committee prior to 2007. These annual reports showed Francis Brooke as president, Aras Kareem as director, and Margaret Bartel as secretary, treasurer, and as registered agent. In the 2006 annual report, Aras Kareem was no longer included. Instead, Margaret Bartel was shown as a vice president and director.
Other activities included working in Iraq on Defense Intelligence Agency-funded programs.
http://www.iraqfact.com/zPic_brooke.html
http://www.warandpiece.com/blogdirs/2004_07.html
For Margaret Bartel’s political campaign contributions, see:
http://www.opensecrets.org
On June 27, 2006, Margaret Bartel contributed $500 to James Webb (Democrat—Virginia).
http://webb.senate.gov/
Divorce Settlement in France
There has been a divorce case (07 DRB 102) in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia, Family Court, Domestic Relations Branch, before Associate Judge Michael Ryan. However, on September 2, 2007, Raymond Tanter and Constance Andresen-Tanter met in France with NCRI leaders to negotiate a divorce settlement. Raymond Tanter offered to withdraw his petition for divorce and to pursue a non-contested divorce if Constance Andresen-Tanter would accept the return of her personal property in Apartment 507 of Alban Towers in Washington, DC plus a payment schedule for payments of $30,000 for bills and of $150,000 for her new life. At a hearing on March 5, 2008, Associate Judge J. Michael Ryan reviewed this settlement offer.
Defend Constance Andresen-Tanter
While Professor Raymond Tanter and the NCRI can pay large sums of money to attorneys, Constance Andresen-Tanter has no access to enough money to defend herself in court. Lawyers, political leaders, Internal Revenue Service (IRS) officials, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), members of the media, literary agents, anti-war activists, women’s organizations, anti-communists, and opponents of the neo-conservatives (neo-Trotskyites) should come to the defense of Constance Andresen-Tanter and learn what is really happening at the Iran Policy Committee.
Her contact information is:
(212) 920-7748 mobile telephone
Despite a UK court ruling to lift a ban on Mojahedin Khalq terrorists, Iran has no plans to lower its diplomatic presence
Despite a UK court ruling to lift a ban on MKO terrorists, Iran says it currently has no plans to lower its diplomatic presence in Britain.
Iran’s ambassador to London briefed the National Security and Foreign Policy Commission in the Majlis on Sunday, causing members of Parliament to call on the government to reconsider the extent of relations between the two countries.
UK support for the outlawed terrorist group, the MKO and its failure to curb drug cultivation in Afghanistan were the main grievances expressed by the lawmakers.
In his weekly press conference on Monday, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hassan Qashqavi told reporters that although the Ministry respects the recommendations of the parliamentarians, it ‘currently has no such plan on its agenda’.
Iran-Britain relations ventured into troubled waters after the British government decided to grant knighthood to author Salman Rushdie, despite the publication of his controversial book, The Satanic Verses, which sparked worldwide outrage in the late 1980s.
Iran described the knighthood as ‘a blatant example of the anti-Islamism of senior British officials’. Top officials from certain Muslim countries also called on their government to sever ties with London.
In a recent move, Britain removed the banned Mujahedeen Khalq Organization (MKO) from its blacklist of terror organizations. The MKO has committed acts of aggression against both Iranian and Iraqi nationals and remains banned by the European Union and the United States.
According to the Iranian Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, Britain has been provided ample evidence of MKO involvement in terrorist operations against the Iranian nation.
"They have even met with some of the victims of the MKO terrorist acts. Still, the London Appeals Court has permitted a dangerous terrorist group to operate in Britain," reads a letter by the Head of the Commission Alaeddin Boroujerdi to his counterpart in the British parliament, Mike Gapes.
The United States of America has consistently and historically championed itself as a preeminent nation in the world. However, since recent international and domestic events left the US in a more precarious position, they are desperately making friends with unlikely groups.
Post 9/11 US Befriending the MEK or MKO
President George W. Bush, his administration, and the mass media have carried the banner of an age-old mantra post-September 11, 2001: “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Along with this mantra, the aforementioned have also propagated a polarizing theory with public statements declaring, “You’re either with us, or against us.”
However, political situations are not always so black and white – but neither are friends and enemies.
The relationship between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the US has remained strained since the 1953 British and US Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) orchestrated coup d’état of Prime Minister Mohammed Mosaddeq, who had aims of nationalizing Iran’s oil. Along with the following 1979 Islamic Revolution and ensuing 444-day student takeover of the US embassy in Tehran, Iran and the US continued to grow apart and remain isolated from one another.
US-Iranian political atmosphere and dominant American philosophies have encouraged the US government to forge a friendship with an Iranian opposition group that is living in exile, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK, MKO or PMOI for the People’s Mujahedin of Iran).
BBC’s Newsnight on January 17, 2007 uncovered an offer that Tehran sent to Washington in 2003, stating Iran would abandon supporting Hamas and Hezbollah if the Western countries would ensure the MEK be disbanded. Many officials in the US government saw an enormous potential of working with Iran, but the offer was stopped in its tracks by Vice President Dick Cheney – and remained unsigned.
Instead of attempting to bridge the gaps between Iran and the US, the American government has been funding the MEK under a guise of ‘democracy promotion’ in Iran. Reported amounts of money differ, but consider the following:
July 16, 2008 the House of Representative’s Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs met to go over the 2009 International Affairs budget. Noted in a section, Function 150, was $65 million allocated as Economic Support Funds For Iran. Included in this same section, was $1.2 million to launch US-backed Radio Free Europe (a.k.a Radio Liberty Azerbaijani) broadcasts into Iran.
Jason Leopold, of The Public Record, wrote on July 10, 2008 that Congress has appropriated over $120 million to fund ‘democracy promotion’ projects inside Iran.
Investigative journalist and Pulitzer Prize winner, Seymour Hersh, revealed in his July 7, 2008 article for The New Yorker that the US has been operating with a covert budget of $400 million, he writes, for plans to “destabilize the country’s religious leadership.” This information was found in a highly classified Presidential Finding that “focused on undermining Iran’s nuclear ambitions and trying to undermine the government through regime change working with opposition groups and passing money.” Hersh also writes that both the CIA and American Special Operations groups have had “long-standing ties” to the MEK.
A Pentagon consultant told Hersh “the MEK has no CPA [Certified Public Accountant] auditing the books, and its leaders are thought to have been lining their pockets for years. If people only knew what the MEK is getting, and how much is going to its bank accounts – and yet it is almost useless for the purposes the [US] Administration intends.”
Even if this is true, the US steams ahead with its aid to the Mujahedin. Congressmen Bob Filner (D-CA) and Tom Tancredo (R-CO) co-chair a bi-partisan Iran Human Rights and Democracy Caucus – which is the main group lobbying for MEK support and removal from the US list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations.
Most recently Representative Tancredo stated in the House of Representatives that “it’s time to take the handcuff’s off the MEK” on July 14, 2008. At the same meeting, Rep. Filner claimed “the MEK provided significant intelligence that helped blow the whistle on Iran’s clandestine nuclear weapons and missile development programs” – neglecting to note that the National Intelligence Estimate deemed Iran did not have a nuclear weapons program since 2003.
Not only do Representatives Tancredo and Filner (and the rest of the MEK supporters in the US government) speak about the group as idealized forbearers of democracy, they also equate the MEK to Iranians en masse. Often times with statements like Filner’s from the aforementioned meeting, “we must…shift our support to the Iranian people” – herein he assumes the almost 70 million strong population of Iran aligns themselves with the MEK, an exiled fringe group.
The MEK in Camp Ashraf
The MEK were active in efforts to displace the Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, but eventually severed their ties with followers of the Grand Ayatollah Rouhollah Khomeini, becoming a violent, militant opposition group inside Iran – one that carried out bombings, attacks and assassinations on both Iranian and Western targets. At the end of 1981, most MEK members were in hiding or exiled in France. In 1986, with developing Iranian-French relations, the Mujahedin were declared ‘undesirable aliens’ and relocated to Iraq.
Camp Ashraf, or Ashraf City, is north of Khalis in-between Baghdad and the Iranian border. It contains the largest consolidation of MEK members with a population around 4,000.
The 2003 US invasion of Iraq included air strikes on the Mujahedin. After the two parties came to terms on a ceasefire, in June 2003 US forces claim to have successfully disarmed Camp Ashraf. In tandem, seven US agencies screened individuals in Ashraf for past terrorist activities. A July 6, 2008 Washington Post article mentioned the FBI fingerprinted 3,800 individuals, and more than 40 already had previous records of known criminality in the FBI’s database.
Despite this finding, the American government concluded the Mujahedin did not have a terrorist basis, and the members of Ashraf City would be protected citizens under the Fourth Geneva Convention in July 2004. On the contrary, the MEK remains among 42 groups on the US State Department’s list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs) since 1997. Their status on the list has to be renewed every 2 years, suggesting the US has consistently re-categorized the MEK as a terrorist group for over a decade.
Again, regardless of an FTO classification, the large monetary endowments from the US have allowed the MEK to turn Ashraf from a shanty desert town into a camp “made up of a complex of roads and buildings. It contains all sorts of educational, social and sports facilities. These include 4 Olympic size swimming pools, a shopping centre, a zoo, a park, 2 universities, a full size football pitch, a mosque and even a cemetery” – boasted MEK literature handed out at an Iran Human Rights and Democracy Caucus meeting on February 11, 2008.
The Mujahedin on the Terrorist List
Seeking legitimacy, the MEK is actively campaigning to be removed from lists designating it as a terrorist group.
After 7 years of efforts in the United Kingdom, the British Court of Appeals upheld the Proscribed Organizations Appeal Commission ruling that the MEK is not a terrorist organization in May 2008. The ruling was based on the finding that the court lacked evidence to conclude the MEK would resort to terror tactics in the future.
This de-listing means the group now has more freedom to meet, fund-raise, and conduct their operations. For example, one month after the British ruling, the Paris-based National Council Resistance of Iran (the umbrella group of which the Mujahedin is the main part) held a rally outside of Paris where many political figures were present to show solidarity.
How do the MEK represent themselves? They claim to be nonviolent, advocate a democratic, pluralist and secular system of government; advocate normalized relations with all the governments of the region and the world; advocate elimination of all forms of discrimination against religious and ethnic minorities; guarantee the individual and social rights stipulated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights; guarantee the separation of Church and State; and guarantee autonomy for Iranian Kurds. They also contend to have a ‘president in waiting,’ Maryam Rajavi, for the fulfillment of MEK’s ultimate goal: overthrowing the current Iranian government.
Conveniently ignored is a historical viewpoint of the group, an explanation of why they were exiled from Iran or justifications for their terror listing over time in various nations. Such as the May 2005 Human Rights Watch report that the MEK are rampant in human rights violations, naming them a ‘cult’ that runs ‘prison camps’ in Iraq, implementing physical and psychological abuse to prevent members from leaving.
All in all, a group with governmental overthrow as their main objective combined with a consistent terrorist designation would make a least likely ally, if the US considered it rationally.
A Misguided Union
Desperate with a bad economy, high oil prices, a sub-prime market lending debacle that is only worsening, wars waging on in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a US budget that will reach a record $482 billion in the upcoming year according to Bloomberg – the US is grappling for a way out.
Americans should be opening dialogue with the Iranian government, not opposition groups, as many believe that Iranian engagement in Iraq is the primary stabilizing factor that could allow a US withdrawal.
However, the MEK have become a friend of convenience, but not a friend offering any promising outcomes. Especially in a time where both Iran and the US have mounting levels of distrust for one another; how would supporting an enemy of Iran make Iran want to be a co-operative friend to the US?
By Nina Hamedani
(Raymond Tanter, Mojahedin khalq and Terrorists, Maryam Rajavi and the Iran Policy committee exposed)
Constance Andresen Tanter, Washington DC, Aug 05, 2008
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=27515&page=2#c1
Constance Andresen Tanter exposes Mojahedin Khalq (Rajavi cult) Terrorists and it’s agent Raymond Tanter commenting on their lobbying article in humanevents.com
… I BELIEVE THAT MADAME RAJAVI AND THE GROUP DO NOT SUPPORT WOMENS RIGHTS SINCE THEY KEEP PAYING AND FUNDING RAYMOND TANTER AND SINCE I WAS THE WIFE AND AM ON APPEAL THAT ALL THEIR INTERNAL AUDITS WILL BE BROUGHT FORTH……HE FOOLED ME AS WELL AS MANY OTHERS….HE HAS THREATENED MY LIFE IF I SPEAK OUT OR EVEN HAVE AN ATTORNEY TO DEFEND MYSELF. I WONDER WHY HE HAS HIDDEN ALL OF THIS AND IN THE DIVORCE ALL DOCUMENTATION OF AL OF THE EMAILS AND UNDO INFLUENCE IS DOCUMENTED FROM THE MEK CAUSING A US STATES DISTRICT COURT IN WAHSINGTON DC TO NOT GRANT DISCOVERY OR EVEN DUE PROCESS…..I AM SEEKING AN ATTORNEY ON APPEAL AND ALSO I WONDER IF I MAY NEED TO SUE THE MEK FOR WHAT IT HAS DONE TO A UNITED STATES CITIZEN I HAVE LIVED IN FEAR OF MY LIFE …
…..
One might wish to investigate the divorce of Raymond Tanter v. Constance Andresen Tanter , myself who was Raymond Tanter’s main support system and his Research assistant who he sent to Paris France to interview Madame Rajavi, who worked so very hard for womens rights, and now…..well Raymond Tanter made me homeless evicted illegally from Alban Towers where he and Alireza and others worked in our Tanter Apartments. That if you read the entire divorce case Tanter v, Tanter 07-DRB 102 you will see how abuse was used, how the MEK AND HEADS OF THE MEK NCRI INTERFERED IN THE DIVORCE INSISTING I SIGN OFF ALL MY RIGHTS, KEEPING ME WITHOUT AN ATTORNEY A HOME AND ANY MEANS OF SUPPORTING MYSELF. Now please understand I am also missing over $300,000 of my Deceased husband’s life insurance…The issue is Does Madame Rajavi support this abuse of women….after all my work for womens issues speaking in London Paris and introducing even DICK ARMEY in Paris france when did I become such a problem…..The month my Mother died in Sepember 2006 Raymond Tanter began his campaign to have me SIGN OFF ALL MY RIGHTS TO GET RENT PAID ON ONE OF THE THREE ABLAN TOWERS APARTMENTS WHEN I REFUSED HE AND ALIREZA MADE ME HOMELESS ALONG WITH THE MEK MEMBERS…..I WELCOME INTERVIEWS SINCE RAYMOND TANTER IS NOW IN DEFAULT OF THE SEPTEMBER 2, 2007 AGREMEENT HE HAND WROTE AT THE DIRECTION OF MADAME RAJAVI TO PAY HIS WIFE BUT THEY ALSO ALLOWED HIM TO DEFAULT AND NOT RETURN MY APARTMENT , $300000 OF MY DEAD HUSBANDS PREMARITAL LIFE INSURANCE AND PAY ME FOR MY WORK FOR THE IPC FOR TWO YEARS AS HIS RESEARCH ASSISTANT…NOW CHUCK NASH AND BRUCE MCCOLM ALL KNEW OF THIS AND THE HOMELESSNESS BUT TOOK THEIR WIVES ON EXPENSIVE TRIPS TO PARIS FRANCE…..IS THE IPC A LOBBYIST FOR THE MEK ONE ONLY NEEDS TO LOOK AT HOW THE TANTER DIVORCE HAS BEEN BLOCKED WITH NO DISCOVERY NO FINANCIAL INVESTIGATION AND DEATH THREATS TO ME SHOULD I SPEAK OUT…..I BELIEVE THAT MADAME RAJAVI AND THE GROUP DO NOT SUPPORT WOMENS RIGHTS SINCE THEY KEEP PAYING AND FUNDING RAYMOND TANTER AND SINCE I WAS THE WIFE AND AM ON APPEAL THAT ALL THEIR INTERNAL AUDITS WILL BE BROUGHT FORTH……HE FOOLED ME AS WELL AS MANY OTHERS….HE HAS THREATENED MY LIFE IF I SPEAK OUT OR EVEN HAVE AN ATTORNEY TO DEFEND MYSELF. I WONDER WHY HE HAS HIDDEN ALL OF THIS AND IN THE DIVORCE ALL DOCUMENTATION OF AL OF THE EMAILS AND UNDO INFLUENCE IS DOCUMENTED FROM THE MEK CAUSING A US STATES DISTRICT COURT IN WAHSINGTON DC TO NOT GRANT DISCOVERY OR EVEN DUE PROCESS…..I AM SEEKING AN ATTORNEY ON APPEAL AND ALSO I WONDER IF I MAY NEED TO SUE THE MEK FOR WHAT IT HAS DONE TO A UNITED STATES CITIZEN I HAVE LIVED IN FEAR OF MY LIFE. BEEN THREATENED IF I SPEAK OUT BUT IN LIFE ONE MUST AND BEFORE ANY COMMENTS ARE MADE READ THE DOCKET FILE OF TANTER V. TANTER 07 -DRB 102 AT 500 INDIANA AVENUE NW WASHINGTON DC IT HOLDS EVEN HANDWRITTEN THREATS FROM RAYMOND TANTER $40 DOLLARS UNDER THE DOOR OF ONE OF OUR APARTMENTS FOR FOOD AND THREATS SIGN OFF SIGN OFF ALL YOU RIGHTS AND CONDO RIGHTS IN ORDER TO GET THE RENT PAID ON APARTMENT 336 HE HAD ME ILLEGALLY EVICTED NOW DISMISSED BY ARSCHSTONE SMITH THIS ALL DOING THE LARGEST PRIVATE BUYOUT IN US HISTORY…$22 BILLION DOLLARS..HE AND ALIREZA USED MY MARITAL APARTMENT 507 IN ALBAN TOWERS SO RAYMOMD AND BOTH WERE TENANTS SINCE JUNE 2001 AND RAYMOND WANTED TO APPLY ALL CONDO RIGHTS TO THE PURCHASE. IF YOU GO FURTHER BACK INTO HOUSING COURT YOU WILL SEE HIS PLAN WAS TO MAKE ME HOMELESSS AND STEAL THE CONDO RIGHTS IN ADDITION L-34 IN ALBAN TOWERS LISTS AS ADDITIONAL TO 507 AS THE IPC OFFICE EVERYWHERE BUT HOW CAN THAT BE IN A RESIDENTIAL ZONED BUIDING…RAYMODN TANTER EVEN USED THE POLICE TO TRY AND SAY THERE WAS A BAR NOTICE OF ME FROM THE BUILDING THAT WAS FALSE AND THE POLICE VERIFIED THAT…I AM USHER AT NATIONAL CATHEDRAL AND AM VERY REAL…HE BEAT ME IN THE END OF THIS TRYING TO FORCE ME TO SIGN OFF……I WAS SUMMONED TO PARIS FRANCE IN FEAR AND THEY KEPT ME THERE TO SIGN
The lies of Hiroshima live on, props in the war crimes of the 20th century
The 1945 attack was murder on an epic scale. In its victims’ names, we must not allow a nuclear repeat in the Middle East
When I first went to Hiroshima in 1967, the shadow on the steps was still there. It was an almost perfect impression of a human being at ease: legs splayed, back bent, one hand by her side as she sat waiting for a bank to open. At a quarter past eight on the morning of August 6, 1945, she and her silhouette were burned into the granite. I stared at the shadow for an hour or more, then walked down to the river and met a man called Yukio, whose chest was still etched with the pattern of the shirt he was wearing when the atomic bomb was dropped.
He and his family still lived in a shack thrown up in the dust of an atomic desert. He described a huge flash over the city, "a bluish light, something like an electrical short", after which wind blew like a tornado and black rain fell. "I was thrown on the ground and noticed only the stalks of my flowers were left. Everything was still and quiet, and when I got up, there were people naked, not saying anything. Some of them had no skin or hair. I was certain I was dead." Nine years later, when I returned to look for him, he was dead from leukaemia.
In the immediate aftermath of the bomb, the allied occupation authorities banned all mention of radiation poisoning and insisted that people had been killed or injured only by the bomb’s blast. It was the first big lie. "No radioactivity in Hiroshima ruin" said the front page of the New York Times, a classic of disinformation and journalistic abdication, which the Australian reporter Wilfred Burchett put right with his scoop of the century. "I write this as a warning to the world," reported Burchett in the Daily Express, having reached Hiroshima after a perilous journey, the first correspondent to dare. He described hospital wards filled with people with no visible injuries but who were dying from what he called "an atomic plague". For telling this truth, his press accreditation was withdrawn, he was pilloried and smeared – and vindicated.
The atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was a criminal act on an epic scale. It was premeditated mass murder that unleashed a weapon of intrinsic criminality. For this reason its apologists have sought refuge in the mythology of the ultimate "good war", whose "ethical bath", as Richard Drayton called it, has allowed the west not only to expiate its bloody imperial past but to promote 60 years of rapacious war, always beneath the shadow of The Bomb.
The most enduring lie is that the atomic bomb was dropped to end the war in the Pacific and save lives. "Even without the atomic bombing attacks," concluded the United States Strategic Bombing Survey of 1946, "air supremacy over Japan could have exerted sufficient pressure to bring about unconditional surrender and obviate the need for invasion. Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts, and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the Survey’s opinion that … Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated."
The National Archives in Washington contain US government documents that chart Japanese peace overtures as early as 1943. None was pursued. A cable sent on May 5, 1945 by the German ambassador in Tokyo and intercepted by the US dispels any doubt that the Japanese were desperate to sue for peace, including "capitulation even if the terms were hard". Instead, the US secretary of war, Henry Stimson, told President Truman he was "fearful" that the US air force would have Japan so "bombed out" that the new weapon would not be able "to show its strength". He later admitted that "no effort was made, and none was seriously considered, to achieve surrender merely in order not to have to use the bomb". His foreign policy colleagues were eager "to browbeat the Russians with the bomb held rather ostentatiously on our hip". General Leslie Groves, director of the Manhattan Project that made the bomb, testified: "There was never any illusion on my part that Russia was our enemy, and that the project was conducted on that basis." The day after Hiroshima was obliterated, President Truman voiced his satisfaction with the "overwhelming success" of "the experiment".
Since 1945, the United States is believed to have been on the brink of using nuclear weapons at least three times. In waging their bogus "war on terror", the present governments in Washington and London have declared they are prepared to make "pre-emptive" nuclear strikes against non-nuclear states. With each stroke toward the midnight of a nuclear Armageddon, the lies of justification grow more outrageous. Iran is the current "threat". But Iran has no nuclear weapons and the disinformation that it is planning a nuclear arsenal comes largely from a discredited CIA-sponsored Iranian opposition group, the MEK – just as the lies about Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction originated with the Iraqi National Congress, set up by Washington.
The role of western journalism in erecting this straw man is critical. That America’s Defence Intelligence Estimate says "with high confidence" that Iran gave up its nuclear weapons programme in 2003 has been consigned to the memory hole. That Iran’s president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad never threatened to "wipe Israel off the map" is of no interest. But such has been the mantra of this media "fact" that in his recent, obsequious performance before the Israeli parliament, Gordon Brown alluded to it as he threatened Iran, yet again.
This progression of lies has brought us to one of the most dangerous nuclear crises since 1945, because the real threat remains almost unmentionable in western establishment circles and therefore in the media. There is only one rampant nuclear power in the Middle East and that is Israel. The heroic Mordechai Vanunu tried to warn the world in 1986 when he smuggled out evidence that Israel was building as many as 200 nuclear warheads. In defiance of UN resolutions, Israel is today clearly itching to attack Iran, fearful that a new American administration might, just might, conduct genuine negotiations with a nation the west has defiled since Britain and America overthrew Iranian democracy in 1953.
In the New York Times on July 18, the Israeli historian Benny Morris, once considered a liberal and now a consultant to his country’s political and military establishment, threatened "an Iran turned into a nuclear wasteland". This would be mass murder. For a Jew, the irony cries out.
The question begs: are the rest of us to be mere bystanders, claiming, as good Germans did, that "we did not know"? Do we hide ever more behind what Richard Falk has called "a self-righteous, one-way, legal/moral screen [with] positive images of western values and innocence portrayed as threatened, validating a campaign of unrestricted violence"? Catching war criminals is fashionable again. Radovan Karadzic stands in the dock, but Sharon and Olmert, Bush and Blair do not. Why not? The memory of Hiroshima requires an answer.
John Pilger The Guardian
Expert outlines reasons for US and UK support to Mojahedin-e-Khalq (Rajavi cult)
Interview with Ali Kordi, 1 August 2008
Translated by BBC Monitoring Middle East
Text of Interview by Politics Desk with Ali Kordi, senior expert at the Centre for Islamic Revolution Documents, headlined: "Britain and America want to preserve the Monafeqin" published by the Iran news paper on 28 July
Politics Desk: At the end of the month of Tir 1367 [21 June to 21 July 1988], the Monafeqin ["hypocrites"; reference to the Mojahedin-e-Khalq Organization, MKO] group, held a meeting with the Ba’thist regime officials and reached the conclusion that with the support of the armed forces of Saddam Hussain, particularly his Air Force, it can launch a military operation and bring down the Iranian central government. These operations were named "The eternal radiance". However, merely few days after their beginning, the Monafeqin were stopped at the Hasanabad Pass [in western Iran] through a series of collective operations by the forces of the [Islamic Revolution] Guards Corps, the Basij, and the Army Aviation Corps and were forced to flee. The combatants [Iranian armed forces] named these operations, Mersad. In this connection, we have talked to Ali Kordi, a senior expert at the Islamic Revolution Documents Centre.
[Question by unidentified Iran reporter] What was the starting point of the ideological problems inside the Monafeqin group, which finally culminated in the situation whereby they drew their arms against the common people of Iran and the launching of Mersad operation?
[Kordi] In reality, the starting point for the ideological problems of the Monafeqin with the people and the political system was something inherent in the nature and essence of that group in the first place. This is because the Monafeqin group is one of the eclectic groups of our society, and as such, its members could never demonstrate that they are in harmony with the prevailing ideology and belief of our society. The Monafeqin could not tolerate the victories of the forces of the Path of the Imam [Khomeyni], as the school of pure Islam, and therefore, they relied on their eclectic mode of thought, and subsequently pointed their guns at the Islamic society of our country.
[Reporter] Despite their Iraqi presence and patronage of Saddam Hussain, why do the Monafeqin group still think that they enjoy popularity in Iran?
[Kordi] Mas’ud Rajavi and the leadership cadres in general in the Monafeqin group are severely suffering from personality cult and they always believe that they are among the most popular organizations and entities. Even during the days of planning "The eternal light" (Mersad) operations, the individuals who had joined the organization from Iran in order to take part in the operations, had objected to the way the operations had been designed and planned, and had said that the people are with the [government] system, and it is not going to be that easy to reach Tehran. Apparently, Mas’ud Rajavi became angry and agitated, and told them: "You know nothing about the situation inside Iran!"
[Reporter] Why at the present, some Western countries, such as America and Britain, are supporting the Monafeqin group? What is the special and specific function of that group at present juncture?
[Kordi] Up to now, America and Britain have tried to preserve the Monafeqin organization as one of the forces which are hostile to the Islamic Republic system of Iran, even though they know very well that this organization does not enjoy any influence and impact on the Iranian domestic affairs. However, based on the premise of foreign powers extending support and backing to the hostile opposition forces, they continue to support the Monafeqin. In fact, the only special function of the Monafeqin is to confirm the existence of an Iranian force which is strongly opposed to the Islamic Republic. The mission of the Monafeqin is to show some Western countries that the situation in Iran never enjoys political stability, and the Islamic state has opponents, such as them.
[Reporter] Do you think that the foreign-based hostile opposition groups are likely to take up arms against the Islamic Republic of Iran again?
[Kordi] The situation in today’s Iran is very different from the circumstances which prevailed in the early 1360s decade [early 1980s]. Not only small groups such as the Mojahedin, but also major powers and countries too are not capable of confronting Iran. The recent missile manoeuvres of the [Islamic Revolution] Guards Corps bears testimony to that fact. On the other hand, it must be recalled that after the defeat of the National Council for Resistance and the alliance of the Monafeqin and Bani-Sadr, none of the current political groups are prepared to cooperate with the monopolistic and oligarchic Monafeqin organization.
Source: Iran, Tehran, in Persian 28 Jul 08
The U.S. relationship with an Iranian opposition group based in Iraq jeopardizes the future of relations with the Islamic Republic, an Iranian report says.
An Iranian Press TV report says the U.S. relationship with various militant groups in the post-Sept. 11, 2001, geopolitical environment is duplicitous.
The United States and Iran have had an acrimonious relationship since a CIA-backed coup in 1953 overthrew the Iranian government. Now, the report said, "U.S.-Iranian political atmosphere and dominant American philosophies have encouraged the U.S. government to forge a friendship with an Iranian opposition group that is living in exile, the People’s Mujahedin of Iran."
The report points to a 2007 BBC report saying Tehran in 2003 offered to abandon its support for Hamas and Hezbollah if the United States would revoke its support for the PMOI, but U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney refused the offer, the report said.
Press TV said that instead of pushing for warmer ties with Iran, Washington has thrown its support behind the PMOI in order to promote democracy in Iran. The column cites a report this year from Seymour Hersh in The New Yorker claiming the U.S. intelligence community has "longstanding ties" to the PMOI as well.
Furthermore, though considered a terrorist group, the PMOI is offered U.S. military protection in its base in Ashraf city in eastern Iraq, Press TV notes.
"Especially in a time where both Iran and the U.S. have mounting levels of distrust for one another; how would supporting an enemy of Iran make Iran want to be a cooperative friend to the U.S.?" the report asks.
UPI, August 1, 2008
http://www.upi.com/Emerging_Threats/2008/08/01/
PMOI_obstacle_to_peace_Iran_says/UPI-72771217631365/
I think that we don’t have the benefit of an accurate measure of terrorism to stop its threats. The existing gap in the laws grants terrorists the opportunity of propagating their violent policies just in the heart of the modern and democratic world. It well indicates that the world lacks the needed seriousness to combat terrorism. If we are really serious about fighting terrorism, we also have to start getting serious about accurately measuring its threats and take precautionary measures rather than awarding them with more than adequate accommodations to gather together or roam in the lobbies of the Western countries parliaments as Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK) is doing.
I wonder that while it is a blacklisted terrorist group on many countries lists, including the US and the EU, and its terrorist as well as cult charges are still open and investigated in France, it has the freedom of organizing a claimed gathering of 70,000 in northern Paris to demand removal of terrorist tag. Isn’t it legally prohibited to engage in any form of activity in the countries where it is blacklisted?
There is a much more surprising case concerning MEK I draw your attention to. Once in October 2006 the present UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, then the Chancellor, gave a speech to the Chatham House think-tank on "Meeting the Terrorist Challenge". The first words went as: “There should be no safe haven anywhere in the world for terrorists. Equally there should be no hiding place anywhere for those who finance terrorism”.
Nice words said and many felt relieved because hopes were fostered that at last the terrorism was beginning to face a real challenge. The next expressed ideas were even more promising. Here is a part:
And today I want to announce the framework of a new regime we are developing nationally and internationally for rooting out terrorist finance. In the last century, the main province of foreign policy was that nations had to guard against threats from other nations. And these threats still remain – demonstrated clearly yesterday by North Korea’s irresponsible action, which our Government and the whole world condemn completely.
But now also we see how small groups of terrorists can cause carnage:
enemies who do not need great armies nor, in practise, large amounts of money, weapons, or technology to put lives at risk; enemies without even a recognised formal chain of command, but enemies who can inspire imitators in the heart of our communities.
And so in addressing these new threats for whom there is no real precedent we are forced to consider every means, every necessary resource – all methods of diplomacy, all means of intelligence, all tools of law, policing and our security and military forces – in order to discharge our first duty: to protect our citizens.
Alas! His ideas and the new measure showed wide differences with that spectrum soon after he was elected the Prime Minister. Now we see he has taken the first step to make England a safe haven for MEK by bringing it out from the terror list. The move is encouraging other proscribed groups, and Al-Qaeda of course, to start defending their rights! I in my turn congratulate Prime Minister for his initiative measure and seriousness to discharge his first duty, as he has said, to protect British citizens.
American tools -Mojahedin Khalq or Rajavi cult- were on the payroll of Saddam Hussein
Iraq will be plunged into a new war if Israel or the US launches an attack on 
Iran, Iraqi leaders have warned. Iranian retaliation would take place in Iraq, said Dr Mahmoud Othman, the influential Iraqi MP.
The Iraqi government’s main allies are the US and Iran, whose governments openly detest each other. The Iraqi government may be militarily dependent on the 140,000 US troops in the country, but its Shia and Kurdish leaders have long been allied to Iran. Iraqi leaders have to continually perform a balancing act in which they seek to avoid alienating either country.
The balancing act has become more difficult for Iraq since George Bush successfully requested $400m (£200m) from Congress last year to fund covert operations aimed at destabilising the Iranian leadership. Some of these operations are likely to be launched from Iraqi territory with the help of Iranian militants opposed to Tehran. The most effective of these opponent groups is the Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK), which enraged the Iraqi government by staging a conference last month at Camp Ashraf, north-east of Baghdad. It demanded the closure of the Iranian embassy and the expulsion of all Iranian agents in Iraq. "It was a huge meeting" said Dr Othman. "All the tribes and political leaders who are against Iran, but are also against the Iraqi government, were there." He said the anti-Iranian meeting could not have taken place without US permission.
The Americans disarmed the 3,700 MEK militants, who had long been allied to Saddam Hussein, at Camp Ashraf in 2003, but they remain well-organised and well-financed. The extent of their support within Iran remains unknown, but they are extremely effective as an intelligence and propaganda organisation.
Though the MEK is on the State Department’s list of terrorist groups, the Pentagon and other US institutions have been periodically friendly to it. The US task force charged by Mr Bush with destabilising the Iranian government is likely to co-operate with it.
In reaction to the conference, the Iraqi government, the US and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) have started secret talks on the future of the MEK with the Iraqi government pressing for their expulsion from Iraq. Dr Othman, who speaks to the MEK frequently by phone, said: "I pressed them to get out of Iraq voluntarily because they are a card in the hands of the Americans."
An embarrassing aspect of the American pin-prick war against Iran is that many of its instruments were previously on the payroll of Saddam Hussein. The MEK even played a role in 1991 in helping to crush the uprising against the Baathist regime at the end of the Gulf war. The dissidents from Arab districts in southern Iran around Ahwaz were funded by Saddam Hussein’s intelligence organisations, which orchestrated the seizure of the Iranian embassy in London in 1980 which was supposedly carried out by Arab nationalists from Iran.
The one community in Iran most likely to oppose the Tehran government is the Iranian Kurds. There have been an increasing number of attacks by PJAK, the Iranian wing of the Turkish PKK, which claims to be a separate party. Based in the Kandil mountains in Iraqi Kurdistan, PJAK has carried out frequent raids into Iran and has reportedly been able to win local support. But it would be extremely dangerous for the US to be seen as a supporter of PJAK as this would offend the Turks who have a military co-operation agreement with Iran against terrorism.
Independent