The Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK, a.k.a. MKO and NCRI) terror cult recruit people through deceitful offers and advertisements.
Nasrin Ahmadi was in her early twenties when she joined the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ Cult of Rajavi) in 1992. She did not survive the group’s regulations so long. She was killed only three years later.
Khalil RamezaniNasab, a former member of the MEK recalls Nasrin as a young girl (age 25) driving BMP tank in Camp Ashraf. “Soon after her arrival in Ashraf, she was fed up with the undemocratic atmosphere of the group”, Khalil says about Nasrin. “She was disappointed with the maltreatment of commanders against the rank and file. So, she started dissent; she wanted to leave the group.”
As it is expected in any destructive cult, departure from the cult of Rajavi was forbidden. Mahvash Sepehri the top commander of Nasrin called on eight of her sub-commanders including Khalil RamezaniNasab to work on Nasrin in order to convince her to stay in the group. “Mahvash Sepehri ordered to hold a meeting for Nasrin,” Khalil recalls. “Mahvash and other commanders tried to dissuade her from leaving the group. The meetings lasted eight hours. Nasrin was determined to leave the group. She said that she was not willing to stay any more and she wanted to leave the group as soon as possible.”
That was Nasrin’s last word. Khalil witnessed that Mahvash Sepehri got extremely angry and began to beat Nasrin with a metal stick. Khalil says, “I was terribly frightened by watching the scene. I was shocked and speechless looking at the dead body of the girl.”
Mahvash orders the men to take the Nasrin’s body out. “Two hours later, Mahvash Sepehri called on us again,” Khalil recounts. “Nasrin died because of a brain stroke!” She told us and warned that nobody should speak about how Nasrin really died.”
Unveiling “Sunset in the Sunset” Painting: Narrative of the Oppression of Martyr Anis Nouri
At the beginning of the ceremony, Mr. Foroutanpanah, the moderator of the ceremony, described the assassination of Ms. Anis Nouri.
He said, “assa was martyred on the 15th of Ramadan (6 July 1982) and during the heavenly time of Iftar due to the attack of the hypocrites on her house. She, her husband, and two children, aged four and five, were waiting for the muezzin at the table. She heard the sound of the bell of the house. She saw a man with a bowl in one hand and a Colt gun in other hand while he was ready to shoot. There was another man with a J3 gun ready to attack. Martyr Anis Nouri shouted and called her husband and stands in front of the attackers. At this moment, one of the attackers entered the house by firing four bullets while her daughter, Zahra was bleeding. Martyr Anis Nouri tried to save her child, but the attacker fired at her and Ms. Nouri fell down. Then the attackers threw a gasoline container on the floor of the house and ran away, but while fleeing, they threw a lighter into the house. Therefore, flames cover the space of the house.”
Then, Mr. Rostampour, a veteran of the holy defense era and an activist in the field of martyrdom, appreciated the Association for Defending Victims of Terrorism for organizing this meeting and said, “We must commemorate the memory of the martyrs because seventeen thousand innocent people from different groups in the country have been victims of terrorism and no attention is paid to these martyrs.”
In another part of the ceremony, Hojjatoleslam Hadi Habibi, the Friday Imam of Roudsar, congratulating the birthday of Imam Hassan Mojtaba (PBUH), introduced Ms Anis Nouri as a victim of the Kharijite assassination and stated that the hypocrites, are similar to the Kharijites and they show themselves in the society in a good appearance and then they undermine the goals and ideals of that society by any means. In Surah An-Nisa’, verse 145, God says that the hypocrites are in the worst parts of the hell. In our country, despite thousands of shameful cases of assassination of innocent people such as the Martyr Anis Nouri, they finally fled to France and took refuge in that country despite their claims of democracy and defense of human rights.
Mr. Yaghoub Estilaf, the husband of Martyr Anis Nouri said, “I appreciate all those involved in this ceremony, especially the Association for Defending Victims of Terrorism. The host moderator told the story of my wife’s martyrdom, but I want to say that this meeting is not only about the cruelty of the hypocrites against a housewife, at the Iftar table, but it is also about the description of the cruelty of the hypocrites against the Iranian nation. The cruelty that has remained in history and the Iranian nation will never forget these cruelties, and even the opponents of the Iranian government hate the hypocrites who allied with Saddam.”
He added, “The hypocrites have no place among the Iranian people and not only in Iran, anywhere else in the world, and they are known as terrorists, and the Iraqi people expelled them and they had to reside in Albania.”
Martyr Anis Nouri’s husband thanked Mr. Aghaeipour and the provincial and city officials of Gilan, and asked the provincial officials not to be content with such ceremonies and think about the naming of urban thoroughfares after this martyr in order to reduce the pain of the oppression of this martyr. Take a step towards honoring the martyrs of assassination as much as possible.
In another part of the ceremony, Mr. Mohammad Reza Davtaleb, Deputy of Culture of the Martyr and Veterans Afairs Foundation of Gilan Province, stated, “With such crimes, it can be said that the hypocrites are the worst group in the history of Iran and today the rightfulness of Martyr Anis Nouri has been proven. She was martyred alongside his family in a city far from the battlefield and at the Iftar table while the whole country was defending against Saddam’s aggression.
Next, the painting “Sunset in the Sunset”, with dimensions of 1.5 by 2 meters, the work of Gilani artist Mr. Hossein Aghaeipour was unveiled.
Mr. Hossein Aghaeipour, the creator of this artistic work, said about the painting, “Art is a cry of commitment in sympathy with society and protesting against the social evils that arise from the passionate heart of the artist to lead the turmoil and irritation of human life to the shore of peace.”
He added, “By displaying the works of violence and extremism, the artist can make the world more aware of the realities of this sinister phenomenon and make the society have a clearer view of the lasting effects and consequences of this calamity of the century. The artist has a duty to use his tools to send the best message to the world to fight against any evil.”
Mr. Aghaeipour added: “Terrorism has victimized all over the world for many years and there is almost no society that has not been affected by the evil of this heinous phenomenon. In addition, Iran is one of the countries that has suffered a lot in this regard, and therefore, it is important to inform our society and the world about these tragedies. Because sometimes, over time, the crimes of terrorists are hidden among various news.
Mr. Aghaeipour continued, “Today, the painting of the Sunset in the Sunset is the story of a mother who was martyred by devils in previous years. This painting tries to narrate an incident that happened many years ago, during Ramadan in 1982, during Iftar, but its pain still remains on the body of society and is painful. This painting seeks to express the fact that the fire that the devils kindled descends on them and shows that, like the case of Abraham, the flames of the criminals are extinguished on the innocent.
At the end of the ceremony, by paying tribute to the great status of this great martyr, a plaque of appreciation was awarded to this committed artist for his efforts.
++ Amidst the news that Iran and Saudi Arabia have held discussions in Baghdad, some commentators pointed out that with JCPOA negotiations taking place in Vienna and now talks with Saudi Arabia in Baghdad Maryam Rajavi has been left in deep shit. She has first lost Saddam and now the Saudis. She will have to find another benefactor. No wonder MEK are trying everything they can to stop any negotiations.
++ On the back of Facebook closing several MEK accounts, people have written that from the time of Saddam to now, the MEK has misused media and social media outlets. Nejat from Tehran published an analytical piece on MEK cyber-terrorism. The piece details how MEK uses social media and the media, paying for advertorials and performing information laundry. The article concludes that it is time for people to wake up. ‘It’s not damaging those you want to target. It is damaging to you. Like a virus, you are not immune yourselves when you spread it.’
++ To mark the 1st May, International Workers Day, many have written reminders of how anti-worker MEK has been and is. Inside the MEK, they use forced labour and slavery. People are forced to work at gun point. They receive no money, medical care, there is no retirement. Some have written about their own experiences of working whilst with MEK.
In English:
++ Three pieces about the MEK in Vienna demonstrate what a hot potato the group is. No western country wants to take responsibility for them, and that, as Anne Khodabandeh points out, has allowed Iran to tell its domestic audience that neither America nor Europe is serious about the talks as they allow a terrorist group freedom to toxify the atmosphere surrounding the talks. Kourosh Ziabari in Asia Times and Maziar Motamedi in Aljazeera, also write about the MEK presence in Vienna. Ziabari suggests that the US (Facebook) is somehow side-lining the MEK after Trump, and Motamedi reports that the US and EU find the MEK challenging. But neither go so far as Khodabandeh to suggest that the US must dismantle the MEK in Albania to demonstrate to Iran that it seeks to negotiate in good faith and with good intent.
++ Iran-Interlink posted a BBC report on the FBI raid on Rudi Guiliani’s home in relation to his dealing with Ukraine. This is a reminder that Maryam Rajavi has paid Giuliani tens of thousands of dollars to advocate for the MEK’s regime change agenda. The company they keep…
++ Mehr news reported the words of Iran’s Defense Minister, Brigadier General Amir Hatami at the commemoration ceremony for Quds Force second-in-command General Seyyed Mohammad Hejazi, who died last week. Hatami praised Hejazi, Soleimani and Shirazi (who was assassinated by MEK) as role models for the next generation. Iran’s resistance forces have become a sizeable and influential power in the region, he said.
++ Albanian historian Olsi Jazexhi in an interview by Reza Moshfeq in the Tehran Times, described MEK in Albania as a front organisation of Israeli imperialism against Muslims. Although MEK continues its terrorist activities with Israel in Iran (assassinations), Jazexhi says there are signs that the Biden administration could dismantle the MEK slave camp in Albania and de-radicalise the members.
Apr 30, 2021
Facebook has closed hundreds of fake accounts linked to the Iranian exile group Mujahedin-e-Khalq Organization (MEK), a move that will be cheered in Tehran and raise questions about official US attitudes about the group under the new Joe Biden administration.
Over 300 accounts, pages and groups believed to be affiliated with the MEK, also known as MKO, were tagged by Facebook for egregious online behavior including disseminating misinformation to discredit the Iranian government.
Facebook ascertained that the majority of the accounts were operated from a single location in Albania and almost universally projected a favorable image of the otherwise historically infamous group some even liken to a cult.
Whether Facebook’s actions came at the request of the Biden administration is unclear, but any such move would be perceived as an olive branch in Tehran at a time the two sides dance around resuming the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear deal.
MEK, a former guerilla group established in 1965, enjoyed broad support among the foreign policy team of former US president Donald Trump, who scrapped the JCPOA and imposed new sanctions on Iran. Top Trump officials made open overtures to MEK, espousing its members as potential replacements to the incumbent Iranian government.
Although the Trump administration never overtly stated that regime change was its goal for Iran, officials including then-national security advisor John Bolton and the president’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani had on different occasions extolled MEK as a symbol of freedom vis-à-vis Iran’s authoritarian, theocratic regime.
Trump’s was a generous portrayal. MEK is a political-militant organization whose ultimate aim is to overthrow the Iranian government. It was part of the popular movement that led to the 1979 revolution in Iran that brought the Islamic Republic to power, but quickly fell from grace and became disillusioned after its former leader, Massoud Rajavi, was blocked from standing as a candidate in the first post-revolution presidential election.
The most acrimonious episode between the MEK and the Islamic Republic occurred when the group allied with late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein after he invaded Iran in 1980 and took up arms against fellow Iranian citizens to overturn the then newly-born revolution. Working in cahoots with Saddam during the Iran-Iraq War painted the MEK as a treacherous, malign force in the eyes of many Iranians.
The official Iranian account is that the MEK has the blood of some 17,000 Iranians on its hands, including former President Mohammad-Ali Rajai and former Prime Minister Mohammad Javad Bahonar, whom it assassinated along with six other senior officials on August 30, 1981.
However, the MEK’s history of violence is not confined to aggression against Iranian citizens. The group subscribed to a fierce anti-American ideology in the 1970s and hit several American targets inside Iran in a string of bombings that hit the US information office, Pepsi Cola, PanAm and General Motors.
A State Department inquiry in 1992 found the MEK guilty of killing six American citizens, including three military officers and three men hired by Rockwell International, a manufacturing company that ceased its operations in 2001.
In 1991, the MEK’s armed wing hatched a plot with Iraq’s Saddam to brutally quell an uprising by Iraqi Kurds in the north and Shias in the south. In April 1992, the group launched attacks against Iranian embassies and diplomatic premises in 13 countries, including Iran’s mission to the United Nations.
Citing its campaigns of terror and killing, the US State Department under Bill Clinton’s administration blacklisted the MEK in 1997 as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO), a designation which detractors of the Iranian government claimed was aimed at appeasing the Islamic Republic and giving a boost to moderates rising to power in Tehran.
In 1986, Saddam set up an enclave for MEK militants in the Diyala Governorate, which came to be known as Camp Ashraf. It hosted nearly 3,500 MEK exiles and continued to be their major shelter until 2016, when it was shuttered by the Iraqi government no doubt under pressure from Tehran.
The Barack Obama administration made a deal with the Albanian government in 2013, under the supervision of the UNHCR, to offer the MEK members asylum. The small Balkan peninsula has been their base since 2016, from which they orchestrate their online misinformation activities.
Although it enjoys protection in Albania, some experts are concerned the group, known for its Marxist ideologies, could seek to foment sectarian divides in the host country.
Sources in Albania tell Asia Times that despite the deal reached between the Obama administration and the Albanian government, the MEK is not viewed favorably by the Albanian public.
“When MEK was officially relocated from Iraq to Albania in 2016, the Albanian public opinion and media protested their coming. However, the Americans who had convinced the Albanian government to host MEK in the country, gave total support to Edi Rama’s regime to host them in Albania,” said Olsi Jazexhi a Canadian-Albanian historian specializing in the history of Islam and nationalism in Southeastern Europe.
Jazexhi notes many of the MEK’s activities, including money laundering, radicalization and human trafficking, violate Albanian law. Yet Albania’s major political parties have thrown their weight behind MEK and its leader Maryam Rajavi to coax the US into supporting them to win parliamentary elections, a reflection of the country’s political fragility.
“The Albanian government has allowed the MEK to build a paramilitary camp in the town of Manza, in Durres. From this camp, the MEK wages war in different ways – from psychological, indoctrination, online and probably even physical against Iran.
“What the MEK does is considered a crime according to the Albanian Penal Code and if Maryam Rajavi was to be Albanian, she would have been jailed for at least 15 years,” claimed Jazexhi.
The MEK also maintains a presence in France. From 1981 to 1986, France functioned as the MEK’s European bastion, but an agreement between the Iranian government and then French President Jacques Chirac over securing the release of two French hostages in Lebanon kept captive by the Iran-allied Hezbollah, stipulated that MEK members were expelled from the European territory.
In 2003, as tensions flared up between Iran and the West over Tehran’s nuclear program, France renewed its offer to shelter MEK operatives and the group chieftain Maryam Rajavi resided there for a spell. MEK organizes annual rallies in the Paris suburb of Villepinte, which are filled by thousands of Iranian and non-Iranians.
MEK was characterized as a terrorist organization by the European Union, Canada and Japan, as well as the United States until the early 2010s. Intense lobbying by the group coupled with the Iranian government’s international isolation, convinced these countries to jettison the terrorist labeling. As a recognized “dissident” group, it has been given latitude to operate and mobilize internationally and reassert itself as a legitimate opposition party with “democratic” aspirations.
In particular, the 2012 decision by Obama’s then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to delist the MEK as a terror group brought the syndicate above ground, allowing it to court and lobby top American politicians and officials.
MEK has since launched a campaign, including through Facebook campaigns, to bury its unsavory past. The Guardian reported the group paid at least US$20,000 to Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the former chair of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, $14,000 to former House of Representatives member from California Bob Filner and “thousands of dollars” to former representatives Ted Poe, Mike Rogers and Dana Rohrabacher, who all accepted generous donations from the MEK and other Iranian-American organizations to advocate for its de-banning.
The MEK also paid at least $1.5 million to three leading Washington lobbying firms – DLA Piper, Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld and DiGenova & Toensing – and more than $150,000 in speaking fees to former Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell in its terror delisting campaign.
In recent years, MEK events have featured high-profile American, European and Canadian guests who have been paid hefty gratuities to speak in support of the group, with many waxing lyrical about Maryam Rajavi’s cult as a democratic alternative to the Islamic Republic.
Donald Trump’s national security advisor Bolton, former mayor of New York City and Trump’s attorney Rudy Giuliani, former Speaker of the House of Representatives Newt Gingrich and former Governor of Vermont Howard Dean are among the stalwart partisans of the MEK. All have heaped praise on the organization as one that can bring the Iranian people freedom and democracy.
They have, however, not gone into their MEK raptures free of charge. John Bolton, for example, is estimated to have received at least $180,000 for speaking at several MEK events through 2018. In one of the most famous ones in 2017, Bolton vowed to celebrate the “fall of the regime” along with MEK members in Tehran before 2019.
Due to the MEK’s lack of transparency and the enigmatic nature of its workings, few details have trickled out about its financial sources, but some informed observers believe Iran’s regional rivals in the Persian Gulf may be among its benefactors.
“The MEK regularly pays tens of thousands of dollars to American politicians to speak at their annual conference outside Paris. The source of these funds is opaque, posing serious questions about who is paying high-profile US politicians to speak in support of the MEK and their regime change efforts in Iran,” said Eli Clifton, an investigative journalist and research director at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft’s Democratizing Foreign Policy Program.
“However, [Saudi] Prince Turki bin Faisal Al Saud’s remarks at a MEK conference in 2016, in which he expressed his support for the group, lends credibility to the reports that Saudi Arabia may be a funding source,” he added.
Despite its insistence that it stands up for democracy, the MEK is sensitive to criticism and often harshly smears journalists and academics, particularly Iranian correspondents in the international media, who report on its conduct and policies.
Certain MEK defectors have taken the lid off the secrets of serving the organization, with reports of its rigid enforcement of celibacy and restrictions on members’ relationships with their families.
To demonstrate allegiance to the cult’s leader, MEK members are required to remain unmarried and promise that they won’t give up the practice. Forced medical sterilization for female cadres so they devote themselves to the organization unconditionally has been imposed on members living in MEK camps.
The MEK’s now at least partially shuttered social media machine is intricate and multi-layered. Using troll armies and hundreds of online hirelings across the world, it disseminates fake news, hijacks popular hashtags related to Iran on platforms such as Twitter and Facebook, and circulates narratives portraying the state of life in Iran in an unswervingly negative light.
The top results for the hashtag “#Iran” on Twitter almost universally return pages belonging to MEK members and advertising the speeches of Maryam Rajavi.
A 2019 investigation by the American non-profit media company The Intercept found that Heshmat Alavi, an “Iranian activist” who published articles on such noted American publications as Forbes, The Hill, Daily Caller as well as The Diplomat and Al-Arabiya English attacking the Iranian government and adulating the MEK as “democratic” was actually a fake persona “run by a team of people from the political wing of the MEK.”
“Western politicians or governments who agree to associate themselves with the MEK are making a mistake. Morally, it is a bad idea, since the group is basically a violent and corrupt cult. Strategically, it is also lunacy, since the group has no support inside Iran. In fact, it is widely hated,” claimed Thomas Juneau, an Iran expert and associate professor of public and international affairs at the University of Ottawa.
“It is not, in any conceivable way, an alternative to the Islamic Republic. Why do politicians do this? Money is certainly one reason. For political reasons, I assume some are also keen to be seen to be associated with opponents of a regime that definitely deserves to be opposed.”
Whether the political tide is turning against the MEK under the Biden administration is yet to be decisively seen, but Washington’s official disassociation with the group will almost certainly be on Iran’s list of JCPOA negotiation points. The Facebook ban would seem to signal at least a tentative step in that direction.
by Kourosh Ziabari
As the Vienna talks about compliance with the JCPOA continue, participating countries need, of course, to report to their domestic audience via the media what has transpired, what their negotiating position has been and what they got for their efforts.
For President Biden, of course, there is the added burden of laying out the achievements of his first 100 days – failure to re-join the JCPOA as promised being a thorny issue. Iran however has found the perfect go to distraction. Iran – which is heading for presidential elections in June – can easily boost the righteousness of Ayatollah Khamenei’s negotiating red lines by framing the American approach to the talks as grounded in bad faith and bad intent. All it took was to mention that five supporters of the MEK have been in Vienna there to protest.
Iranian papers reported that a small gathering of Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) supporters took up position outside the Grand Hotel which hosts the talks, where they cursed and swore to try to intimidate the Iran delegation. Their demand: an end to diplomacy and for the US to declare war against Iran. Iran’s interpretation to its domestic audience in the run up to the presidential election in June, is that the West is simply playing games using anti-Iranian terrorists, and that this shows that neither America nor Europe is serious about the talks or establishing normal relations with Iran.
In Iran, MEK has become shorthand for ‘the threat to national security from the west’. The negotiators do not need to defend their work. It is enough to denounce the MEK’s unchecked presence in Vienna to demonstrate that the blame lies on the west’s side. It would be foolish to underestimate just how despised the MEK are among Iranians. Every school child on a trip to their local war museum will pass through a section graphically describing the MEK’s deadly collaboration with Saddam Hussein during the eight-year war. The MEK waged a two-decade long terrorist campaign against Iranian civilians that, by its own admission, killed up to 17,000 people. Worse, the MEK continues to act as mercenaries to foreign powers which seek to damage Iranian national interests, including assassination of nuclear scientists, and generals Shirazi and Soleimani. With this history, it is unsurprising that Iran’s leaders find fertile soil to plant anti-west opinion in the population.
To be fair, Europe has tried to curtail MEK activity in recent years, finding it counter to its stated goals of diplomacy with Iran. In 2018 the MEK leader Maryam Rajavi was expelled from Europe on security grounds and set up her new headquarters in Albania. But in Albania support from within the Trump administration allowed the MEK to continue to conduct itself as it has for the past forty years – using intimidation, corruption and propaganda under the protection of the CIA to pursue its anti-Iranian agenda. Not only does this play a major factor in why Albania will not be able to join the EU, the presence of MEK supporters now in Vienna fatally undermines the EU’s position vis-à-vis Iran.
We wrote back in January and again in April that President Biden could score a quick and effective Iran policy win by dismantling the MEK in Albania where the CIA has a free hand. Among the benefits for his administration would be to help stem the flow of foreign funds and false propaganda narratives that continue to hinder and could even destroy America’s opportunity to re-join the JCPOA and position itself to influence future demands on Iran. It would also remove the MEK as a stick with which Iran can beat its opponents – as it has done in this case. Failure to grasp this simple equation is surely based in America’s blindness to its own growing weaknesses and to Iran’s growing military and diplomatic capabilities.
As an Iranian Arab, Taleb Farhan left his home town in South of Iran for the United Arab Imarets, in 1999. Soon, he could find a job as a driver because he could speak Arabic fluently. He resided in the Iranians’ dormitory where his fate was ruined by the agents of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi).
Farhan had planned to immigrate to Europe and the MEK recruiters promised him to give him a political case as a member of the group in Iraq and then he would move to Europe through Iraq. They took him to their team house in Dubai.
All day long, videos of Massoud and Maryam Rajavi’s speeches and the MEK army in Camp Ashraf, Iraq, were shown to Farhan and other Iranian youth who wished to go to Europe via Iraq.
Farhan and the others were taken to an Iraq port by ship. They were then transferred to Baghdad by a few MEK representatives. The trip ended up by reaching Camp Ashraf. A few weeks after entering the camp, Farhan found out that exit is forbidden. He asked the MEK authorities why the do not keep their promise to take him to Europe. “There is no way out,” they answered. “As you came to Iraq illegally, we will deliver you to Iraqi forces and they will imprison you in Abu Quraib for at least ten years.
Farhan was stuck in the cult-like system of the MEK. He had to attend long brainwashing and self-criticism meetings. He was victim of forced labor in response to his passiveness in the organizational regulations.
He endured oppressions until 2003 when the US invaded Iraq and eventually disarmed the MEK. He moved to the camp that the American military built for MEK defectors, called TIPF. From there, he could finally manage to return to Iran.
He lives in Abadan, Khuzestan province, now. “Damn Rajavi and the authorities of his cult who ruined the life of a large number of Iranian youth,” he says.
After the blacklisting of army commanders, Iran urges action over ‘violations’ of its citizens’ rights by EU states.
In a strongly worded letter to the Council of the European Union, Iran formally protested against the blacklisting of several individuals and entities and what it says are European double standards on human rights in Iran.
The letter was written by the High Council of Human Rights of Iran – an entity under the country’s Supreme National Security Council currently headed by judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi and comprised of several ministers – and handed to Portugal’s ambassador to Tehran Carlos Costa Neves as the country currently holds the presidency of the Council of the EU.
It comes in response to a move on April 12 by the EU to sanction eight military commanders and police chiefs, in addition to three prisons, for their role in a deadly crackdown of public protests in November 2019 that Amnesty International said led to at least 304 deaths.
The EU has now blacklisted 89 individuals and four entities as part of its decade-long human rights sanctions regime against those who it says are violating human rights in Iran.
In response, Iran’s foreign ministry said it will immediately suspend talks with the EU on human rights and all resulting cooperation, including that on “terrorism”, illicit drugs, and refugees. It also traced “political intentions” behind the move and said is considering reciprocal sanctions.
In its letter, the Iranian human rights council condemns the EU for its policies that it says are “enforcing the illegal and oppressive sanctions” unilaterally imposed by the United States after it withdrew from Iran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers in May 2018.
The sanctions, which intensified only after the COVID-19 pandemic began in early 2020, have hampered imports of food and medicine, in addition to creating money transfer issues in buying coronavirus vaccines.
The letter says a number of EU member states have imposed “intentional damage on the health and wellbeing of the Iranian people, particularly children, women, the elderly, and persons with disability”.
For instance, it lists the names of more than a dozen children who died because of a lack of access to vital medicine to treat epidermolysis bullosa (EB), a rare medical condition that results in blistering of the skin and mucous membranes.
It also describes how several European countries refused to work or deal with Iranian firms on medicine, medical equipment, and vaccines, and says several airports have failed to provide services to Iranian passenger planes because of US sanctions.
The human rights council also condemns the fact that Iranian migrants and students have faced difficulties in opening bank accounts in European countries based on their nationality, and says several Iranian citizens are held in European prisons on “arbitrary” charges and have been mistreated in prison.
Moreover, it says the EU should have unequivocally condemned the January 2020 assassination of Iran’s top general Qassem Soleimani by the United States as a “clear example of state terrorism” that Iran believes was assisted by elements within the German government.
Among other things, the council also holds that a number of European countries continue to shelter members of the Mujahedin-e Khalq, which Iran recognises as a “terrorist organisation”, and provided Saddam Hussein with chemical weapons during the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s.
‘Double standards’
The letter is aimed at holding the EU accountable for its double standards on human rights in Iran, according to the deputy for international affairs at the Iranian council.
The letter is focused on two things: the violation of Iranians’ human rights by the EU inside Iran, and in European countries, Seyyed Majid Tafreshi told Al Jazeera.
“The Europeans who have so many claims on human rights are themselves the perpetrators of many human rights violations of Iranian citizens,” he said.
Tafreshi also said it is unfair that the EU directs the majority of its attention towards “following illegal sanctions imposed by the US” while ignoring the plight of Iranians inside and outside the country.
According to Tafreshi, the human rights council expects an “actionable response” to its letter, which called on the EU to “bring the violators of the fundamental rights of the Iranian nation into trial without any politicisation”.
It would only “strengthen Iran’s position” if the EU fails to adequately respond, he said.
‘Utter lack of knowledge’
An EU source told Al Jazeera the Council of the EU has yet to receive the letter, so it cannot comment on its contents.
Peter Stano, an EU spokesperson for foreign affairs and security policy, said it would be wrong to claim the EU has supported US sanctions on Iran.
“Quite to the contrary, the EU repeatedly rejected the unilateral imposition of the US sanctions and prevented US efforts under the Trump administration to reintroduce UN sanctions on Iran,” he said.
“And it was the EU that was always looking for ways to enable food and medicine supplies to Iran, especially in the context of the coronavirus pandemic. To claim otherwise is utter lack of knowledge and ignorance.”
Stano said the new European sanctions listings are completely unrelated to continuing efforts to restore the Iran nuclear deal.
“The EU supports a balanced, comprehensive approach with Iran through dialogue, with a view to addressing all issues of concern including human rights,” he said. “We are critical when there are divergences and cooperative when there is mutual interest.”
Talks on the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in Vienna have been continuing for several weeks, with all sides saying progress is being made on lifting US sanctions and reversing Iran’s nuclear steps despite lingering challenges.
By Maziar Motamedi
Iranian Defense Minister Brigadier General Amir Hatami says the Resistance forces are winning on battlefields against the United States and the Zionist regime and have become a sizeable and influential power.
Iranian Defense Minister Brigadier General Amir Hatami made the comments today during a ceremony to commemorate the IRGC Quds Force second-in-command General Seyyed Mohammad Hejazi, who passed away last Sunday.
He hailed the important role that Martyrs Qassem Soleimani and Hejazi played in the fight the Takfiris in Iraq and Syria and said”Had it not been for the command of Martyr Haj Qassem and Martyr Hejazi in Syria and the Axis of Resistance, America with the help of its proxies the takfiri groups, would have dried up the roots of Islam and the Islamic Revolution in the region.”
He further pointed out that today martyrs like Soleimani, Hejazi, and Sayyad Shirazi, who served as the commander of the Ground Force and was assassinated by terrorist MKO in 1999, are a role model for the young generation, declaring that the IRGC and the regular Army have joined hands to continue defending the country and the Islamic Revolution against American and Zionist front.
Gen. Hatami added that the IRGC and the Army have jointly created security and deterrence for the nation, adding that the American and Israeli enemies have today been defeated by the resistance forces.
“Today, the resistance fronts consisting of Iran, Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Yemen,… against the United States and the Zionist regime are not only undefeated and passive but they are considered the victors of the battlefields and [have become] a sizeable and influential power.”