Ex-members of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MEK, MKO, PMOI, Cult of Rajavi), current members of the group and their families are all victims of its cult-like and violent practices during over forty years.
42 former members of the Cult of Rajavi raised their complaint in the Iranian judicial system in March 2019. Branch 55 of the Tehran International Legal and General Court officially registered their complaint, and on March 7 and 8, 2021, court hearings were held. The primary verdict of the Court was issued on March 16, 2021. The Iranian judiciary, in accordance with civil procedures, sent notices to the governments of France and Albania to notify the defendants, who are residents there, of the verdict.
A petition was consequently filed on Change.org in support of the complaint of these 42 Former members against the leaders of the MEK. “These people were enslaved and contained in the closed and remote Camp Ashraf in Iraq, isolated from the outside world, and subjected to the conditions of severe cultic abuse,” the petition read. The petition has so far reached near five thousand signatures.
Following the final verdict of the Iranian judiciary and the accompanying media coverage of the case at domestic and international levels, the number of plaintiffs has been on the rise. They seek to file a complaint with international judicial bodies against the MEK leaders.
The file was finally referred to The International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, under the Iranian judicial law and international justice, in the early days of July 2021.
Former members of the MEK and families of current members –who are taken as hostages in the group– welcome the new action taken to bring Massoud and Maryam Rajavi to justice. They are hopeful that the International Criminal Court in The Hague prosecute the MEK leaders who continue to practice cultic abuse and violate the most basic rights of their members while asking compensation for some of the damage caused by years of modern slavery inside the group.
Soraya Abdollahi
A number of ex-members of the group including some of the petitioners of the complaint has sent messages to express their happiness and their desire for a fair trial for the MEK leaders.
The release of brainwashed radicalized members of the Cult of Rajavi will naturally be the secondary consequence of a fair trial of MEK leaders. “The news of the court is a light of hope in the heart of mine and the hearts of other families of MEK members,” said Soraya Abdollahi, a mother whose son, Amir Aslan Hassanzadeh has been captive behind the bars of the MEK for two decades.