In March 2005, the Human Rights Watch published the investigative report on the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK/ MKO), titled “No exit: human rights abuses inside the MKO camps”. No exit was the title of the report, but the content revealed a very small part of the human rights violations that take place inside the MEK on a daily basis.
The “no exit policy” was started by the group’s disappeared leader, Massoud Rajavi in 1994. Iraj Salehi, former member of the MEK explains Rajavi’s no exit policy to keep members in his cult of personality for a lifetime. The policy is still implemented in the Cult of Rajavi.
“Divorce Revolution” had been set off by Massoud Rajavi a few years earlier, after he forced members to divorce their spouses. He had appointed his third wife, Maryam Rajavi as the “president elect” and formed his cult hierarchy to maintain control over members. However, in 1994 he completely closed the exit doors of the group.
Iraj Salehi writes:
In the middle of 1994, Massoud Rajavi removed all the curtains and revealed his true face to the members. On that day, the commanders gathered the lower ranks and read Rajavi’s new organizational order to them. In this order, Rajavi had said, “from now on, no one can send him a request for departure and he or she must give it to his direct commander”. In fact, with this trick, Rajavi wanted to stop members from asking for separation, because he knew that with the atmosphere he had created, there would be a few people who dare to be accused of being traitors among their peers.
Over time, this decree went to the point where no one could write a request to leave the group. Actually, it was forbidden to leave the organization. Thus, this order is known as the “no exit” order among MEK members. When I joined the MEK, we were told that the entry door of the organization does not open easily, but the exit door is always open. But what was implemented in practice was that from 1994 the exit doors of the organization were completely closed and after that all of the people in the MEK camps were under invisible or visible control. They were kept in the cult by pressure, force and tricks. As time went on, the internal relations of the MEK became more and more bounded and the pressure on the members increased.
The communication between the members and their families was also cut off, we did not have a phone to call our families. Only in special circumstances, certain people were allowed to make phone calls, which was for work or to advertise on behalf of the cult. If the person who was in the cult had relatives in Europe or America, and if the relatives went to the MEK’s centers in those countries ask for contacting their child in the group’s camp, they would be allowed to make a phone call. This was the case for families who were sure of their children’s presence in the MEK’s camp in Iraq, and the officials of the group knew that they were aware of this matter, otherwise, the families of the members would refer to the offices of the MEK in Europe and America but they officials would tell them that they do not know such a person and have no information about him or her.
Inside the Cult of Rajavi, when someone was allowed to make a phone call, they would take him to a place that was not public and was frequented by certain people, and the rest were not aware of the existence of the phone in that place. When calling, at least one person must be present next to the person calling. The members did not have the right to dial, they had to give the number to the woman who was sitting next to the phone, she dialed the number. The person who went to that place to call his or her family had to talk to the family in presence of the woman and the other superior member. And there was no such thing as privacy.
As the conditions were getting worse day by day, and after that, the MEK members faced the following consequences in their daily life:
– Imprisonment and torture of hundreds of members, which led to the murder of several of them in prison
– Compulsory writing of daily self-criticism reports
– Establishing restrictions and prohibitions that were increased gradually.
– Launching various meetings for the purpose of inquisition and control of members on a daily, weekly and rotating basis
– The complete disconnection of the members of the group with the outside world through ban of phone calls, lack of access to means of communication, lack of permission to travel outside, etc.
– Increasing the pressure on members to control them more by adding fences and physical restrictions
– Forbidding communication and friendship between members inside the group by enforcing the law “forbidden meeting – meeting is a branch of the IRGC”
– Neglecting and ignoring the diseases of the members and forcing the sick members to do daily labor and participate in the brainwashing meetings
– Continuous forced labor by members
– Filling the members’ daily scheduel so that they don’t have time to think
– Enraged the members and created enmity between them by forcing them to spy, write reports and take positions against each other.
– Complete gender segregation to the extent that women and men were not allowed to use gas stations at the same time.
– Attempting to escape and commit suicide by members to get rid of continuous pressure
– The Increase in suspicious and sudden deaths
– The dominance of fights and debates in the relations of the MEK instead of friendship and brotherhood
– Appreciation of flattery; flattery for the Rajavis and female commanders
– Suppression of those who criticize
– There is a lot of difference and discrimination between the conditions and facilities that Rajavi and some female commanders enjoyed with the rest of the forces.
– Sustained stress and worry in mind of members in fear of being subjected to organizational attacks (the person whose turn was to read the self-criticism report in the meeting or the person about whom the meeting was held was called a subject)
– The prevalence of bad mouthing and obscenity and even physical assualts in meetings and in some cases spitting in face of the one was the subject of the meeting.
– Taking everything from members and turning them into robots
– Since then, Rajavi forced members to write and sign letters of commitment two or more times a year.
Prefaced and Translated Mazda Parsi