Iran has condemned the removal of the MKO/PMOI terrorist group from the European Union’s terror list. Earlier today, Iran’s Ambassador to Azerbaijan Naser Hamidi Zare’ said that exclusion of the group from the list was a new Western trap for the Islamic state, accusing the West of operating a policy of double-standards in dealing with terrorist groups.
A Russian scholar said the European Union (EU) manipulated such issues as terrorism and human rights for its own political purposes. Talking to IRNA here on Saturday, Ludmila Kulagina, as a top researcher in the Russian Institute of Oriental Studies, criticized the recent EU move in removing the terrorist Mojahedeen Khalq Organization (MKO) form its terrorism list.
PMOI / NCRI have the same leaders, the same framework, the same structure, the same practices and sectarian violence. The uniform and the Islamic veil, the insignia of paramilitary type, this shows that PMOI is the NCRI and that, whatever the name used, they are of a single sectarian and terrorist organization: the Mujahideen of the People.
British Foreign Secretary David Miliband made clear his country’s position on the terrorist nature of the MKO grouplet had not changed, despite the European Union’s controversial decision to remove the MKO from the terror list, IRNA reported…Miliband’s latest comments on the MKO came in the wake of earlier statements by Larijani who in his address to the Munich security confab on Friday voiced outrage over the West’s harboring of known terrorist groups, alluding to European countries providing safe haven to the MKO.
It is true that the decision to withdraw from the European list is motivated solely on technical issues and form such aspects of rights of defense. But now, France has appealed this decision and the Belgian Minister of Foreign Affairs reiterated that for it, PMOI did have its place on this list. Moreover, the text that was adopted makes it clear that several countries among the 27″are not convinced that the Mujahedin were away from terrorism”. It will be recalled that the process of withdrawal, the Swiss and the French had launched new accusations against PMOI.
the movement is in decline already .Since the late nineties the internal dissent in Camp Ashraf is increasing and with the fall of the dictatorial regime of Saddam Hussein, the MKO will be deprived of their basic logistics..we believe that the leadership of MKO[PMOI/MEK] should answer the killing of civilian Kurds…we are sure that the meetings in Europe with several supporters and / or members of MKO led you to find them available and courteous.
We have documented serious human rights abuses that the MKO was inflicting on its own members in their camp in Iraq,” said Tom Porteous, the London director of Human Rights Watch. “The organisation … has shown that criticism of leadership is certainly not tolerated..When the European Union removed a militant Iranian opposition group from its blacklist of terrorist organisations last month, it drew not only protestations from Iran but also the contempt of a former member who claims the group is little more than a cult.
many years, the roughly 3,500 members of the Iranian dissident group Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK/PMOI/MKO) living quietly in Iraq drew little attention… The simmering issue of the MEK’s fate flashed into the open earlier this month when Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki unexpectedly declared that the group would no longer be allowed to remain in Iraq…The E.U. move, which came after a long lobbying campaign by the MEK’s supporters in Europe, sparked an outcry in Tehran. About 300 people were gathered around noon on Wednesday in front of the British Embassy in Tehran
An Iranian lawmaker today urged France to relinquish any political pressure to remove name of the Iraq based – Mujahideen Khalq Organization (MKO/PMOI/MEK) out of the terrorist groups’ list and keep up its independent position. ..Head of MKO Maryam Rajavi is expected to remain excluded from the UK despite the EU dropping the previously outlawed group from its proscribed list. British Foreign Office said that although it does not discuss individual cases of exclusion, the government continues to believe that the MKO or MeK, as it prefers to call it, was”responsible for vile acts of terrorism over a long period.”
A State Department Spokesman says the US administration will not change the terrorist status of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO/PMOI/MEK).”We’ve already done a review and it was determined that there would not be a revocation of that status for the Mujahedin-e Khalq, so nothing has changed from our standpoint,”Robert Wood said at a briefing on Monday, when asked if Washington would follow the action taken by the European Union.