Rajavis and Cult Leadership

True Threat of Terrorism: Human Beings who turned into “acolytes” of Rajavi

Over the past decades, much of the attention of the world have been focused on the radical extremist groups such as AlQaeda and ISIS. But the true threat actually comes from the cult-like structure of these groups. Cult-like controlling system and the indoctrination methodology of these groups finally results in the most horrible acts of violence.

The Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/MEK) is characterized as one of these destructive cults that threat the world’s security. Elizabeth Rubin the prominent journalist of the New York Times, was first to call the MKO, “the Cult of Rajavi”. The phrase was based on her first-hand experience of visiting the group’s base in Iraq, Camp Ashraf. About the world she witnessed in the MKO camp, she wrote:

“When I arrived at Camp Ashraf, the base of the group’s operations, in April 2003, I thought I’d entered a fictional world of female worker bees. Everywhere I saw women dressed exactly alike, in khaki uniforms and mud-colored head scarves, driving back and forth in white pickup trucks, staring ahead in a daze as if they were working at a factory in Maoist China. I met dozens of young women buried in the mouths of tanks, busily tinkering with the engines. One by one, the girls bounded up to me and my two minders to recite their transformations from human beings to acolytes of Ms. Rajavi. “[1]

As Rubin asserts, members of the Cult of Rajavi transformed from “human beings to acolytes of Rajavi “. But what the leaders of the cult want to show off is entirely different from what they really are. Jeremiah Goulka is one of the authors of the RAND Corporation report on the Mujahedin Khalq. He criticizes the US high profiles who support the group and finally removed it from the list of terrorist organization. ”Accidentally or not, though, the speakers were helping to raise the profile and legitimize the aims of a cult group that will not bring democracy to Iran and has no popular support in the country,” he warned. [2]

The group will not bring democracy because it has not practiced democracy in its four-decade history. “After my visit, I met and spoke to men and women who had escaped from the group’s clutches,” Rubin writes. “Many had to be deprogrammed. They recounted how people were locked up if they disagreed with the leadership or tried to escape; some were even killed.” [3]

“Friendships and all emotional relationships are forbidden. From the time they are toddlers, boys and girls are not allowed to speak to each other. Each day at Camp Ashraf you had to report your dreams and thoughts.” [4]

Rubin also refers to RAND report, “ A 2009 RAND Corporation study found that up to 70 percent of the group’s members there might have been held against their will. “ [5]

Regarding the cult-like terrorist substance of the MKO, its leaders’ efforts to pretend the group as a democratic alternative to the Islamic republic is ridiculous. The so-called president elect of the group starts her fabrications in an article raising the issue of the “radical factions” who shake “the world with their ability to convince ordinary people to commit unspeakable atrocities.”

As leaders of a cult, Massoud Rajavi and his wife definitely know how “to convince ordinary people to commit unspeakable atrocities”. The “acolytes” of Massoud and Maryam Rajavi, committed numerous acts of violence including military operations, mortar attacks, suicide attacks and assassinations. One significant example of the MKO’s “unspeakable atrocities” was the suppression of Kurdish uprising in Iraq. Read Rubin’s account of the story: “In 1991, when Mr. Hussein crushed a Shiite uprising in the south and attempted to carry out a genocide against the Kurds in the north, the Rajavis and their army joined his forces in mowing down fleeing Kurds.

“Ms. Rajavi told her disciples, “Take the Kurds under your tanks, and save your bullets for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards.” Many followers escaped in disgust.” [6]

Today, with the increasing growth of defection from the MKO and the decline of the group following the relocation of its rank and file from Iraq to Europe, the group leaders make efforts to hook their survival to the West. In their masquerades to boast a democratic portrait, Rajavi introduces her cult as “moderate Muslim” that is suppressed by the Islamic Republic.

Presenting a solution to the trouble of the region, she tries to pass her cult off as “an interpretation of genuine Islam that is both democratic and tolerant” that should be accompanied with “military campaigns and intelligence operations in the region”.

Jeremiah Goulka correctly suggests that the MKO’s real aim is “to have the United States install the MEK as Iran’s new government”. He warns, “That would mean war. The MEK may deny wanting violent regime change, but the only conceivable way it could become the next government in Tehran would be at the head of a U.S. invasion force.”[7]

Goulka advises the American supporters of the MKO, “Aligning ourselves with the MEK would undermine any attempt at credibility among Iranians because it would make us look like dupes.” [8] He is absolutely right but looking like “dupes” is the least danger that a community in which the MKO followers are living is posed to.

Brainwashed members of the Cult of Rajavi have several times showed their ability to commit “unspeakable atrocities”. A dozen of them set themselves on fire to protest the arrest of their leader by the French Police, in June 2003. Two female members of the cult lost their life because of self-immolation.

The Rajavis are definitely professional on the most effective methods to turn ordinary people into devotees who commit appalling violence.

By Mazda Parsi

Sources:

[1] RUBIN, ELIZABETH, An Iranian Cult and Its American Friends, The New York Times, August 13, 2011

[2] Goulka, Jeremiah, The Cult of MEK, The American Prospect, July 18, 2012

[3] RUBIN, ELIZABETH, An Iranian Cult and Its American Friends, The New York Times, August 13, 2011

[4] ibid

[5] ibid

[6] ibid

[7] Goulka, Jeremiah, The Cult of MEK, The American Prospect, July 18, 2012

[8]ibid

December 26, 2015 0 comments

The cult of Rajavi

Brainwashing? There should be a law against it

Shocking revelations about Maoist cult leader Aravindan Balakrishnan and his female victims in a suburb of London shone a light on the normally hidden phenomenon of cultic abuse which pervades society. The danger now will be that this is treated as just another sensational story before being placed on a journalistic ‘bizarre incident’ list along with Jonestown, Wako and Heaven’s Gate, as a freak occurrence.

Sadly, practitioners in the field of cult awareness know of thousands of lonely families suffering the loss of loved ones to cultic abuse with little recourse to help or even acknowledgement.

As a former member of the political cult Mojahedin Khalq, I am intimately familiar with the methods which Balakrishnan used to control and exploit his victims. As this case has highlighted, for a person caught up in cultic abuse there is no exit, they are in fact modern slaves. Indeed, the 2005 report on the MEK by Human Rights Watch was named ‘No Exit’.

If the experience of the daughter and the other victims in the Balakrishnan case are to teach us anything, it is that this is more common than we’d like to believe and that such ghastly behaviour – much like child abuse – thrives on secrecy and collusion; that is, the unwillingness of successive governments to acknowledge this as a widespread problem. More than anything we need to explode the myth that cults are about religion. They are not. The illusion that ‘new religious movements’ are relatively harmless belongs thirty years in the past. But for years, families and former cult members have been dismissed, even denigrated, as hysterical, malicious or delusional or have been exploited for entertainment by the media. No wonder they are reluctant to speak out.

Even when families do bravely confront the cults which have enslaved their loved ones, they find themselves battling litigation, intimidation and disbelief.

Government failure to engage with this phenomenon has left the public unprotected. While civil law protects a designated group of vulnerable people from undue influence, cult experts argue that anyone can be susceptible to deceptive cult recruitment at some point in their lives; people are usually in a state of transitioning when they get involved in cults. This emphasis on susceptibility not vulnerability is an important distinction because it places culpability directly on the intention and activities of the perpetrator rather than looking for deficiencies in the victims. The Balakrishnan cult case is unusual because the leader was prosecuted, not just because the victims were rescued.

Interestingly, techniques for deceptive psychological manipulation are already acknowledged and understood in various modern contexts where coercive persuasion is used for cynical exploitation and enslavement. These include partner abuse, grooming for sex, spiritual abuse, abusive therapy, extremist violence and terrorism. All these are regarded as morally repugnant. But as yet we lack a law which covers the activity which underlies them all.

In the modern vernacular, the term brainwashing is used by ordinary people exactly to describe an unaccountable change of mind and/or personality in an otherwise normal person. Bewildered families of young people travelling to Syria say their children have been brainwashed. The government needs to catch up with scientific and social understanding of this phenomenon if we are to be protected. Are MPs aware, for example, not whether, but how many fully brainwashed cult members are working in sensitive national security roles? We know they exist because as cult counsellors we talk with their families. Yet the phenomenon is glossed over as almost immaterial.

Cultic abuse – known in the vernacular as brainwashing – has a very precise definition. It is not about ‘using advertising to brainwash us into buying things’ or ‘brainwashing us into becoming docile citizens under government dictates’. These are false and unhelpful myths. Neuropsychology explains that ‘changing your mind’ is a physical experience which can be scientifically identified. Brainwashing is not about doctrine, it is about the psychologically manipulative techniques used to literally ‘change’ our minds.

In more legalistic terms it is ‘the deliberate and systematic application of an array of recognised techniques for psychological manipulation without the knowledge or informed consent of the victim in order to effect a breach of a person’s mental, emotional, intellectual and social integrity for the purposes of abuse, exploitation, slavery and/or pecuniary gain, and to so inhibit their critical faculties that they do not recognise their own predicament so that they may act in ways harmful to their best interests and the interests of society on instruction or by command or by neglect.

The advantage of criminalising cultic abuse in this way is that it is ideologically neutral and does not reflect any particular belief system but straightforwardly describes harmful behaviour. This would protect all our citizens and an obvious place would be an amendment to the new Modern Slavery Bill passed in March.

Prime Minister David Cameron has already uttered the word brainwashing in speeches about Radicalisation. There was no public outcry or panic. Ordinary people know what he means. What a law would do is to give a precise definition which would allow us to ‘join the dots’ between seemingly disparate events like the Balakrishnan cult, the Rotherham grooming for sex scandal and terrorist recruitment.

Indeed, public apprehension over the war on terrorism in Syria and the perceived threat of blowback, is the perfect opportunity for the government to introduce and explain the phenomenon of brainwashing in this narrowly defined sense as an element of the Prevent Strategy. The introduction of a criminal offence which allows the detection, prosecution and punishment of this abhorrent behaviour will aid public understanding and allay fears.

Anne Khodabandeh @AnneKhodabandeh

Anne Khodabandeh, a leading authority on cultic abuse and terrorism, works as a consultant within the remit of the UK Prevent Duty. After twenty years in the MEK, a dangerous, destructive mind control cult, she helps families through Iran-Interlink.

Anne Khodabandeh (Singleton), Iranian.com,

December 13, 2015 0 comments

The cult of Rajavi

Family, Menacing Icon for the Cult of Rajavi

One sure sign of someone being involved in a cult is that there is a clear separation from family and friends. This sign is clearly observed in the Cult of Rajavi (The Mujahedin khalq Organization/ the MKO). There are numerous cases of families of the group members residing in Camp Liberty Iraq who have been striving to visit their loved ones in the camp but they are absolutely barred by the authorities to do so and they are labeled the group authorities who forbid any kind of family relationship, label the families as “agents of the regime’s intelligence Ministry under the cover of families of the residents”. However, the efforts of the suffering families picketing in front of Camp Liberty resulted favorably by the Iraqi Parliament.

Following the meeting between Liberty residents’ families and certain Iraqi MPs, a parliamentary committee was formed to investigate the situation of the MKO members and their families’ request to visit their loved ones in the camp. They are hoping that the Iraqi administration will take proper actions to facilitate their visit. The parliament website reported that a member of the parliament’s leadership board, Dr. Humam Hamoudi had recommended the Human Rights Commission and Foreign Relations Commission to form a delegation to visit Camp Liberty in order to get first-hand information about the situation in the camp. This will help them to transfer the family’s wishes to their loved ones about their desires to visit them in the camp.

On the other side of the battle, the MKO’s propaganda does not remain silent. It publishes a so-called letter of families of liberty residents to the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon. In the alleged letter, the alleged “liberty residents’ families residing in Europe and the United States” are “gravely concerned” about the lives of their children!

The so-called letter is a failed tactic because of the numerous evidences on violation of the rights of family in the MKO camps. Regardless of the grieves of a large number of families from Iran who have been endeavoring to visit their beloveds in Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty, the truths on the family rights abuse inside the MKO is undeniable.

Despite the MKO propaganda calls for visa for families in Europe and the US, there are families who were granted visa to travel to Iraq but they were prevented from visiting their loved ones in the Camps. Mustafa and Mahboubeh Mohammadi, whose daughter Somayeh has been taken as hostage by the MKO leaders, went to Camp Ashraf Iraq several times. They were not allowed to visit their daughter and even they were beaten by the MKO agents. However, the Mohammadis did not stop their efforts to save their daughter from the cult bars of the MKO.

Mustafa Mohammadi together with his other daughter Hurieh even went to the MKO’s headquarters in Auver sur d’oise to urge the group leaders to release their long lost daughter. Once more, they were attacked by the group agents for seeking their most basic right, the right to have a free contact with their loved one. Mostafa and Hurrieh were accompanied by another heartbroken father, Ghorban Ali Hosseinnezhad. When Gorban Ali escaped Camp Ashraf his daughter was left behind in the camp.

According to his testimonies, when he was in the camp he was not allowed to visit his daughter regularly. “The leaders of the MKO cult did not allow me and my first daughter Zeinab, 34, to visit and talk to each other while we were both in the same camp,” said Hosseinnezhad. “We were just allowed to meet each other on the New Year’s celebration for an hour or two and under their direct control and supervision.”

In Hurriyeh Mohammadi’s report on their trip to Auver sur D’oise you can read: “The Mojahedin are threatened by a father and daughter that have put their lives on hold many times and have used the little resources they have to fly to Paris to ask for the safety of Somayeh. They call themselves an organization for the liberation of the people of Iran yet they cannot even provide freedom to the ones they call their own. We will not stop fighting for the safety of our children and this will not be over until these captives are freed.”

As usual, the MKO propaganda labels the two fathers as agents of the Iranian Intelligence but there are many more evidences on the cases of violation against families in the group. Forced divorces and separation of children from parents are two iconic examples of abuses took place in the MKO after the so-called ideological revolution of Massoud Rajavi. Human Rights Watch and the US Defence Department’s RAND report, both mentioned the fact.

In Persian references you can see testimonies of former members who reveal horrible evidences about child abuses committed in the MKO camps. Manijeh Habashi and Nadereh Afshari, Batoul Soltani and many others are female defectors of the Cult of Rajavi who recount horrific facts about distorted family relations in the MKO camps. Before the children were dispatched to Europe in 1991, mothers in Ashraf were not permitted to live with their children. They were just allowed to visit their children on certain days of the week or certain hours of the day.

The above mentioned cases of violation of family rights occur in the camps of the MKO where no visa is needed to travel to visit a family member and the distance between two family members is not more than a few kilometer.

In a letter to UNHCR, former members of the MKO including Ghorban Ali Hosseinnejad ask the authorities to provide residents of Camp liberty with a situation so that they can decide for their future with their free will. “Many of us have been in this organization, before being able to find a way out of it, for decades”, they state.” We are fully aware of the brainwashing and intimidation activities that take place at every level with the single aim of isolating the members from the outside world and feeding them false information and targeted propaganda to turn them against their own families.”

The signatories of the letter believe that family connections –that the MKO members have been deprived of for many years—are a key to release them mentally and eventually physically. “Based on our personal experience, we assure you that if you facilitate the meeting of the members with their families in a protected and private space, without the presence of their superiors, they will find the courage to express their true desire that is to join their families and relocate from Iraq,” they write.

While the MKO propaganda claims that Iraqi government does not grant visas to families of liberty residents, this is the call of families who repeatedly went to Iraq, stand behind the gates of Ashraf and Liberty but they were not granted “visa” to visit their loves ones who are taken as hostages behind the bars of the camp:

“We will go to any lengths and are begging anyone who can hear our voices to help us. Please help free our kids from their evil clutches. Help their voices be heard. Help mothers take their children back into their arms. Help children see the advancement of the world and live the rest of their lives not in fear but tranquility and peace.

By Mazda Parsi

December 7, 2015 0 comments

UN High Commissioner for Refugees

MKO imprisoned us and didn’t let us meet our brothers

UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Baghdad

Dear Sir,

I, Mahmonir Iranpour, am writing to you about my brothers, Ahmadreza and Mohammadreza Iranpour, who left Iran aiming to reach Turkey and then Canada or one of the European countries in December 2002 hoping to create a better future there. Unfortunately, on their way to Europe, in Turkey, they were caught by People’s Mujahedin of Iran (MKO) and then were taken to Camp Ashraf. For a long time, we were totally unaware of them until we were informed about their condition through those who had managed to flee from Camp Ashraf. Finally, for the first time, in January 2004, we went to Iraq and Camp Ashraf and succeeded in meeting them. However, we were not allowed to visit them privately in such a way that about 20 MKO members accompanied us stopping us from contacting them personally and privately. Also, they told us that we could stay there for some nights providing no other family members were with us. Afterwards, in March 2004, we revisited Camp Ashraf with three other families. This time, not only didn’t they let us meet our brothers, but they also imprisoned and investigated us. Although a number of children and elderly people were accompanying us, they deprived us of any food for a night and then in the morning they beat and expelled us from Camp Ashraf. Afterwards, we wrote to an American commander, who was there, and sued them for what they did to us. Also, after returning back to Iran, we wrote to Human Rights Watch and complained about what they had done. At the same time when Human Rights Watch was addressing our proceedings and they were condemned, we received an Email inviting us to Camp Ashraf in November 2004 saying that this time we would be allowed to meet them provided that we were alone and no family accompany us. Having been unaware of the situation that they had been investigated by Human Rights Watch for what they had done, we went to Camp Ashraf being incognizant of their conspiracy. We and my brothers, who were dressed up formally, stayed there and were filmed. After returning to Iran, we had a telephone contact with Human Rights Watch representative in London named Doroodi, who told us that we lay and that we both had met our brothers and had taken photographs with them in Camp Ashraf. They deceived us by taking photos pretending that we had met our brothers using these photos against us in Human Rights Watch proceedings. Now, according to your sound judgment, are they liars and fraudulent or us??

Why were deprived of meeting with our dear ones while it is a basis right and one of the elements of human rights? Our brothers are kept in Camp Liberty which is a very small place surrounded by barbed wire and concrete walls. They are physically and mentally trapped by Rajavi sect. you know that you are sometimes attacked by these people. We fear that our brothers may get hurt and we are for a long time unaware of their condition. I hereby should remind you of binding protocols approved in United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees committee as regards the fact that refugees are entitled to choose their destination, education, contact with their relatives. Here is the question, why we are deprived of these rights and why this commissioner, as protector of refugees’ and our rights, evade their duty and deprive us of our basic rights?

I have repetitively asked for visiting both through Email or telephone contact. But, every time what I receive says that MKO members don’t allow any chance of visiting our brothers. Here is the question, generally wherever a group of people are under control of a commissioner, they should abide by the commissioner orders. Your responses in this regard are not acceptable. Unfortunately, it seems that instead of employing international regulations as regards defending refugees’ and their families’ rights, the commissioner acts against United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees committee decisions which is detrimental to those imprisoned in Camp Liberty. It is our right to meet our brothers and we expect you to defend this right, not to deprive us of it.

Finally, I suggest that you read protocols approved by United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees committee. Also, since I see myself entitled to these rights, I ask you to provide me with an opportunity to be able to meet my brothers.

Truly yours,

Mahmonir Iranpour, sister of Ahmadreza and Mohammadreza Iranpour, who are kept in Camp Ashraf

Desember5, 2015

Shiraz- Iran,Tel: 00989173035585

December 6, 2015 0 comments

Massoud Rajavi

Rajavi: To let go of my hostages, you have to pay me more

Rajavi reacts to the Iraqi parliament supporting families of the hostages in Camp Liberty (From Canada!!)

Mojahedin Khalq (aka National Council of Resistance, MKO, MEK, Rajavi cult) have put the reaction of their fugitive leader Massoud Rajavi on their site.

One of their banners reads “Issue Visas for us to visit our children in Camp Liberty”. We asked the Iraqi Foreign ministry about this. The reply was simple. “Ask for Visa and if rejected, then protest. Iraq is more that happy to give Visa especially if it is for reunion between families. We also welcome any help given to remove the residents of Camp Liberty out of Iraq”.

The other one reads “Dear Mr. Prime Minister, Order that obstacles of sale of Ashraf properties be removed or compensate the residents so their resettlement be expedited“.

Massoud Khodabandeh from Middle East Strategy Consultants commented on this saying:

“Considering the resettlement of MEK members from Iraq to Albania is financed by the United Nations (And partly by the Iraqi Government), Rajavi’s message could not be more clear. Pay me more if you expect me to release the hostages in Camp Liberty. This is not his first time. He has on many occasions asked for ransom whether in Iraq or in France. Unfortunately too many times getting what he wants but not keeping his side of the bargain. Remember America’s Secretary of State Hilary Clinton taking them off the American list of bad terrorists if they evacuate Camp Ashraf without violence in return. Rajavi’ cult got off the list as promised but refused to allow the transfer of the last 100 remaining people until over 50 of them were killed by the angry Iraqis who had their relatives killed by Mojahedin Khalq under the protection of Saddam”.

News Published in MEK Website:

Relatives of Camp Liberty residents rally outside Iraqi embassy in Canada

Thursday, 03 December 2015 09:12

NCRI – Relatives of members of the Iranian opposition who are under siege in Iraq held a rally outside the Iraqi embassy in Ottawa on Monday.

The protestors condemned the recent plots by agents of the Iranian regime’s Intelligence Ministry against the members of the main Iranian opposition group People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI or MEK) in Camp Liberty, near Baghdad.

They pointed out that the regime’s intelligence agents were being sent to the camp under the ‘bogus guise’ of relatives of the Camp Liberty residents, while actual family members of the residents around the world were being denied visas by the Iraqi government to visit their loved ones in the camp….

December 5, 2015 0 comments

UN High Commissioner for Refugees

Open letter to UNHCR

United Nations High Commissioner of Refugees,

We, the under signed former members of Mujahedeen Khalgh (OMPI) who are currently residing in Europe wish to share our concerns about the violation of the protected person’s rights with you.

As individuals with years of knowledge and experience about the oppressive means of this organization’s leadership, we are writing to you to draw your attention to the situation of those members still kept at Camp Liberty in Baghdad. Once again, in the past few days, the leadership used illogical and baseless excuses to prevent the meeting of those concerned families who came to the gates of Camp Liberty hoping to meet with their loved ones after, in cases, many decades. Unfortunately, they were denied any contact with their family members.

Many of us have been in this organization, before being able to find a way out of it, for decades. We are fully aware of the brainwashing and intimidation activities that take place at every level with the single aim of isolating the members from the outside world and feeding them false information and targeted propaganda to turn them against their own families.

Based on our personal experience, we assure you that if you facilitate the meeting of the members with their families in a protected and private space, without the presence of their superiors, they will find the courage to express their true desire that is to join their families and relocate from Iraq.

In our many years as part of this organization we have never witnessed any election or another means of member participation in the process of decision making or appointments. Ordinary members are not in the position of sharing their opinions or being involved in any decision, even about their own situation. In this organization, no one dares to express his/her true opinion and those who pretend to represent members are actually appointed by the leadership and their role is to pass the leadership’s agenda as the will of the members to you or any other authorities.

Considering all the facts and the grim condition of the Camp and its residents, we urge you to contact each individual personally oppose to listening to their so called “representatives”. It is the basic right of every citizen in a free society, even in prisons, and should not be denied to these individuals kept under UNHCR’s care.

The situation in Camp Liberty is not safe or sustainable. We urge you to stop talking to those who have taken these individuals hostage for so long and recognize the rights of these individuals in making their own decisions apart from the negative propaganda and intimidation of the leadership.

It is critical that UNHCR acts immediately before another catastrophic attack takes more lives.

Respectfully,

Faryad Azadi Association

Peyvand Rahaee Association

Yaran iran Association

December 1, 2015 0 comments

UN High Commissioner for Refugees

Letter to the UNHCR

The following letter was sent to the UNHCR on behalf of the suffering families of the residents of Camp Liberty:

The UNHCR – Baghdad

Dear Sir or Madam,

With kind regards, we have been inundated by calls in the past couple of weeks by the families of the residents of Camp Liberty in Iraq who wish to learn about their loved ones trapped in the Rajavi Cult known as the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO, MeK, NCRI, NLA, PMOI).

In this letter we as their representative wish to state that considering:

1. The UNHCR is directly and solely responsible for Camp Liberty and its residents and the Camp is managed and run by the UNHCR;

2. The UNHCR is obliged to be in contact with the refugees inside the camp directly with no proxy in between, and that dealing them as a group with contacting only with the leaders is against your own regulations and obligations;

3. Iraq and Camp Liberty is by no means a safe place for the residents according to past experiences over time;

Therefore, we wish to ask you why:

1. The families are not allowed to visit or be in contact with their loved ones inside the Camp?

2. The UNHCR yields to the demands of the cult leader Massoud Rajavi all the time?

3. The entire residents have not been moved to a safe place yet more than 12 years after the fall of Saddam Hussein?

We on behalf of the families are anxiously looking forward to receiving your reply as soon as possible.

Yours Sincerely,

Sahar Family Foundation

Translated by Nejat Society,

November 21, 2015 0 comments

Former members of the MEK

Iran Women Association took action to denounce Rajavi

Members of Iran Zanan Association took action to denounce leaders of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization in Koln, Germany.

On Sunday November 7th, 2015 these former female members of the MKO took an action in front of Dame Church in down town, Koln.

Ms. Batoul Soltani, Ms. Zahra Moini and Ms. Homeira Mohammad Nezhad condemned the deadly attack on Camp Liberty residents in Iraq. They condemned the leaders of the Cult for negligence to take proper actions to relocate the residents of the camp in a safe place.

They called on international community to engage for the immediate relocation of the residents. Former members of the cult of Rajavi asked the UN, Red Cross and other human rights bodies to put pressure on the leadership of the group to get engaged for the release of the residents who have been taken as hostages.

While the three female ex-members of the Cult of Rajavi could gain the attention of Koln citizens, a few agents of the cult tried to launch an organized propaganda to whitewash the leaders of the group and to distract public opinion from the main culpable of the incident.

By the way, the action lasted for hours. Attendees handed out brochures on the true nature of the MKO that was welcomed by citizens.

November 12, 2015 0 comments

The cult of Rajavi

Family Revives the Experience of the Free Life, Rajavi Fears

One sure sign of someone being involved in a cult is that there is a clear separation from family, friends and society. Common point between all former members of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the Cult of Rajavi) is that they had lost their family contacts during their membership in the MKO.

Separation from family is the main factor that helps recruiters recruit people to join the cults. Dounia Bouzar, a 51-year-old Muslim anthropologist, who speaks to Reuters during an interview in Paris, France, believes that when a person is recruited by an extremist cult, he thinks that he is chosen. Ms. Bouzar who failed to convince young recruited Islamic militants to leave the cult by religious arguments believes in this idea: “Don’t try to reason with people”. [1]

Bouzar, a Muslim herself, instead uses memories, music and even smells to try to win young militants back. Recruiters have adopted techniques developed by cults, she says, so it takes different skills to break their hold. [2]

Bouzar’s effective technique to get cult victims back to family, has been testified by a large number of former members of the cult of Rajavi. Dr. Massoud Banisadr is a defector of the group who has authored a book called “Memoirs of an Iranian Rebel” about his experience in the organization. He now focuses much of his work on the research and understanding of cults, terrorism, and cult behavior within those structures. Dr. Banisadr was interviewed on his account of living in the Cult of Rajavi by Richard Potter of the mondoweiss.net in, 2013. In the interview he describes how he was manipulated by the cult leaders to leave his wife and his children. He also tells the horrific story of a group of adolescents who were taken to Iraq by the MKO in order to take part in the so-called Eternal Light Operation –a blind operation commanded by massoud Rajavi to take over Tehran across Iraqi borders in three days! [3]

Dr. Masoud Banisadr recounts:

“It was very horrible. There were 15 students who were from the United States, they were supporters. They were brought to Iraq and in the same night they were moved to the battle field. Because of my political rank I was a commander even though I had no military background. I didn’t know anything about fighting. Only a few days before for the first time I saw a machine gun, and I only shot it once. So in the first battle I almost lost my life, I was shot and went unconscious and was taken back to the hospital. Unfortunately I learned all 15 died because they didn’t have any training, and because it was done so quickly no one asked them their names and nothing was recorded. I didn’t even know their names. It was horrible.” [4]

Dounya Bouzar has studied the recruitment process by examining phones and computers of hundreds of French adolescents, and heard it described by the young people and their families who have come to her for help. "Recruiters show differing utopias to young people," she said. "It’s by listening to how they get caught that we can undo the deception." [5]

What happened to Dr. Banisadr was the kind of technique that was presented by the anthropologist. That was family ties, her daughter and other belongings revived the sense of life in his heart. To answer how he was dissociated with the MKO he tells Richard Potter:

“In 1996 Maryam Rajavi (Wife of Massoud Rajavi and current head of MEK) was speaking in London and they asked me to come and mobilize supporters, and talk to British politicians and arrange meetings for Mrs. Rajavi, including Margaret Thatcher. So in London after five or six years I met my daughter. Before that she was 13 and now she was 18. I was faced with a lady. Emotions and feelings are very important in destructive cults. They isolate you from your loved ones, so you don’t turn your emotions to your loved ones. In London I could see my daughter and my sister and my old friends. From early morning to midnight I had to see old friends, ex-supporters of MEK, and answering thousands of questions which internally I had no rational answer for any of them. So these things, my feelings between my friends and family helped me change. And also luck. I had an accident and back problems, and I was so active in London that I had to go to the hospital. My back gave out. Fortunately for me MEK was very busy then for Maryam Rajavi with different meetings, so they didn’t care about me. If it was another juncture they’d make sure someone was with me, because MEK never leaves a member without a chaperone, always at least two with each other they watch and look after each other. So in the hospital I was alone for the almost a month and I could see normal relationships of people with each other. HUMANITY There was a guy beside who had an accident and I was helping him to shave his beard, or to feed him and so on, and this revived my individuality and my humanity and self-confidence. All gradually it came back. When it came that I left the hospital I left MEK. I didn’t reject them fully yet, but I realized I couldn’t be with them anymore.” [6]

Bouzar has also borrowed an idea from French writer Marcel Proust, who wrote a masterpiece on memory which said how the flavor of a certain sponge cake – a Madeleine – revived an intense experience from his childhood. [7]

As she suggests families using emotional cues – music, pictures, places, scents, food – to "wake up" their loved ones caught in the cults, one may find out why the leaders of the MKO are so dreadfully scared of presence of families in front of the gates of their camps.

The propaganda of the MKO tries to demonize the families labeling them as “agents of the Iranian intelligence ministry”. The group leaders even indoctrinated members to turn against their families. In several cases, children were shown on the MKO TV channel verbally abusing their parents accusing them of working for the “regime”.Ghorban Ali Hosseinnezhad and Mostafa Mohammadi fathers of two girls who are taken as hostages at Camp Liberty were even beaten by henchmen of the Cult after they took an action to denounce the group’s abusive attitude in front of Maryam Rajavi’s headquarters in Ouver sur Oise, Paris. [8]

“Touched by memories of his childhood," as Ms. Bouzar said or having heard the voice of their parents and siblings through loudspeakers at Camp Ashraf was so moving to stimulate a large group of the MKO members to escape the cult-like bars of the group. And, that’s the bitter experience Rajavi fears the recurrence.

By Mazda Parsi

References:

[1]MEVEL, PAULINE& LABBÉ, CHINE , ditch reason, Dounia Bouzar, a 51-year-old Muslim anthropologist, speaks to Reuters during an interview in Paris, France, REUTERS, October 22, 2015.

[2] ibid

[3] Potter, Richard, The Cult in the Shadow War: An Interview with a former member of Mojahedin-e-Khalq, mondoweiss.net, November 26, 2013

[4] ibid

[5] MEVEL, PAULINE& LABBÉ, CHINE , ditch reason, Dounia Bouzar, a 51-year-old Muslim anthropologist, speaks to Reuters during an interview in Paris, France, REUTERS, October 22, 2015.

[6]Potter, Richard, The Cult in the Shadow War: An Interview with a former member of Mojahedin-e-Khalq, mondoweiss.net, November 26, 2013

[7] MEVEL, PAULINE& LABBÉ, CHINE , ditch reason, Dounia Bouzar, a 51-year-old Muslim anthropologist, speaks to Reuters during an interview in Paris, France, REUTERS, October 22, 2015.

[8] https://www.nejatngo.org/en/posts/6160

November 11, 2015 0 comments

Massoud Rajavi

Free my brother; Mostafa Beheshti

Rajavi is responsible for the lives lost

Narges Beheshti is a suffering sister who has not been able to have any contact with her brother; Mostafa now for long years.

She says:” Rajavi and irresponsible ranks of his cult caused the death of my beloved brother Morteza due to their passion for power…

The Rajavis have taken hostage the other brother of mine; Mostafa now for 14 years. During all these years they didn’t allow us to visit Mostafa even once.

We traveled to Camp Ashraf, Iraq several times. We and other Camp residents families even went to UNHCR in Baghdad. However the MKO Cult leaders didn’t allow the suffering families to visit their beloveds.

It is now 4 years that the Camp Ashraf residents have been relocated to Camp Liberty. They were due to stay there as a temporary location to soon be transferred to third countries. However, during all these four years just some 400 individuals have been transferred to Albania that is 100 people a year.

I believe that Rajavi does not intend to save the helpless residents of Liberty. He just think about his zeal for power, his relatives and friends.

How does it come while my brother and other stranded Liberty residents are kept by the MKO Cult leaders within the violence and insecurity of Iraq as captives and don’t transfer them to third countries, the Rajavi’s son, Maryam Rajavi and Shahrzad sadr and her daughter and many other Rajavi’s relatives were transferred to foreign countries.

I plea all human rights bodies to probe the suffering families petitions. I declare that Rajavi is personally responsible for the lives of our beloveds.

Narges Beheshti, Iran Interlink, Translated by Nejat Society

November 10, 2015 0 comments

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