The Third View on Mujahedin Khalq

Iraqi victims of MKO to collect signatures to expel the group

Chairman of the Committee for the defense of Iraqi victims of Mojahedin Khalq working to collect signatures to expel MKO (MEK, Rajavi cult) from Diyala, Iraq

The head of the Special Committee to defend the victims of the crimes of Mojahedin Khalq, Mr. Nafee-Issa, said the Committee is working to collect signatures for the expulsion of the Mojahedin from the province of Diyala, and from Iraq.

In a statement to All-Iraq News Agency on Tuesday, Mr. Nafee-Issa said that "the Committee is working to collect a large number of facts that show the crimes of this organization and what caused the killings of civilians in Iraq since 1986 till 2003."

He added that "organized crime continued after 2003 as a result of political interference in the affairs of Iraq by creating sectarian strife between Iraq’s people and in addition working to destabilise the security situation in the province of Diyala and the country in general."

Camp Ashraf, or as it is now known camp New Iraq, houses thousands of Iranian fighters of the MKO, an Iranian opposition faction, which based the headquarters for its Chairman at the camp nearly three decades ago.

All Iraq News, Translated by Iran Interlink

August 27, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

Some participants in the rally had no knowledge about MKO

Several hundred supporters of the Iranian opposition Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO, aka MEK and People’s Mujahedin) gathered on August 26 in front of the State Department in Washington, D.C., to urge Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to remove the group from the United States’ list of foreign terrorist organizations.

The participants, who were wearing yellow vests with pictures of the leaders of the group, Maryam and Massoud Rajavi, chanted, "We want justice, we want peace, we want MEK off the list" and also "Iran, Rajavi, Rajavi, Iran."

The State Department is reviewing the status of the MKO, which it put on the list of terrorist organizations in 1999. The group, which has been described by former members as a Marxist/Islamist cult, is also designated as a terrorist organization by Iran.

The MKO, which was involved in a series of attacks in Iran in the 1980s, says it has renounced violence and is working for democracy in Iran. The group sided with Iraq during the bloody Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s, and more than 3,000 members are still based in Camp Ashraf in Iraq.

Today’s event included speeches by several former U.S. officials and congressmen, including former Representative Patrick Kennedy (Rhode Island-Republican) who said in Persian, " I am Iranian, I am an Ashrafi," referring to the camp in Iraq. He also warned Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki that he will be put on trial in the International Criminal Court for attacking Camp Ashraf.

Organizers said the event was broadcast live for Camp Ashraf members. Several rally participants told RFE/RL they have family members in Ashraf.

One of the organizers, who identified herself as Shirin, told RFE/RL the removal of MKO from the list of foreign terrorist organizations would allow MKO members in Ashraf to move to other countries.Shirin said the MKO’s removal from the list would allow those who are "hesitant" because of this status to join the opposition group.

Rally participants also included a number of non-Iranian-Americans. Several of them told RFE/RL they had little or no knowledge about the MKO. "We’ve come for Iranian people," said one African-American.

When asked whether he and his female companion received money to attend the rally, the woman first said yes, but then retracted her statement at the man’s behest.

Another MKO supporter said describing the group as a cult is a label by intelligence agencies, which he said do not understand the nature of the group. In response to a question about the whereabouts of MKO leader Massoud Rajavi, who hasn’t been seen for years, he said his location should be kept secret for his personal safety.

Today’s rally was the latest event in a series the MKO has held in recent months in Washington to push for its delisting. Western media have reported that former U.S. officials have received substantial financial contributions to speak at MKO events and express support for the delisting of the group.[..]

Tehran-based political analyst Nejat Bahrami told RFE/RL earlier this month the delisting of the MKO would make average Iranians frustrated with the United States.

"The messages [U.S. President Barack] Obama has sent to the Iranian people on several occasions, including for Norouz, have been very encouraging," he said. "But I think [the delisting of the MKO] would neutralize those positive statements. And it might lead to frustration with U.S. policies and even hatred."

By Golnaz Esfandiari, Hossein Aryan

August 27, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

MEK rally planned for Friday at State Department

Supporters of the Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK) movement are planning their largest-ever gathering in Washington on Friday in front of the State Department.

"Join us in solidarity with the Iranian people, Camp Ashraf, and against the dictatorship ruling Iran," reads the flyer advertising the Aug. 26 rally and march at the 22nd and C Street entrance of the State Department’s Foggy Bottom headquarters. MEK supporters have been gathering there for months, imploring State Department employees and visitors to press Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to remove the MEK from State’s list of foreign terrorist organizations.

"Dear Hillary, My name is Shaghayegh. I am 14 and I live in Camp Ashraf, Iraq. I am afraid I am going to be murdered," begins an open letter from an MEK member to Clinton that has been printed in full-page ads in the Washington Post.

The State Department placed the MEK on its list of foreign terrorist organizations in 1999 for its involvement in bombings that killed six Americans, but is reviewing that status now.

The event is the latest and greatest example of the MEK’s multi-million dollar effort to build support among Washington’s political elite. The speakers at the event will include: Congressman John Lewis (D-GA), former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, former FBI Director Louis Freeh, former Sen. Robert Torricelli, Rep. Patrick Kennedy, and former CIA Deputy Director of Clandestine Operations John Sano.

The MEK also lists among its supporters in Washington former National Security Advisor Gen. James Jones, former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, former Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Richard Myers, former White House Chief of Staff Andy Card, Gen. Wesley Clark, former Rep. Lee Hamilton, former CIA Director Porter Goss, senior advisor to the Romney campaign Mitchell Reiss, Gen. Anthony Zinni, former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, former Sen. Evan Bayh, and many others.

So what is the MEK? Well, that depends on who you ask. The group, which has an ideology based on the fusion of Islam and Marxism, was formed in Iran in 1965. It allied itself with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and fought against the Shah and his Western backers. After falling out of favor with Khomeini, the group was given shelter in Iraq by Saddam Hussein, who used them to conduct brutal cross-border raids during the Iraq-Iran war.

MEK leader Maryam Rajavi, who lives in Paris with her husband Massoud Rajavi, reportedly told her followers in 1991, "Take the Kurds under your tanks, and save your bullets for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards."

After the fall of Saddam, the United States helped broker an agreement whereby 3,400 MEK members were confined to a complex in Iraq called Camp Ashraf, which was protected by the U.S. military but then handed over to the Iraqi government in 2009. In an interview on Tuesday, Iraq’s ambassador Samir Sumaida’ie said that the MEK was dangerous and "nothing more than a cult."

In 2005, Human Rights Watch published a report accusing the MEK in Camp Ashraf of enforcing loyalty by subjecting "dissident members to torture and prolonged solitary confinement," and being responsible for "two cases of death under interrogation."

Elizabeth Rubin wrote about her 2003 trip to Camp Ashraf in the New York Times earlier this month. "Access to the Internet, phones and information about the outside world is prohibited. Posters of Ms. Rajavi and her smiling green eyes abound," she said. "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. If a man was turned on by the scent of a woman or a whiff of perfume, he had to confess."

The MEK says it renounced violence in 2001 and professes to be leading the resistance to the Iranian regime. That claim, in addition to lucrative payments to former officials in both parties, has bought it a lot of attention and friends in Washington. But how can senior officials take money from a terrorist group?

"The MEK’s delisting campaign is funded by a fluid and enigmatic network of support groups based in the United States. According to an MEK leader, these groups are funded by money from around the world, which they deliberately shield from U.S. authorities," the Huffington Post reporter Christina Wilkie wrote. "These domestic groups book and pay for their VIP speakers through speaker agencies, which in turn pay the speakers directly and take a fee for arranging appearances. That way, the speakers themselves don’t technically accept money from the community groups."

An event organizer told The Cable that the MEK is expecting between 5,000 and 10,000 people at its rally at the State Department on Friday, which begins at 10 a.m.

Foreign Policy.com – By Josh Rogin

August 27, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Why are U.S. political and diplomatic figures endorsing a terror group?

In recent weeks, a number of national U.S. news outlets have documented a strange phenomenon. Dozens of retired U.S. government officials, spanning the liberal-to-conservative political spectrum and some paid tens of thousands of dollars in speaking fees, have joined a well-orchestrated lobbying campaign to remove a controversial Iranian exile group from the list of terrorist organizations maintained by the U.S. State Department.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is expected to make a decision on the group’s status within weeks. She should take a close look at the history of the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK) before making a decision.

The MEK is a cult-like organization run by Iranian exiles Maryam Rajavi and her husband Massoud. Ms. Rajavi lives in Paris and leads the National Council of Resistance in Iran, a group that claims exile-government status. According to the FBI, it is a front group for the Mujahedeen-e Khalq.

Also known as the Warriors of God, MEK has a history of anti-American rhetoric and unsavory associations over the past four decades under the leadership of the Rajavis. It was initially aligned with the leaders of the Iranian Islamic revolution and later with Iraq’s dictator Saddam Hussein after the group was expelled from Iran. It is accused of dozens of assassinations and bombings, including one which killed six American advisers in Iran, and murdering Kurdish refugees in Iraq at Hussein’s behest. It is currently based at a camp in Iraq protected by the U.S. military but facing expulsion by the Iraqi government. A clash between Iraqi forces and camp members resulted in 34 deaths in April.

Despite the MEK’s ugly history, a power-packed roster of speakers has appeared at forums in the U.S. and Europe to endorse its drive to get off the terrorist list. Among the luminaries are former Vermont governor and Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, retired Gen. Wesley Clark, former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton, former Energy Secretary and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson and former FBI director Louis Freeh. Some of the high-profile speakers admit they knew little about the group beyond their briefing by MEK advocates.

According to a study by the Rand Corporation in 2009, the MEK has deceptively retooled its image to that of a democratic, nonviolent organization dedicated to bringing down the Iranian government. As such, the group is cultivating prominent Americans looking for a plausible alternative to Iran’s current leadership.

The MEK doesn’t seem to fit that bill. The Rand study reported that up to 70 percent of the 3,500 people at MEK’s Iraqi camp were deceptively recruited and are held against their will. Even prodemocracy groups inside Iran have denounced the MEK as a totalitarian cult group dedicated to the Rajavis.

An investigation by the Christian Science Monitor reported that millions of dollars provided by MEK have paid those high-profile speakers’ fees and hotel costs for the events. Although U.S. law prohibits Americans from providing direct assistance to or taking payments from terrorist groups, the connection is disguised by running the funds through third parties, usually Iranian exile groups in the U.S.

Prominent Americans should not be accepting payments and supporting a group that has shed American blood in the past and has no viable support inside Iran. We urge Secretary Clinton to keep the MEK on the terrorist roster.

Chron.com

August 27, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization's Propaganda System

Supporters of Iranian resistance group rally at State Department

Hundreds of supporters of the Iranian resistance group Mujahedin-e Khalq rallied in front of the U.S. State Department in Washington Friday, demanding the United States remove the group from its list of foreign terrorist organizations. In a sophisticated display of its public relations ability, the demonstration featured scores of young supporters wearing matching yellow T-shirts and straw hats chanting slogans, live big-screen broadcasts of the speakers, appearances by well-know U.S. politicians and the release of white doves that flew up toward the State Department’s enormous navy-blue flag as a storm of yellow and blue confetti filled the air.

The protest took place as the State Department prepares to decide whether to remove the organization from its list of foreign terrorist organizations. The MEK denies that it supports terrorism.

The department placed the MEK on the list in 1997. The group initially supported the 1979 Iranian Revolution, but later turned against the ayatollahs and, until 2003, carried out bombings and killings of Iranian officials.

The State Department also cites eyewitness accounts and MEK documents that it says demonstrate that MEK members participated in and supported the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and, in the 1970s, carried out terrorist attacks against U.S. interests in Iran as well as assassinations of Americans.

In the 1980s, because of the group’s anti-Iran actions, Iraq’s Saddam Hussein provided it with financial support and military training. During the Iran-Iraq War, the State Department says, Baghdad "armed the MEK with heavy military equipment and deployed thousands of MEK fighters in suicidal, mass wave attacks against Iranian forces."

The MEK surrendered its heavy arms to the U.S.-led coalition that invaded Iraq and, in 2003, said it was renouncing violence. Since then, roughly 3,400 M.E.K. members have been living at a refugee camp called Camp Ashraf on the Iran/Iraq border.

But the new Iraqi government, which is more sympathetic to the Iranian regime, wants to move the MEK out of Iraq. The camp has been violently attacked several times by Iraqi security forces. In one attack this spring, at least 30 of the camp’s residents died.

At Friday’s rally at the State Department, girls wearing yellow tiaras on their heads with the word "Ashraf" led the audience in cheers.

Onstage, former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell and former U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy addressed the crowd, urging support for its cause. The MEK, which is based in France, has spent millions of dollars to win backing in Washington.

The State Department, in its 2010 Country Reports on Terrorism, noted, "The MEK’s political arm, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, has a global support network with active lobbying and propaganda efforts in major Western capitals. NCRI also has a well-developed media communications strategy."

Some Iranians in the United States have been critical of the MEK. In a press release Friday, Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian American Council, said delisting the group "would be disastrous for Iran’s nonviolent democratic opposition ."

Calling the MEK "a cult that abuses its own members," Parsi said it has "no support among the Iranian people." The MEK, he said, has been paying U.S. politicians to get it off the list of foreign terrorist organizations.

"If the MEK campaign is successful," he said, "it means that America’s national security is officially on sale to the highest bidder, and terror groups are free to set U.S. policies if the price is right."

By Jill Dougherty, CNN Foreign Correspondent

August 27, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Why Are Prominent Americans Lobbying for MKO Terrorists ?

It is not hard to imagine how Americans would react if they learned that Al Qaeda had hired top lobbyists to help promote its agenda in Congress. Or if they heard that influential active and retired government officials were being paid to attest to Hezbollah’s good character. They would be appalled.

But, amazingly, a group similar to Al Qaeda and Hezbollah is doing just that. It is the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), an Iranian exile group that is on the Department of State’s list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations alongside other more prominent groups such Al Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas, and Al-Shabaab.

The MEK wants to be removed from the terrorist list because, by law, its presence there prevents it from directly promoting its agenda in Washington, and most importantly, from fundraising. So it has recruited some of officialdom’s biggest names to convince Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to "delist" MEK and free it from the current limitations on its activities. News reports predict that Clinton is seriously considering the move and will make a decision by month’s end.

According to the New York Times, among the "luminaries" promoting "delisting" are former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani; former Vermont governor Howard Dean; former NATO commander Wesley K. Clark, President Obama’s former national security adviser Gen. James Jones; former F.B.I. director, Louis Freeh; former New Mexico governor Bill Richardson; former attorney general Michael B. Mukasey; and Lee H. Hamilton, the former congressman who was co-chairman of the 9/11 Commission. The Times report notes that the MEK endorsers are paid handsome sums (up to $100,000) for speaking out in its behalf.

The MEK’s hired guns say that it does not belong on the list because it long ago abandoned its violent ways. But its record is so long and so bloody that only the very credulous can believe that it turned a new leaf. And there is doubt whether the MEK is even a peaceful movement today. An FBI report from 2004 noted that the agency had reason to believe that the group was still "planning and executing acts of terrorism."

It is hard to keep up with the MEK, which changes its positions and alliances as often as a teenager changes baseball caps. That is, in part, because it is more like a cult than a political organization. (Even its supporters agree with that.) Its members are required to lay aside all personal desires and devote themselves completely to the MEK leader in a manner eerily similar to the Jim Jones Jonestown cult.

The Mujahedin-e Khalq started out supporting the Iranian revolution that drove out the Shah and replaced him with the Islamic Republic of Ayatollah Khomeini. That was in the 1970’s, a decade during which the MEK assassinated six U.S. military advisers and civilians in Iran and then participated in the seizure and hostage taking at the American embassy in 1979. It was among Ayatollah Khomeini’s most militant supporters and opposed any compromises with the United States which it called "the satanic force threatening the world…."

But it soon broke violently with the Ayatollah Khomeini regime and dedicated itself to overthrowing it. It relocated to, of all places, Iraq and allied itself with Iran’s then arch enemy, Saddam Hussein. Saddam gave the MEK a military base inside the country, from which to conduct its war against Iran and Saddam’s other enemies.
During the Iran-Iraq war, the Times notes, MEK "served as Mr. Hussein’s own private militia….For two decades he gave the group money, weapons, jeeps and military bases along the border with Iran." In 1991, the MEK helped Saddam crush the Shiite uprising in the south and eradicate the Kurds in the north. Reports of Iranian dead at the hands of the MEK range from several hundred to thousands.

Following the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, American forces disarmed the MEK camp, although some 3,400 MEK members remain there today despite the natural determination of the current government to get a pro-Saddam encampment out of the country. (Most observers believe that a large percentage of the people at the camp are being held against their will, with no means to escape or place to escape to.)

And that brings us back to the current effort to "delist" the MEK. One of the ostensible reasons MEK’s advocates use is that "delisting" would allow innocent people in the camp to get out and seek refuge in other countries. But freeing the captives can be accomplished through the combined efforts of the U.S. military, the International Red Cross and the United Nations who can go in and separate out the hostages from the terrorists, who should be prosecuted. Delisting is irrelevant in that context.

So why the effort to delist? The MEK wants to be free to ensconce itself in Washington and other world capitals and play the role of a legitimate Iranian opposition, similar to what Ahmad Chalabi and his Iraqi National Congress did prior to the Iraq war. Also like the Chalabi group, the MEK seeks to align itself with American neoconservatives (many of whom already support it) and agitate for a U.S. invasion of their home country.

That analogy is an especially telling one because the MEK is despised in the nation it would like to "liberate." According to Ray Tayekh, a scholar at the Council on Foreign Relations, the MEK has absolutely no standing whatsoever to play a role in Iran, and not just because Iranians hate the organization for having joined Saddam’s war against the country.

At a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing last month, he testified that the group’s "alliance with Saddam and its cult-like dispositions have alienated even the radical segments of intelligentsia that once found its ideological template attractive. … The Iranian populace is seeking ways of liberalizing its society and not embracing yet another ideological movement with totalitarian tendencies."

Given all this, it is amazing that any American would ally himself with the MEK. After all, what end does delisting serve other than to liberate a former terrorist group so that it might more effectively promote U.S. involvement in another Middle East war. That is, in fact, precisely why prominent neocons support delisting, just as they supported Chalabi.

"If the group is taken off the list, not as a result of an objective review, but by virtue of their lobbying prowess, several repercussions can be envisioned," Trita Parsi, president of the National Iranian American Council, a pro-democracy group, wrote earlier this year.

Some of these serious repercussions would be felt by the Iranian people. Because the group is despised by Iranians across the ideological, political and social spectrum, legitimizing it here might delegitimize the democracy movement there. [..]

It is likely that most of the people who lend their names to the MEK’s campaign have no idea what the group is and simply accepts money from it as an honorarium for making a speech, as if the MEK was like any other group that opposes the Iranian regime and supports U.S. policy goals. It isn’t. The MEK is indeed an enemy of the Iranian regime. But it is also our enemy. In other words, sometimes the enemy of our enemy is not our friend.

By MJ Rosenberg

August 25, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization as a terrorist group

The MEK will never become a moderate political force

Radical by Nature
The MEK will never become a moderate political force
The presumption that the MEK would transform itself into a “moderate” political group if delisted is flawed. The MEK did not become “radical” as a result of being “listed” as a terrorist organization in 1997. It was an extremist group way before that date. What fuels its radicalism and taste for terrorism is not how it is termed by the State Department or the nature of its relationship with the U.S, but its fanatical ideology, pugnacious discourse, undemocratic structure, leadership, mission and agenda. So unless the act of delisting provokes by itself a miraculous mutation in the group’s genetic fabric (something that proponents of delisting have to prove), there is absolutely no reason to believe that the MEK would or even could go against its own nature and fundamentally change its behavior solely because of a new legal status. Expecting an inherently violent and erratic organization to relinquish its raison d’être and become pragmatic because of a mere change of designation is as absurd as removing a snake from the list of “reptiles” and expecting it to act as peaceful dove.

Delisting the MEK would more likely allow it to advance its agenda with more freedom and with much more funding and act out its twisted vision with a credibility bestowed upon it by a U.S stamp of approval.

Of course, no one denies that an unconventional political group, a paramilitary or any other non-state actor could potentially moderate itself if it is engaged in a conventional political process. But the conversion from an eccentric actor to a rational one is not automatic. And not every group is capable of it. It requires a minimum of rationality and reasonableness amongst the group’s leadership. It takes some element of moderation – eventually represented by a faction within the group – that can be enhanced and boosted through engagement and recognition. But with the MEK, we’re talking about a senseless monolithic cult – with absolutely no voice or seeds of moderation inside – with a violent mentality and language that has not evolved one bit since 1980 (they still shout “death to Khomeini” in their rallies 22 years after the former leader’s demise). We’re talking about a cult that did not hesitate to go as far as instructing its own members to set themselves ablaze for the sheer purpose of attracting media attention when it wanted to coerce France to release Maryam Rajavi after she was detained by a French judge for a few days in Paris in 2003.

So, the subject of debate is not a normal political group that has at one point made few bad choices, then reformed and now deserves a second chance to integrate. But an inherently spiteful and unbridled cult in which members are still expected to show an excessively zealous and unquestioning commitment to their immovable leaders, where mind-altering practices (such as group chanting, collective rituals, denunciation sessions) are daily routine and where violence and coercion have been deeply engrained as very legitimate tools of achieving the end. Therefore, it is very unlikely that removing the MEK from the FTOs list would suddenly make its guru-style leaders change their ways (the only ways they know) or awaken the dormant forces of compromise and rationality within it so that it can act as a rational political actor.

Moreover, even if we accept the improbable assertion that delisting the MEK may somehow moderate its future behavior, it is still not a solid reason to do so. The State Department’s mission is not to close its eyes on the realities, history and current nature of an organization under review and to forgo all statutory criteria for designation in hope of taming or pacifying it. Its mission is to assess the current state of the organization and make a decision based on what it sees. A mere hypothetical prospect – or hope – of “moderating” the group in the future should not counterbalance all the actual and real facts supporting its designation as a FTO. If a group qualifies as a “terrorist organization” under U.S law based on its past actions, nature, ideology and material capacity to act violently then it should simply be called a “terrorist organization”. In other words, the process of designation is not about how we hope a particular group would act if delisted; but about what the group is or isn’t in its current form. Not calling a demonstrably dangerous organization what it so to induce it to change is not exactly a prudent or wise policy. Besides, it would send a terrible message to all other terrorist organizations about the United States’ resolve to fight terrorism.

Finally, among the State Department’s list of FTOs, the MEK is in one grim sense one of the few exceptions: The current leaders of the MEK, unlike the leaders of many other listed FTOs, are suspected with very probable cause of the highest and most serious crimes under international law – especially of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Whilst the members and/or leaders of many other FTOs – vicious and violent as they may be – are considered common criminals, outlawed rebels or simply “terrorists” liable for criminal prosecution under their respective domestic jurisdictions, the seriousness, nature and gravity of the crimes imputable to the MEK leadership is such that it makes them prone to prosecution in just any territory that they could be found. In other words, we’re not just talking about “terrorists” or “corrigible terrorists” that some proponents may, by a stretch of logic, even call “freedom fighters” but about alleged perpetrators of the most heinous and wanton crimes known to mankind. For this reason, it would be both irresponsible as a political act and disastrous as a legal precedent for U.S officials to take the risk of legalizing and legitimizing a group accused of the highest crimes, simply in hope of “moderating” its future behavior. Just imagine what sort of message such laxity could send to both the defenders and violators of international criminal law.

by Reza Nasri

August 24, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization as a terrorist group

U.S. FTO List published August 2011 includes MKO

Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism
U.S. State Department report on terrorism published August 2011 includes MKO
Country Reports on Terrorism 2010

August 18, 2011

Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs) are designated by the Secretary of State in accordance with section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). FTO designations play a critical role in the fight against terrorism and are an effective means of curtailing support for terrorist activities.

Legal Criteria for Designation under Section 219 of the INA as amended:

1. It must be a foreign organization.
2. The organization must engage in terrorist activity, as defined in section 212 (a)(3)(B) of the INA (8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(3)(B)), or terrorism, as defined in section 140(d)(2) of the Foreign Relations Authorization Act, Fiscal Years 1988 and 1989 (22 U.S.C. § 2656f(d)(2)), or retain the capability and intent to engage in terrorist activity or terrorism.
3. The organization’s terrorist activity or terrorism must threaten the security of U.S. nationals or the national security (national defense, foreign relations, or the economic interests) of the United States.

U.S. Government Designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations

Abu Nidal Organization (ANO)
Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG)
Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade (AAMB)
Al-Qa’ida (AQ)
Al-Qa’ida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP)
Al-Qa’ida in Iraq (AQI)
Al-Qa’ida in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM)
Al-Shabaab (AS)
Ansar al-Islam
Asbat al-Ansar
Aum Shinrikyo (AUM)
Basque Fatherland and Liberty (ETA)
Communist Party of Philippines/New People’s Army (CPP/NPA)
Continuity Irish Republican Army (CIRA)
Gama’a al-Islamiyya (IG)
Hamas
Harakat ul-Jihad-i-Islami (HUJI)
Harakat ul-Jihad-i-Islami/Bangladesh (HUJI-B)
Harakat ul-Mujahideen (HUM)
Hizballah
Islamic Jihad Union (IJU)
Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU)
Jaish-e-Mohammed (JEM)
Jemaah Islamiya (JI)
Jundallah
Kahane Chai
Kata’ib Hizballah (KH)
Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK)
Lashkar e-Tayyiba (LT)
Lashkar i Jhangvi (LJ)
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE)
Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG)
Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group (GICM)
Mujahadin-e Khalq Organization (MEK)
National Liberation Army (ELN)
Palestine Liberation Front – Abu Abbas Faction (PLF)
Palestine Islamic Jihad – Shaqaqi Faction (PIJ)
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP)
Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command (PFLP-GC)
Real IRA (RIRA)
Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC)
Revolutionary Organization 17 November (17N)
Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party/Front (DHKP/C)
Revolutionary Struggle (RS)
Shining Path (SL)
Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan (TTP)
United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC)

ABU NIDAL ORGANIZATION

aka ANO; Arab Revolutionary Brigades; Arab Revolutionary Council; Black September; Fatah Revolutionary Council; Revolutionary Organization of Socialist Muslims

Description: …

(…)

MUJAHADIN-E KHALQ ORGANIZATION

aka MEK; MKO; Mujahadin-e Khalq; Muslim Iranian Students’ Society; National Council of Resistance; NCR; Organization of the People’s Holy Warriors of Iran; the National Liberation Army of Iran; NLA; People’s Mujahadin Organization of Iran; PMOI; National Council of Resistance of Iran; NCRI; Sazeman-e Mujahadin-e Khalq-e Iran

Description: The Mujahadin-E Khalq Organization (MEK) was originally designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization on October 8, 1997. The MEK is a Marxist-Islamic Organization that seeks the overthrow of the Iranian regime through its military wing, the National Liberation Army (NLA), and its political front, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI).

The MEK was founded in 1963 by a group of college-educated Iranian Marxists who opposed the country’s pro-western ruler, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. The group participated in the 1979 Islamic Revolution that replaced the Shah with a Shiite Islamist regime led by Ayatollah Khomeini. However, the MEK’s ideology – a blend of Marxism, feminism, and Islamism – was at odds with the post-revolutionary government, and its original leadership was soon executed by the Khomeini regime. In 1981, the group was driven from its bases on the Iran-Iraq border and resettled in Paris, where it began supporting Iraq in its eight-year war against Khomeini’s Iran. In 1986, after France recognized the Iranian regime, the MEK moved its headquarters to Iraq, which facilitated its terrorist activities in Iran. Since 2003, roughly 3,400 MEK members have been encamped at Camp Ashraf in Iraq.

Activities: The group’s worldwide campaign against the Iranian government uses propaganda and terrorism to achieve its objectives. During the 1970s, the MEK staged terrorist attacks inside Iran and killed several U.S. military personnel and civilians working on defense projects in Tehran. In 1972, the MEK set off bombs in Tehran at the U.S. Information Service office (part of the U.S. Embassy), the Iran-American Society, and the offices of several U.S. companies to protest the visit of President Nixon to Iran. In 1973, the MEK assassinated the deputy chief of the U.S. Military Mission in Tehran and bombed several businesses, including Shell Oil. In 1974, the MEK set off bombs in Tehran at the offices of U.S. companies to protest the visit of then U.S. Secretary of State Kissinger. In 1975, the MEK assassinated two U.S. military officers who were members of the U.S. Military Assistance Advisory Group in Tehran. In 1976, the MEK assassinated two U.S. citizens who were employees of Rockwell International in Tehran. In 1979, the group claimed responsibility for the murder of an American Texaco executive. Though denied by the MEK, analysis based on eyewitness accounts and MEK documents demonstrates that MEK members participated in and supported the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and that the MEK later argued against the early release the American hostages. The MEK also provided personnel to guard and defend the site of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, following the takeover of the Embassy.

In 1981, MEK leadership attempted to overthrow the newly installed Islamic regime; Iranian security forces subsequently initiated a crackdown on the group. The MEK instigated a bombing campaign, including an attack against the head office of the Islamic Republic Party and the Prime Minister’s office, which killed some 70 high-ranking Iranian officials, including Chief Justice Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti, President Mohammad-Ali Rajaei, and Prime Minister Mohammad-Javad Bahonar. These attacks resulted in an expanded Iranian government crackdown that forced MEK leaders to flee to France. For five years, the MEK continued to wage its terrorist campaign from its Paris headquarters. Expelled by France in 1986, MEK leaders turned to Saddam Hussein’s regime for basing, financial support, and training. Near the end of the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War, Baghdad armed the MEK with heavy military equipment and deployed thousands of MEK fighters in suicidal, mass wave attacks against Iranian forces.

The MEK’s relationship with the former Iraqi regime continued through the 1990s. In 1991, the group reportedly assisted the Iraqi Republican Guard’s bloody crackdown on Iraqi Shia and Kurds who rose up against Saddam Hussein’s regime. In April 1992, the MEK conducted near-simultaneous attacks on Iranian embassies and consular missions in 13 countries, including against the Iranian mission to the United Nations in New York, demonstrating the group’s ability to mount large-scale operations overseas. In June 1998, the MEK was implicated in a series of bombing and mortar attacks in Iran that killed at least 15 and injured several others. The MEK also assassinated the former Iranian Minister of Prisons in 1998. In April 1999, the MEK targeted key Iranian military officers and assassinated the deputy chief of the Iranian Armed Forces General Staff, Brigadier General Ali Sayyaad Shirazi.

In April 2000, the MEK attempted to assassinate the commander of the Nasr Headquarters, Tehran’s interagency board responsible for coordinating policies on Iraq. The pace of anti-Iranian operations increased during “Operation Great Bahman” in February 2000, when the group launched a dozen attacks against Iran. One attack included a mortar attack against a major Iranian leadership complex in Tehran that housed the offices of the Supreme Leader and the President. The attack killed one person and injured six other individuals. In March 2000, the MEK launched mortars into a residential district in Tehran, injuring four people and damaging property. In 2000 and 2001, the MEK was involved in regular mortar attacks and hit-and-run raids against Iranian military and law enforcement personnel, as well as government buildings near the Iran-Iraq border. Following an initial Coalition bombardment of the MEK’s facilities in Iraq at the outset of Operation Iraqi Freedom, MEK leadership negotiated a cease-fire with Coalition Forces and surrendered their heavy-arms to Coalition control. Since 2003, roughly 3,400 MEK members have been encamped at Ashraf in Iraq.

In 2003, French authorities arrested 160 MEK members at operational bases they believed the MEK was using to coordinate financing and planning for terrorist attacks. Upon the arrest of MEK leader Maryam Rajavi, MEK members took to Paris’ streets and engaged in self-immolation. French authorities eventually released Rajavi.

Strength: Estimates place MEK’s worldwide membership at between 5,000 and 10,000 members, with large pockets in Paris and other major European capitals. In Iraq, roughly 3,400 MEK members are gathered at Camp Ashraf, the MEK’s main compound north of Baghdad. As a condition of the 2003 cease-fire agreement, the MEK relinquished more than 2,000 tanks, armored personnel carriers, and heavy artillery.

Location/Area of Operation: The MEK’s global support structure remains in place, with associates and supporters scattered throughout Europe and North America. Operations have targeted Iranian government elements across the globe, including in Europe and Iran. The MEK’s political arm, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, has a global support network with active lobbying and propaganda efforts in major Western capitals. NCRI also has a well-developed media communications strategy.

External Aid: Before Operation Iraqi Freedom began in 2003, the MEK received all of its military assistance and most of its financial support from Saddam Hussein. The fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime has led the MEK increasingly to rely on front organizations to solicit contributions from expatriate Iranian communities.

(…)
U.S. State Department, August2011

August 23, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq Organization

What is Iran’s MEK and why is it so popular among American leaders?

It’s been quite a year for the Mujahedeen Khalq. The organization, known by its initials MEK, seeks regime change in Iran and is on a determined big-money campaign to get off the U.S. terrorism list.

The state department review of their status is due in a matter of weeks.

Iranians protested when the EU took Mujahedeen Khalq off its terrorist list in 2008.

The organization, accused of having a cult-like culture, bought a full page ad in the Washington Post and has purchased the support of dozens of American politicians and national security experts. The Huffington Post lists 31 prominent people from both sides of the political aisle who have appeared at Mujahedeen Khalq-related events.

We get analysis from Narimon Safavi, a Worldview regular and president of the Pasfarda Arts & Culture Exchange.

Listen to the interivew

by Worldview on WBEZ.org

August 21, 2011 0 comments

Mujahedin Khalq; A proxy force

Antiwar’s Scott Horton interviews Gareth Porter on MEK

This interview is from the KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles broadcast of August 12th.

Gareth Porter, independent historian and journalist for IPS News, discusses the infamous “laptop of death” documents from which the vast majority of “evidence” about Iran’s supposed clandestine nuclear weapons program comes from; the conspicuous mistakes in the documents that lead him to believe a foreign intelligence agency (probably Mossad) fabricated them; how Iran’s refusal to turn over military missile blueprints (which are none of the IAEA’s business) got them labeled “uncooperative” and sanctioned by the UN; and how the MEK launders information, passing off documents sourced from Israel as their own.
Download Antiwar’s Scott Horton interviews Gareth Porter on MEK

August 21, 2011 0 comments

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