MKO former members
Nejat Society congratulates Mr. Jamil Bassam and his wife on their wedding.
Family is the first shelter and marriage is the sign of being rid of organizational and cultic relations.
MKO former members
It is not something strange if you want to return to your country where you were born and grown up.
Nothing is more beautiful than your mother land. A former member, of Mujahedin-e-Khalq , an Iranian dissident group, has repatriated. Please notice the report of his repatriation:
About 3000 members of MEK are still abroad.
Some of the defectors of MEK are trying to convince the others to return home and enjoy the granted public amnesty. The cries of wailing families who have been expecting such a day, their anxiety will end in a few minutes that last as years. The eyes of the relatives show how they have been waiting for their beloved ones for twenty-nine years now without having any news of him. And this expatriation was not for education or building a future.
Sedige Yousei, Mohammad’s sister, the MEK defectors:
We haven’t had any news of him for 28 years until by a phone call, we found out he was released 40 days ago. His return is based on his honest internal feelings and emotions for his country.
Because Mohammadi had lived far from his family for years, he has lost many things.
Mohammad Yousefi (the former member of MEK):
I got shocked after I found out the real nature of the MEK but returning to the country was impossible. It seemed that they possessed the members; all members were forced to submit daily reports to their officials. Once I committed suicide, I committed phlebotomy .
There are too many people like Mohammad in the MEK. The number mounts to 3200. Since the foundation of Nejat Association which is in charge of helping the repatriation of MEK captives, a lot of them have succeeded to return home after the Iranian government declared the amnesty for those who hadn’t committed assassination and also they even granted amnesty to those who don’t have any private appellant.
Arash Sametipour:
We have tried to release the MEK member since 2003. The number of the current captives is 3200 who have 3200 mothers who are grieving due to their children. I’d say there are a lot of families who suffer the separation of their beloved children.
Esmat lost his father, a tailor working in his shop, in a terrorist operation. Edalat Association was founded to air the voices of hers and the ones similar to her, to the world saying that terrorism will end up some day.
Esmat Sepehri:
We don’t want to revenge and we don’t want the other countries to pay the price we paid by the blood of our dear ones. We want to present a solution to the countries that were harmed by terrorism. We want to fight terrorism.
More than 500 defectors have repatriated and they are now living a normal life. When the man is forbidden of any contact, he feels lonesome, defeated and terrified.
But the love for country is routed in the hearts.Download Nejat Society on MBC
Hassan Atash Afzun, MKO former member, tells his memories of the 18 years he spent in the group.
I was born in Bandar Abbas in 1968. I didn’t know the MEK just like most Iranians, however those Iranians, who know them, hated them due to clear reasons but I wasn’t even interested to know about them.
In 1983, I traveled to UAE illegally to find a Job. After 6 years of working there, when I was likely to be able to get citizenship, in 1989 I met Majid Shekouhi, he suggested working in Europe and I accepted the suggestion ambitiously. In the late 1989 he took me to Dubai airport to board the plane with a false passport! At the airport when I was boarding, I found out that there was no trip to England and the plane was supposed to take me to Baghdad. So my fate was going another way.
In Camp Bagher Zade I heard of Mujahedin Khalq for the first time! I was not able to communicate with them at all so I complained asking for leaving the camp but they began to threaten me saying that “Because you entered Iraq illegally, we have to hand you to Iraqi forces who will send you to Abu Qoraib prison.”
They recommended that after a three-month period of military training! I would go to Europe. Once I saw Majid Shekouhi in a ceremony and complained to him because he had deceived me, so he promised that I would go to Europe in thee months.
They tried to convince me to stay in Iraq. They even resorted to methods to control my mind, for example they would let me watch Indian films if I was ready to watch the films of their suicide operations. I was controlled by threats, alluring, terrifying, so I stopped complaining. I always had a question in mind: why do they urge on recruiting some one by deception and then keep him by force? A question I could find answer for when I entered MKO’s relations: the MEK seriously needed to show Saddam Hussein that their number is everyday on the rise in order to prove their legitimacy and also they could get more facilities due to their new recruitments.
I was organized in NLA which was in fact a complicated part of Saddam’s army and, in 1991, I attended the operation that ended with the death of Kurdish people in Touz-Kefri road. I could personally see five Kurds who were killed by the MEK.
Masud Rajavi said about “Pearl Operation” :
“we are defending our landlord – Izat Ibrahim commands over the MEK and if he wasn’t here, they would not give the tanks to us- we paid the price of the donated tanks by Kurds’ blood.”
Saee’d Manouchehri, Mohammad Reza Tari, Mohammad Reza Pour Daghi, and many other MEK members who participated in the operation told us quoting from the Rajavis:
”Take the Kurds under your tanks ,keep the bullets for revolutionary guards.”
During the first Gulf War, when the Iraqi forces left Baghdad ,Izat Ibrahim was in charge of the MEK ( in fact he was ,after Saddam, the main supporter of the MEK). It seems that at the present time, the MEK is trying to stay in Iraq in the hope of Izat Ibrahim’s supporters and the return of Baath remnants.
I had challenges in the organization where I was punished due to the least complaint; in 1993 when Mahmoud Qaem Shahr saw my insistence to leave the group told me to write down and sign that I was regime’s agent , then I would be allowed to go!
In fact, this was a way to prevent forces’ defection and the other way was to threaten the members that they would hand them to Iraqi government and imprison them in AbuQoraib. Once more I wasn’t in doubt, so I was sent to “Traffic control” section to serve as the guard for authorities of MEK. Mostly I was with Ozra Alavi when she wanted to go to Habib base in Basra.
At the time, they showed too much concern for me and even Masud Rajavi sent a message to me that :
” you should become Shiite due to the organization and your ideological leader and you should declare that you are not a Sunnite anymore and you have converted to Shiite religion!” but I didn’t accept.
After the fall of Saddam Hussein, the MEK had a hard time because their main supporter in the world was overthrown, they were disarmed and controled. Mozhgan Parsaiee was so afraid of the time when the American forces figure out that the Mujahedin cheered and celebrated the September Eleventh attack so their problems increase. I remember that I got the news of Sep.11th attack when I was in the soccer field.
We started cheering and chanting. They announced to go indoors so as the American satellites cannot notice us! In a meeting that was held after September 11th attack, Masud Rajavi told to Maryam Rajavi:
”if your forces had revolted, they would have launched such an operation” and he also addressed the pilots :”Dear pilots, you must be prepared for such operations.”
The situation was so disturbing after the fall of Saddam Hussein and American’s settlement. Also some members were complaining so the organizations officials had to deal with both internal and external problems. Mozhgan Parsaiee said in the meetings:
”we will not stop the armed struggle but we have to postpone it because of our preferences.”
For their maintenance in Iraq, after Saddam, they used any trick including paying large amounts of money to people to sign petitions asking for MEK’s stay in Iraq. I was transferred to this section because I knew Arabic. I was in charge of gathering signatures and paying money to the signatories. Hamid Mausavi and abu Heidar (Iraqi) were also recruited by MEK to collect signatories in Iraqi tribes. For each signature 150,000 Dinars were paid. I was supposed to revise the signatures and divide the money. The problem was that out of the 400 signatures, 390 were the same. This reminded me the time when the members were marching in Camp Ashraf and each member had to pass in front of the scene several time but in different forms so as the number of members seemed more!
When I was working in MEK’s social headquarters (The meeting room for their visits with Iraqis), I had a TV and I could receive Iranian channels. When I saw the film “wolves” [which was made by Iranians on MEK’s relations with Saddam Hussein] and I found out the close relationships between Saddam Hussein and Masud RAjavi,I was deeply decided to escape towards TIPF but my decision was denounced. Since that time I started disobeying the organization’s orders. Finally I could come to TIPF where I immediately contacted my family whomI was not allowed to contact with for many years.
Since I came to Iran, I have been assured that the MEK have been spending their time in a cave called Ashraf for two decades. The MEK’s world is a dark, tight world where everything is black and white and iced. This is a fact that you can not find out unless you face the Sun. Now I am under a sun named Iran.
Memories of Batoul Soltani – Part Four
SFF: Mrs. Soltani, we would like your mind to get back to Ashraf where you had difficulty to escape from. We would like you describe the internal relations in MEK that caused you run away?
Batould Soltani: I was actually in the MEK for two decades so I know about the MEK’s internal relations very well. When in 1986 I entered the organization, the most convenient houses and hotel were dedicated to the families. It was the time when Masud and Maryam Rajavi came to Iraq from France. The MEK had used all its strength to recruit members and all IRI opponents from all over the world. There was a tension among supporters in abroad. Rajavi was using his entire wisdom to get the supporters out of their normal life and bring them to the organization and of-course the prison of Ashraf. They used any practice to bring the people to the cult in Iraq. For example they managed to send smugglers, financing them, to take the people out of their families and bring them to Iraq.
The other activity they were also busy of, was to found National Liberation Army and the deals with Iraqi Regime like the meetings with Iraqi ministries or deputies and then with Saddam Hussein who offered them bases, weapons, military trainings. The focus was on recruiting members for the so called NLA. At that time the Iraqi military organs were launching intelligence operations together with the MEK elements to succeed their attacks against Iran. The MEK was taking care of such affairs. Everyday there was a new crisis, a new adventure. So the supporters were busy enough.
After some time they spoke of NLA and military uniform and boots and things like that. Later in 1989 the second phase of Ideological Revolution (after the first phase which was operated in 1985 when the couples were forced to divorce.) was started by MEK that claimed that the first phase was not completed and the divorces should be perfect for ever; this time the divorces should be real and there is no return and anyone who wants to enter the organization must divorce. Since that time divorce became a condition for membership in the MKO.
They named this revolution as “whirl-wind” in which they filtered the devotees from the opponents. Several meetings were arranged by Masud and Maryam Rajavi who brought members group by group there; where they set the situation so artificially that the members became obliged to take out their wedding rings and divorce their spouses. I was in the last group of MKO members who divorced.
They held the meeting for a group of members. From the beginning moments the members were so worried of being called, then they called a person who went to deliver all his responsibilities… then we saw Maryam and Masud cheering made an atmosphere and asked the person:” Ok, now what must you give?” Or “what have you hidden?” they pressured the member mentally and at the end he was prepared for divorce. The person had to write and sign the feature of his dependence on his spouse, his problems and thoughts. Then he had continual meetings so as he can ideologically divorce the marriage in his mind. Thus the leaders could have a better control on the members’ emotions and feelings. The next step was to cut the remaining emotional point: children.
I remember they used the opportunity of war in 1991 and said: “Due to the war, we can not keep the kids here”, so they arranged another chantage and separated the children from their families. That was a treacherous plan that was executed. They even said themselves:” That’s a good pretext to get rid of children.”
The evil Masud had calculated everything; he knew that the presence of children would take a lot of energy. Now they had members who were completely and professionally at Masud‘s service. They sent the children to places, they know themselves, and for example they sent my son to a country and my daughter to another one and I had no idea of where they were.
I couldn’t ask, in any case, where my kids are. They would punish me using their manipulation techniques …
Then, they determined a criterion which was ‘’Maryam ‘’who divorced from her husband for Masud’s sake, married him ideologically and her whole existence has become Masud! In a new scenario, she came said:” I leave all my organizational duties” and Masud said the same thing and introduced Maryam as the first authority of the organization because she was the only one who was joined to Masud and all the others had to be dissolved in and dedicated to Maryam, if not they were called anti-woman, non-revolutionary … this was their new story to seize the members soles and minds.
The bottom line of the story is that Masud is only the ideological leader. If you want to analyze the MEK, you should work one two dimensions; one: the strategic and military dimension and two: the ideological and organizational dimension. The strategic aspect included the departure from France and arrival to Iraq to from NLA. The ideological aspect began with the ideological revolution in 1984. Following the defeat in the “Eternal Light” operation, they concluded that the failure happened because the ideological revolution hasn’t performed perfectly so the fighters haven’t fought well. The discussions on the ideological revolution ended with the divorces saying that the emotions are illegal.
After Maryam Rajavi became the first authority of MEK, Masud left all his organizational responsibilities. They wanted to open their way to European countries, so they established “Presidential Offices” in European countries. A new series of stories began with the name of “President Elect” ( Maryam Rajavi),calling for opposition groups to come under MEK’s hegemony and form National Council of Resistance to abuse them.
Then they continued with equipping their NLA by Saddam Hussein’s aid. Rajavi always was proud of the gifts granted to him by Saddam Hussein. For any operation they launched inside Iran, Saddam praised them with his offered weapons and tanks.
Translation: Nejat Society
Open letter of the Sahar Family Foundation to Dr Alejo Vidal-Quadras Roca, Vice President of the European Parliament Regarding the members of the European Parliament Visiting the base of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) in Iraq called the Ashraf garrison.
Dr Alejo Vidal-Quadras Roca
Vice President of the European Parliament
Brussels, Belgium
Sahar Family Foundation
Baghdad
November 2008
Dear Sir
Please accept our warmest regards as well as those of the families of the members captured in the terrorist cult of Rajavi called the Mojahiden-e Khalq Organization (MKO) in Iraq.
According to the news released by the websites of the MKO, some MEPs as a delegation headed by you visited the base of the organization called "Ashraf" and expressed some opinions relating the garrison of the terrorist cult of Rajavi in Iraq.
The Sahar Family Foundation which consists of the former members of this organization and the families of mental and physical captives in the Ashraf garrison in Iraq would welcome such actions provided they are not one-sided and they do not intend political purposes. We do hope that such visits would continue and would also end to the savior of the captives in that cult and rejoin them with their families who are anxiously waiting to see their beloved ones for over two decades.
Referring to your expressions as well as those of other MEPs reflected in the MKO sites; obviously this visit was aimed for fact-findings about the cult garrison of the MKO in Iraq. Such action is of course welcomed; but we would like to ask you that: shouldn’t a representative of those separated from the organization and those who have been subject to abuses or a representative of the families of those confined in that garrison and have no way to the outside world be present in such a visit?
Recently in a meeting in the European Parliament, Ms Nassrin Ebrahimi a former member of the MKO, talked about hysterectomy and castration of women. Surely this has drawn the attention of yours and that of the delegation that companied you in Ashraf. Also Ms Batool Soltani a former member of the leadership council of the MKO who is based in Baghdad and is the spokesperson of our foundation has listed the names of nearly 150 individuals (%10 of the total number of women in the organization) who have been castrated in the cult of Rajavi. Shouldn’t a physician be present in your delegation to examine these miserable women for fact-finding? It is worth mentioning that Ms Soltani in Baghdad has announced several times that she is ready to visit the Ashraf garrison along with any international delegation in order to find the truth about the MKO.
Your visit and that of the delegation along with you from the Ashraf garrison in Iraq is merely used as a propaganda tool in the hands of a cult to further manipulate its captive followers, since no representative from the opponents, critiques or defectors of the organization were present. Cults do need to justify their inhumane actions and that is why they try to whitewash their faces using well-known people. Our expectation from European politicians was that they act more rational and more reasonable.
For your information it is worth mentioning that the garrison that the MKO calls the "Ashraf city" has the following characteristics:
1. Lacks any families or offspring. Children do not exist there. Women and men live on two opposite sides of this so called city separately and have no contacts with each other what so ever. That is sex apartheid is imposed severely in there. Even gas stations are separated for men and women.
2. The inhabitants of this garrison do not have the right to love anyone but the spiritual leader i.e. Massoud Rajavi. Any kind of expressing love or emotions towards any other person is prohibited and is considered as committing a sin.
3. Followers must regard the members of their families as their main enemies and therefore hate them. Reminding of spouses, offspring or parents is considered as treason to the cult. This cult regards family as the "nest of corruption".
4. Those based in this cult garrison are deprived from facilities such as telephone, cell phone, post, radio, television, internet, satellite, daily papers, gazettes or any form of connection with the outside world and do not have the least of ideas to what is happening outside the garrison. They are only fed with the information provided by the MKO media. It is interesting to know that the organization is even showing its own television programs with delay and after being censored for these practically hostages in the Ashraf garrison. This is done for preventing pictures of the normal life be shown to the captives in order to avoid the awakening effects on them.
5. Members have no right to criticize the actions and the policies of the leader of the cult and the followers have no right to even doubt the political and strategic lines of the organization.
6. Individuals have to attend inhumane sessions called "current operations" and be damned for their deeds and thoughts and even their night dreams. In these sessions which are the most immoral methods of psychological pressures over people, the natural mental and emotional defense of one is shattered in such a way that one submits oneself to any unsound demand and has not the power to say "no".
7. Finally the MKO under the leadership of Massoud Rajavi and his wife Maryam is an established cult according to modern scientific psychological and sociological definitions which utilizes mind manipulation methods in order to recruit, preserve and control its forces. This organization is using brainwashing techniques to restore a kind of modern slavery where individuals are both mentally and physically captives. Cults do need an isolated remote place in order to impose their mental methods over their followers and the Ashraf garrison in Iraq has provided such facilities for over two decades for the MKO first under Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship and then under the protection of the US forces. In other hands the isolated European garrison of the MKO called the Maryam garrison in a suburban area in the north of Paris called Auvers-sur-Oise is used to theorize new mental implementation methods and is used to produce human robots.
If the politicians visiting the Ashraf garrison in Iraq have the least knowledge about the actions of a cult, they definitely know that what they did is to help a destructive terrorist cult to gain justification against its members which are its prime victims in order to brainwash them more and exploit them more.
We urge all MEPs who visited the Ashraf garrison in Iraq to ask the MKO leaders that why they do not allow free and without intervention visits of families with their beloved ones in the Ashraf garrison to take place and why they prevent them using all sorts of excuses.
Best regards
Sahar Family Foudation
Baghdad, Iraq
Copy to:
The European Parliament’s Presidential Committee
A number of MEPs
The public media
Memories of Batoul Soltani- Part three
In the previous part, Mrs.Batoul Soltani described her defection process. She is going to explain her first visit within her family and her following activities in Sahar Family Foundation.
Batoul Soltani: out of Ashraf, there was another world. I found the opportunity to meet my family who had come to Iraq. It was so bizarre. The family is a spiritual gift: mother, father, brothers and sisters who are full of emotions and feelings. I realized how badly I had behaved to them, how much they had suffered because of me. I found out that my father had died due to a heart attack, and my mother had suffered a lot of grieves. So I had much motive to help the other families because I have seen that the organization is still capturing the youth of our country by various methods even deception and abuse of emotional relationships. If anyone wants to leave the group, they ruin his future so as he will have no future out of the group, forcing him to stay in the organization for his whole life.
After the defection, I could have had a normal life but I had enough motivation to stay in Iraq to help my ex-friends and those who are likely to be captured by MKO; the ones who are like me and who do not know what is waiting for them in the cult despite their deceitful smile and green lights. I know what is behind the smiles of the captives in Ashraf. They are very tired but they are afraid of complaining because they would be marked. They have no idea what to do. Even those members, who could leave MKO, have their own problems because the organization has functioned so violently that no one accepts the defectors either.
I learned about a foundation called Sahar, I contacted them and I was willing to help them. Then I became a member of Sahar Family Foundation and now I am a spokeswoman of that. My activities included a trip to Turkey to contact some of the defectors who had legal and financial problems there, we had some jobs and interviews there, with Mr. Masud Khodabandeh who is the founder of SFF.
We are trying to pave the way for MKO defectors to be able to live a normal life in a free society. Mr. Khodabandeh and I also had a trip to Karkul,Irbil,Soleimanieh and Dahouk, and we visited various defectors in these cities. I had recently a trip to the North of Iraq to help those ex-comrades. I could have some meetings with the deputies of Kurdish parties and some journals and international communities to provide the conditions to aid the defectors of MKO. I met and talked to many of them, I got acquainted with their life, problems and grieves. Now I am doing my best to aid SFF in order to help the defectors of MEK.
I had to help my husband; it was my responsibility to save him. I know what happened to him finally and what his motive at the beginning was. I asked his family for help inviting them to Iraq. They came to Iraq after some time, we went to camp Ashraf. I will explain the way the organization treated us in detailed in another part. The scenario they had designed was so significant that needs to be discussed carefully in a separate program.
My activities are partly based on my human feelings. I know my children are hostages in MKO where they are manipulated. I got to know that my daughter Setareh has been forced to come to Iraq. I know she didn’t want to come to Iraq at all.
They were so eager to bring Setare to Iraq before I leaved TIPF or Iraq. Unfortunately I got into some troubles and I couldn’t get in touch with my daughter. Later I figured out that they had convinced her to come to Iraq to visit her father. They brought her to Iraq last March and told her to stay there. She was told:”your mother has psychological problems and she wants to take you to Iran.” She was also told other lies to keep her in the camp as long as they can and of-course to manipulate her more and more. The first step has been the interviews against me but my daughter has resisted and hasn’t done it. But they have terrified her so terribly that she doesn’t answer my phone calls turning off her cell phone. Then she was taken to Ashraf to visit her father who has treated her so unkindly- He has not been in a normal condition- Then she was taken to their indoctrination system. They have manipulated her so seriously that she is completely mixed up now; she is in Netherland where my son is living. She was taken there to work on her brother, Miaad who is totally confused now.
Miaad says:” How is it possible? I am sixteen now, and I haven’t had any idea that I have a sister, mother or father. I don’t know what’s happened that now I have a father and I am repeatedly invited to go to Iraq to visit him or now I have founded my sister after years, in another European country.”
One of my tasks is to go to a European country to pursue the case legally to be able to visit my children after 16 years. My son was 6 months old when the organization separated him from me. I haven’t seen them for 16 years. I missed them a lot. I’d really love to see them but what shall I do that the terrorist cult of Rajavi commits any crime against the defectors.Translation: Nejat Society
Mrs. Sho’le Shadram, former member of MKO, who is now residing is Sweden, had an interview with Nejat Society during her trip to Iran. The following is an extract of her speech at Tehran branch of Nejat Society:
I am Sho’le Shadram. I was born in 1966 in Lahijan, Gilan. In 1985, when I wanted to join MKO I went to Turkey from where I was sent to Iraq. When I fled Iran, I was in age of 17 and I was a MKO supporter. After I arrived in Iraq, Camp Ashraf, gradually I began to doubt what the organization was saying. I couldn’t trust them. When I was in Iran I was very sympathic and serious supporter of MKO but when I got in to a close relationship with them, I felt that they have another face which never looks like what they say.
The peak of the internal contradiction was that my first marriage was organizational [dictated by the organization] and my first husband was killed in the group’s attack to Iran [Eternal Light Operation]. My second marriage was also organizational which ended to the mandatory divorce dictated after the ideological revolution!
How do the cult leaders allow themselves to enter the individuals’ private personal space and manipulate them by psychological methods? I didn’t agree the divorce and marriage of Maryam Rajavi (the basic contradiction that everyone has question on but no one dares to express)
They wanted to convince me and the others to accept it.Under their hysteric peer pressure we had no way except accepting the controversial divorce and marriage of Maryam Azdanlou[Rajavi].
Basically I didn’t believe in going to Iraq and cooperating with Saddam Hussein, considering it treason against Iran and Iranians (this was the second basic contradiction, contrary to the principals) but the ruling atmosphere was so controlling that I didn’t have the courage to express my idea. No one had the courage to even think about defection because they had made it a taboo: the highest treason. I never accepted a responsibility so I was all the time reproached. I was ready to suffer the worst condition to find a possibility to leave the camp and never get back.
In 1990, when I was in Camp Ashraf I stated my defection from MKO, so I was immediately taken to the group’s prison in Debes in Northern Iraq. After a year, they sent me to the refugee camp in Romadi where the condition was very bad but of-course better than that of MKO. Once I escaped from the camp to go to Jordan but the Jordanian police arrested me and handed me to Iraq. The news of my escape was published, so the organization became obliged to send me to another country. First they transferred me to Baghdad and then in 1991 Turkey where I went to the UN’s High Commission of Refugees. After two and a half years of living in refugee camp in Turkey, I was granted refugee status by Sweden where I got married and became the mother of three children.
As soon as I got to Sweden, the MKO agents came to me continuously asking me to do fundraising activities in the streets. I resisted firmly and didn’t obey them. Finally, they stopped bothering me.
For along time, after my residence in Sweden, I had terrible nightmares. I had the feeling that I was still captured in the organization. I wondered how I was deceived by the cult and how I could waist my life in a cult. At nights I had nightmares of Ashraf Camp, I shouted in sleep. A few years passed and I could find a normal status.
In Sweden there was a group that helped the people who had gone to the war and had mental problems. They also helped the defectors of MKO psychologically to return them to the society. They had experts who aided the survivors of the cult. In Sweden, I had financial problem, I was homesick and I had problem with the language but I was never willing to have the least contact with MKO.
After some time, I contacted my family who were unaware of my condition for years. I wanted to go to Iran to visit them. I got married. I got three kids and I came to Iran to make my disagreement with MKO concrete. For the time being, I have no concern except my concern for those who are still captive of Camp Ashraf and I know them.
I appreciate the efforts of Nejat Society that tries to link the captured ones of the cult of Rajavi with their families in Iran. I hope that the entire captives of Camp Ashraf and Auver Sur d’Oise can soon get back to their families and society.
Memoirs of Ms. Batoul Soltani – Part two
In his phone calls, Masud Rajavi tried to know why I was upset by making jokes and having fun. He wanted to know what my problem was. I didn’t tell him what my problem was. I was very sad. I had many questions on the organization. I felt that I have lost all my life, wasting my lifetime for looking for nothing. I even saw that the organization didn’t obey its own principles. For example, at that time, we claimed to be anti-Imperialism so much, but I saw how they spread red carpet for the Americans in Camp Ashraf welcoming them warmly. They named the cooperation with Americans as the struggle with the main enemy which is Islamic Republic, saying that
“It doesn’t matter to negotiate with the US to fight the main enemy.”
Sometimes, I asked them:
” why do you make the youth miserable by bringing them to the organization? Why haven’t we overthrown the regime yet after two decades? Or why are we struggling at all?”
However I was stuck in vain, this was not a factor to make me escape or leave the organization until the day I was working on the computer and I entered the private network of Mozhgan Parsaie. In fact I was supposed to fix their network. In one of their rooms, I entered Mozhgan Parsaie’s network where she had prepared a report which was supposed to be sent to Maryam Rajavi. I read the report and I saw what she had written about me. I got shocked extremely wondering what the reason of all respects they had for me was and what this report is. I felt they are so hypocrite and the word hypocrite really deserves them. They had back-bitted about me writing anything they could write about me although I was a member of Leadership Council. For instance they had written that I have moral problems or I have problems with children etc…. they had stated that my situation was so crucial. So I got very upset since they had wasted my life. I was looking for a way to carry out my decision and soon I was able to pack my bag and escape from the camp. We were seriously controlled.
We couldn’t walk around the camp alone. The low-ranking members were told:
“You may be arrested or kidnapped by the others who traffic the camp.”
The members do not trust anybody. They are always monitoring each other. I was in the Leadership Council, so I know that they falsely say that
“We do not allow the women to walk alone due to lack of security in the camp.“
In fact they want to cover the reality of their jobs.
The women were controlled in a particular way, so strictly, that Rajavi had soon sworn that
“We have no female defector”,
The control over the women members were more sever because he wanted to prove his claim.
Since I couldn’t get out alone, I planned a way to escape. At the sunset time, I put a back bag on the front seat of my jeep and I put a cap and a scarf on the pack bag to make the figure of a woman. Therefore I could pass the control station. I told them that my colleague is taking a nap on the front seat. So I could get out until I reached the street around the camp where I parked the car and walked out of the prison I had spent so many years of my life: Two decades of my life, from the moment I was recruited by the cult until the time I could run away by a complex plan. When I was escaping from the camp, I didn’t intend to go to TIPF (the American camp). I had some tools such as a wire cutter to cut the barbed wires and walk out of the camp. I knew that there are some hungry dogs wondering around the camp. I brought some food to give them in case of the risk of their attack. When I entered the deserts around the camp and I was walking towards the cast, I encountered the dogs. So I gave the food and water to them. They became my friends and escorted me.
But when I got to the barbed wires I found out that I had lost my wire cutter when I was trying to feed the dogs. So I changed my plan and decided to go to American camp. I came towards the American camp and tried to draw the soldiers’ attention to myself, but they couldn’t hear me because they were listening to music by their headsets. I tried to shout, using my English. I told them that
“I am a woman who escaped from MKO camp and I don’t want the organization learns about me.”
Finally I could get in the camp of American forces.
In the camp, MKO tried to contact me, in many ways. They sent me letters, messages,.. They even called me on the cell phones which were held secretly in the American camp. They wanted me to get back to Ashraf promising me to do anything I want such as going to Europe or giving financial aids. Then they launched a large attempt to attract me by my children. They knew that I was looking for my children. They particularly wanted to bring my daughter to camp Ashraf so as I would get back. They even had her supervisor, in Europe, call me so that they can control me out of Camp Ashraf and even abroad. But I never let them get close to me. They had taken my daughter as a hostage; she wasn’t allowed to call me. She was told a lot of nonsense about me. They had even told her to have an interview against me but she hadn’t accepted because she was busy with her studies and her personal life.
I stayed in TIPF for a period of time. Americans suggested working for them. I did their computer works about storage of their goods listing them in the computer and I was paid 2.5 dollars an hour.
Meanwhile I had some contacts with my family. I was sometimes afraid of my future life. I was afraid of making mistake. I didn’t know what was waiting for me. Sometimes I got disappointed. The organization was also trying hard to have me back with promises of money or a free life in Europe but I was sure that I would have no way out with MKO except that same isolated cult.
We had many difficulties in TIPF. The Americans didn’t help us; instead they aided the organization to become more stable, for example they recognized Mozjgan Parsaie but not the separated members of the cult. The organization used the opportunity and expanded its control and hegemony over the members more and more. The pressure of the meetings was increased.
In the meetings, about 300 people were shouting at an individual asking him or her:
” what is in your mind? Why do you want to leave the camp? Why do you think about your children or husband?”
When I just remember these memories, I get terrified. So I didn’t think about any of their suggestions. In my contacts with my family, they couldn’t help me so much they wanted to help me in their own way offering their emotions and sympathy.
Translation:Nejat Society
To be continued
Memoirs of Ms. Batoul Soltani – Part One
The following is an interview with “ Former member of the leadership Council of MKO; a woman who was released after two decades of being captive of the cult of Rajavi …during those years she lost her kids and her warm family center. The life of Mrs. Batoul Soltani is mostly like a tragic drama that seems like an incredible fate. She is now stepping in a way to rejoin her missing husband and kids.
SFF: Mrs.Soltani, Thank you for your time. We would like to offer you our sympathy due to the entire grieves you suffered for more than two decades. As we’d like to learn about your tragedy-like life, please explain how you were recruited by the organization?
Mrs.Batoul Soltani: Thank you. I am Batoul Soltani. I was born in 1965 in Isfahan where I graduated from high school. I was accepted for the university but I didn’t go there and instead I married a man who had just been released from the prison.
In 1986 we got married and then one of my husband’s friends, who had joined the organization, introduced him to MKO. He had told them that we are opposed to the Islamic Republic. So the MKO’s men came to Isfahan to look for us.
My husband told me about leaving Iran. I had some social problems so I was ready to leave Iran. I said:
”It is so good. We will leave Iran to look for our happiness and life.”
The same year when I was pregnant (about eight months after our marriage) we left Iran through Iran-Pakistan border by the help of a smuggler who worked for MKO.
We were on the way for a few days. I remember the difficulties I had on the way. When we arrived in Pakistan, I told my husband that I wanted to continue my studies and have a free life. We asked the UNHCR for the refugee card. Due to my physical status, pregnancy, they soon granted refugee to us. I gave birth to my first kid in Pakistan.
Later MKO came to my husband. He insisted on going to Iraq and I disagreed but my husband said:
”It is very good to live in Iraq. They have a very good situation there. We will have a comfortable life. If we don’t want to live there, we can go to a European country.”
But from the other side the MKO’s representative said:
” everyone cannot step in this way. It is so hard. “
But my husband said:
”No, it’s not like that. They say these words to everyone who wants to join MKO, but it is not actually as what he says. They have a very relaxing life. They want to know how loyal the members are and such things.”
He said these things to convince me to be satisfied and tolerate any difficulty.
Therefore, in 1987 we came to Iraq with our two-month old baby. They received us in the best hotels of Baghdad and settled us in a 5-starred hotel. After a period of residence in the hotel they told me that I can leave my kid to the nursery and work in their school. I remember that they took our passport and refugee card when we arrived at the airport and we couldn’t understand that they were blocking all the way back.
When I got their base, I left my baby to the nursery and started working as a teacher in their school. We were practically gotten involved in the organization’s relations.
The process continued until they told us that they wanted to send the children to Europe. This was a plan after the Gulf War. They used the opportunity and said:
”We are not able to keep children here any more and we must send them to Europe. “
They held indoctrination meetings and various factors convinced us to send the children to Europe. I talked with my husband. He said:
”we have no way out of Organization’s relations and no appropriate facilities and means to live our life in Iraq without MKO. We can not return Iran because we will be arrested and executed there. Besides we have no money and the organization keeps our documents.”
Actually he was gotten stuck within the Organization’s relations so he wanted to continue as before.
So he convinced me to let our children go for their own sake in the hope that they will be lucky and happy there and we will be loyal to each other here and soon we will also go abroad. Or we will go to Iran after victory. He seriously emphasized that the regime of Iran would overthrow in 6 or 7 months and we would go to Iran.
After that I remember that I was so sad and I missed my children. I cried under the blanket at nights because we shouldn’t show our emotions. If they found out that I had missed my children, they would punish me. They said:
” what’s wrong with you? You are a revolutionary avant-garde. You are here to liberate your country.”
So I tried to hide my feelings. Then the promotions began in the organization. They held special programs to allegedly liberate the women in revolutionary phases, heightening the scene of responsibility of the weakened women.
Thus everyday I was promoted in my ranks and duties. After the departure of my children, I received military trainings and soon, in 1993, I was the commandant of a unit.
In 1991, the mandatory divorces were ordered. They said:
”Anyone who wants to stay and continue the way must divorce from her husband. “
Therefore in an artificial atmosphere, anyone wanted to take off her ring and declared her divorce to show that she is superior and more liberated.
This was Masud and Maryam’s plan to separate the spouses. [..]
After the divorces, the control was heightened to keep the men and women away from each other. If even the members thought about their spouses or asked any question about them, they would be punished seriously.
Later the group forced the men to give their hegemony following giving their wives to the organization and under the revolutionary titles they handed their duties to the women gradually.
I remember that I was the commandant of a unit with 11 tanks, each one with 3 service-men. It was a big responsibility and I had no free time. I could relax only two hours a day. Then I received computer training for 4 years after I went to Britain with a false passport. At the time the systems of the computers in MKO was Appel and the group wanted to promote them to PC so I was chosen for some new trainings.
During the war I learned the site systems and designed websites. I only for a short time worked in the recruitment section to recruit new forces. In 2007, I was promoted to the Leadership Council.
I attended the meetings of the Leadership Council which were held once a week. We held several meetings when Masud and Maryam were in Iraq and later, as the layer of the leadership council we had the meetings everyday.
In 2006,I was the subject of the meetings for a long time. They asked me why I’m not relaxed. Why I’m depressed or thoughtful. They constantly put me under questions until I got several phone calls from Masud Rajavi.
Translation: Nejat Society
To be continued
Dear Mr. Nouri Al Maleki,
We the undersigned have arrived in Europe over the past few weeks as refugees from .
We are survivors of the Rajavi cult (aka Mojahedin-e Khalq) which for many years was part of Saddam Hussein’s repressive apparatus.
As you are aware we had the chance of taking refuge from the Rajavi dictatorship with the American army when they established a TIPF next to Camp Ashraf in Diyali province.
Recently we were freed from there and have managed to reach the European Union. Many others decided to voluntarily repatriate to where they have re-joined their families. Others have decided to go to other countries like .
The situation of Camp Ashraf is not unknown to you. We know that many of our friends still trapped there would like to leave, but now do not have the opportunity that we had, now that TIPF is closed.
As part of the Iraqi government’s drive to remove the MKO from Iraqi territory, we believe it is vitally important to re-create a place similar to the American camp so that those people who no longer want to be terrorists can escape the MKO camp.
The UNHCR has stated that it cannot begin to deal with these people until they stop being a paramilitary group. It is important to give individuals that very chance by providing them an escape route.
We implore you to create another camp next to Camp Ashraf for people to go to. Once they see a glimmer of hope we are sure many, many will take the opportunity to leave the MKO and from there leave itself.
We further implore you to open the actual gates of Camp Ashraf and allow families in to have access to their loved ones. Let Rajavi’s victims see that their friends and families are there to help them.
We are ready to help in any way needed, including returning to help run the new facility.
Paris, October, 2008