there were no MEK signs or banners at the event, as one usually sees wherever the MEK is camped out. .. Congressional aides attended the event on Thursday in the hearing room both out of curiosity and hunger for free food. But multiple aides told The Cable the event was bizarre, even by Congressional standards.
A Treasury Department probe cast a wider net than previously known, according to NBC News, to collect information on advocacy by multiple American former politicians and officials for a controversial exiled Iranian opposition group[MKO/MEK/PMOI]. Last Friday, the Washington Times broke the story that former Democratic Party leader and Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell’s speakers’ bureau received a subpoena..
NBC News did a long report on the group’s ties to terror activity in Iran. And the Treasury Department recently announced that it is investigating payments to prominent former American government officials to speak in support of the MEK.Beyond the public attention, the Romney campaign has been engaged in the MEK/MKO/PMOI issue well before his professed ignorance in December. Romney may not have been aware of it, but …
Maybe it was the money. Or perhaps they were conned by an incredible MEK lobbying effort carried out through a series of front groups. That effort lavished money on prime-time TV, and full-page newspaper ads, which portray the MEK as a democratic group leading the fight for Iran regime change. Apparently none of these pooh-bahs ever asked about the source of their honoraria.”Nobody has ever been able to figure out where the money comes from,”says Iran expert Barbara Slavin
It is unclear how far Treasury Department officials intend to push the probe .. But NBC News has obtained one possible clue: A small Pennsylvania-based speakers firm called Speakers Access wrote an email in September inviting a Washington based national security expert to speak at a conference in Geneva, Switzerland”on behalf of our client, National Council of Resistance of Iran, Foreign Affairs Committee.”..
In both 2006 and 2007, I helped review the MEK’s terrorist designation. I worked with my colleagues in government to review documentation dating from the 1970s to the present, and it was swiftly determined that the MEK’s aka MKO/PMOI terrorist designation remained warranted. This was during the Bush administration — which had an openly stated policy of regime change.. The facts were so indisputable that nearly zero debate took place inside ..
Sources told NBC that former government officials received fees of more than $30,000 a talk and were flown first class to Europe. The officials claimed that they were told the fees came from wealthy Americans or foreign supporters of the group — but not the group itself.Many of the speaking arrangements were made through speaking booking firms, according to the report.”This is about finding out where the money is coming from,”..
Meanwhile, U.S. taxpayers are reportedly paying to improve the terror organization’s new temporary residence while the UN works to shuttle them out the country. According to news reports, the MEK/MKO/PMOI members are supposed to be processed at Camp Liberty[TTL] as they await UN-sponsored relocation to other countries as refugees.But the group’s leaders and their well-paid Western lobbyists have asked for Iraqi law enforcement…
There are many misconceptions about the MEK/MKO/PMOI so I checked in with several Iranian born experts on Iran. All of them are distressed that American politicians are advocating for the MEK. They also doubt that the money paid to the politicos comes from the Iranian Diaspora because most expatriate Iranians do no support the MEK.. a Washington political consultant, said,”The MEK is a terrorist group. It is a cult of religious automatons. ..
You may think this was a bad ruling. But a ruling it is, and it’s the law of the land. And yet, a large cast of worthies, including Rudy Giuliani, Howard Dean, Michael Mukasey, Ed Rendell, Andy Card, Lee Hamilton, Tom Ridge, Bill Richardson, Wesley Clark, Michael Hayden, John Bolton, Louis Freeh, and Fran Townsend have actively lobbied for MEK and have apparently done it in coordination with MEK’s leadership.