++ As the UN Human Rights Council meets in Geneva, former MEK members have written to alert officers and attendees to the presence of Behzad Naziri. They say Behzad Naziri has donned a suit and tie and poses as a human rights activist to infiltrate the buildings and meetings of the UN. However, as a commander of Saddam\u2019s Private Army he is a wanted man in Iraq where there are also cases pending accusing him of torture of MEK members. Many individuals have written personal testimonies against him in addition to their objection letters to the UN.<\/p>\n
++ On the occasion of the anniversary of September 11, many people have written their personal memories about Massoud Rajavi\u2019s reaction and the celebrations he ordered in support of Al Qaida. Rajavi said, \u201cif they represent Reactionary Islam, we are Revolutionary Islam, and we can do ten times more\u201d. Writers remind us that Rajavi changed his tune when America invaded Iraq and the MEK suddenly acted as if they had been American since birth. Rajavi was able to change sides in a matter of months because he leads a mercenary force.<\/p>\n
++ The MEK held a celebration to mark the 50th anniversary of the foundation of the organisation. As usual this became a laughing stock. Writers pointed out that whatever the MEK originally was it is irrelevant to what it is now, it is a completely different organisation. Some said this was pitched to hold onto their older members. Even though the MEK rub shoulders with the likes of arch neoconservative John Bolton, they try to pretend to be the original anti-Imperialist MEK. Others say the MEK now have no real identity and their Zionist supporters are tying to buy them one. The irony is that they want to identify themselves as an anti-imperialist force, but to celebrate it they have to invite Zionists and Imperialists. Critics refer to Maryam Rajavi\u2019s speech \u2013 her asking in every way possible for the Americans to help them stay in Iraq. The new Iraqi govt has made it impossible for them or ISIS to remain in Iraq since the Iraqi govt is now united as never before. While insisting on staying, in same speech Rajavi claims that the \u2018blood of the 52\u2032 has won their place in Iraq. Critics interpret this as wanting to kill the others too. In the celebration one of retired US generals has demanded that the US go and take over Camp Liberty and announce it as a \u2018free zone\u2019 protected by air jets and that the UN must be forced to give the mandate to take control of the place. He also said the MEK have the same rights as the Yazidis as residents of Iraq. Critics deride this, saying the MEK have now changed their nationality and are claiming to be Iraqis. While publishing reports about their activities on their own sites the MEK have, as usual, added a few lies of their own. The biggest lie this year was a made up, non-existent announcement by Ayatollah Sistani pronouncing value judgements for or against the new Iraqi politicians.<\/p>\n
++ A third article from Ebrahim Khodabandeh in Tehran has been published in which he talks about the contact he has from both current members and former members of the Mojahedin Khalq. He relates what these various people say to him along with his own opinion about their issues. Khodabandeh says the people in Auvers sur Oise are very confused. The MEK claims to be secular, but when members ask about continued gender apartheid and enforced hijab, the commanders give no answer. According to the article, there are three major issues troubling the cult. One is the issue of religious identity and secularism. Another is about the continued \u2018Presidency\u2019 of Maryam Rajavi after two decades. One member had asked about this and was told that Maryam is \u201cPresident of the Resistance\u201d, to which he innocently replied that \u201cwe all know that by \u2018Resistance\u2019 you mean \u2018Massoud Rajavi\u2019, so does that mean he has appointed her as his President?\u201d Apparently the man was severely punished for this. The third contentious issue is circulating in Camp Liberty. People are asking why, when high up members like Massoud Khodabandeh, Masoud Banisadr or Mesdaghi left the MEK, Rajavi didn\u2019t start attacking them as \u2018agents of the Iranian regime\u2019 until they started speaking out against him and the MEK, yet when his Arabic translator Ghorban Ali Hossein Nejat left, Rajavi immediately denounced him as a homosexual. The members in Camp Liberty say they have no problem with his sexuality even if it were true, but they cannot understand Rajavi\u2019s sensitivity toward him and this uncharacteristic response. One of the groups who were undergoing an indoctrination session with Abbas Davari (a veteran member of 40+ years), asked him about this. When pressed, Davari himself discovered that he had the same question, and he too had no answer. Finding this out, the MEK forced Davari to write against Nejat Association to be published on MEK websites. However, Davari is semi-literate (he was recruited as a railway worker before the 1979 revolution), yet in other cases, he has apparently written a book in English denouncing former MEK members and was named as the author of the \u2018Pentagon Report\u2019.<\/p>\n
In English:<\/p>\n
++ Mazda Parsi of Nejat Bloggers writes about \u2018Modern Slavery in the Cult under Rajavi\u2019s Program for Women\u2019. Stating that the treatment of women is an indicator in understanding a civilized country, the article identifies the example of the Rajavi cult \u201cwhich is governed by kind of modern slavery system [that] deprives female members from their fundamental freedoms and rights. Nevertheless, the MKO propaganda tries to demonstrate a modern democratic portrait of a viable alternative for the Iranian Government while in reality it practices discrimination and violence against its female members. The new documentary published by Press TV proves just the opposite of what their propaganda claims. \u201cComrades in Arms\u201d unfolds the story of those women who fell for deceptive slogans of the MKO. Looking for a brighter future these women ended up in Camp Ashraf, where they faced a gloomy fate.\u201d<\/p>\n
++ Setaregan Association in Switzerland have written an Open letter to Pandeli Majko ( Albanian Prime Minister 1999 \u2013 2002). The letter warns him of the deceptive methods the MEK uses to trap people like himself into giving their support. \u201cThe Rajavi cult (Massoud and Maryam Rajavi) has two completely different faces. In the EU and US they are behaving like a chameleon and hide their true nature. For example, Mrs Rajavi pretends that she is leading a struggle against dictatorship. In reality, we have experienced ourselves that Massoud and Maryam Rajavi are nothing other than brutal dictators themselves. Someone who does not allow the smallest basic freedoms inside their organisation cannot claim to be struggling for freedom, can they?\u201d<\/p>\n
++ Tehran Times reported remarks made by Ayatollah Rafsanjani, head of Iran\u2019s Expediency Council, in a meeting with Danish Foreign Minister Martin Lidegaard in Tehran. \u201cThe condition for serious and effective fight against the \u2018virus of terror and terrorism\u2019 is sincerity, bravery, and avoidance from double standard policy,\u201d Rafsanjani noted. Rafsanjani, a veteran politician, also said how one can believe the claims by Westerners, especially Americans, that they are fighting against terrorism while they still support some terrorist groups like the Mojahedin Khalq Organization. For example, Rafsanjani said, the U.S. is fighting ISIL terrorists in Iraq while it supported the terrorist group in Syria.\u201d<\/p>\n
++ The Financial Times exposed a financial corruption allegation involving Zalmay Khalilzad, a former US ambassador to Afghanistan and Iraq. Khalilzad, who now runs his own consultancy firm in Washington, has lobbied for the Kurdish regional administration in northern Iraq in the past and also represented foreign businesses in Iraq. He has also lobbied for the MEK.<\/p>\n
++ Justin Raimondo\u2019s article for Anti-War \u2018Hoaxes, Hype, and Hysteria \u2013 The War Party never takes a holiday\u2019, says \u201cWhile Americans were barbecuing over the Labor Day weekend, the Usual Suspects were busy cooking up new wars, from Iraq to Ukraine. While this is nothing new \u2013 after all, evil never sleeps \u2013 one thing I did notice: the stunning lack of imagination on their part. It was, in effect, the equivalent of a bunch of summer reruns: tired formulaic retreads that weren\u2019t all that convincing in the first place\u2026 the neocons came up with a not-so-new one [threat]: they claim a laptop computer ostensibly captured from ISIS by the \u201cgood\u201d jihadists \u2013 the so-called Free Syrian Army, which is armed and trained by the US \u2013 contains plans for constructing \u201cweapons of mass destruction,\u201d i.e. biological weapons. They\u2019re even calling it the \u201claptop of death\u201d \u2013 a phrase that ought to ring a bell for those who follow these sorts of things. That\u2019s the same phrase used to describe yet another purloined laptop, this one supplied by the Mujahedin-e-Khalq, an Iranian terrorist group that, for years, has been feeding the War Party bogus \u201cintelligence\u201d about Tehran\u2019s nonexistent nuclear weapons program. That tall tale was debunked in 2011 \u2013 yet another case of MEK cobbling together old outdated data, adding a dash of forgery, and shaking well enough to fool the credulous.\u201d<\/p>\n
++ Iranian Pen Association writes an Open Letter to Dr Ahmed Shaheed, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Iran, warning him of the lies fed to him by agents of the MEK. The letter reminds Dr Shaheed of the cult nature of the MEK and details some of the MEK\u2019s abuses of human rights inside the organisation.<\/p>\n
12 September 2014<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A third article from Ebrahim Khodabandeh in Tehran has been published in which he talks about the contact he has from both current members and former members of the Mojahedin Khalq aka MKO\/MEK\/PMOI. He relates what these various people say to him along with his own opinion about their issues. Khodabandeh says the people in \u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[669],"tags":[180],"module":[81],"ctype":[17],"blog":[117],"class_list":["post-5823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-iran-interlink-weekly-digest","tag-iran-interlink","module-article","ctype-story","blog-iran-interlink"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5823\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5823"},{"taxonomy":"module","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/module?post=5823"},{"taxonomy":"ctype","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ctype?post=5823"},{"taxonomy":"blog","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nejatngo.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/blog?post=5823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}