The English translation of the text of Mrs. Erisa Rahimi’s speech, to be presented at the Modena conference, which was given to the officials of La Terra dei Padri before her trip to Italy.
Good day everyone and welcome to my presentation.
First of all, let me thank you all for coming here today. I also wish to thank the organizers particularity Mr. Luciano Lago for inviting me to participate and speak about a very interesting and important topic in this conference.
Let me start by introducing myself.
My name is Erisa Idrizi. I am the president of Nejat Society in Albania. Nejat Society, with the aim of supporting the Iranians living in Albania, has been active for several years and last year I managed to officially register it along with some other humanitarian Albanians in Tirana.
I speak with pain about betraying the country, terrorism and violation of human rights, because I have seen a lot of evidence and heard a lot of suffering testimonies and felt the pain of friends, colleagues and members of the Nejat Society in Albania, which consists of the former members of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK, MKO) and their Albanian friends.
I was introduced to MEK seven years ago by my husband, Sarfaraz Rahimi, a former member of this organization who managed to rescue himself and live freely. We have a six-year-old son called Ermolindo.
Seven years ago, my husband’s words seemed unbelievable, when he told me that during 17 years he did not communicated with his family, he did not have the right to think freely, he did not have the right to leave the camp in Iraq for fun or for medication, he did not have the right to communicate with any member inside the camp, not even with his brother and his nephew, who were also part of this organization, and he did not have the right to marry and form a family.
But the thing that amazed me the most was how the leaders of this organization controlled the feelings and thoughts of the members. My husband and many other members who have been part of this organization told me that every night they had to sit and write their thoughts and the work they had done during the day and criticize themselves.
Aren’t you surprised now?
I was also surprised 7 years ago. How can a person have so much power over the others to control their thoughts to the point that forcing them to write down all their thoughts and even their dreams, and the people be punished if they thought about their family, friends or anyone and anything outside the organization?
Members would be psychologically punished in the form of being severely criticized and morally insulted in daily sessions called the “the current operation” or peer pressure.
Don’t you think that this is the most inhuman act against the members? That is, controlling their thoughts so that they deny their families and parents? Do you think this is the only criminal act of this organization? There are so many of them that I need a whole day to count them all for you.
But I only refer to some main topics about the criminal activities practiced systematically by the MEK.
The first is abusing the basic human rights of the members in a mind control destructive cult. The members have no right to leave the camp in Albania or resign, they have no right to marry and form a family or contact with the outside world particularly the family and friends. No one can have private ownership whatsoever. Members are not allowed to medication and there have been suspicious deaths inside the camp.
Members who live in a remote and isolated camp are subject to psychological thought control techniques systematically. Those who managed to escape and free themselves say that many individuals wish to free themselves but they have been frightened that they would be arrested and imprisoned by the Albanian police if they leave the camp.
Maryam Rajavi, the leader of MEK after the absence of her husband Massoud Rajavi, claims to respect the women’s rights inside the organization which is totally false. Women are subject to double abuse inside the cult. According to the Ideological Revolution masterminded by Massoud Rajavi, all female members are considered the legitimate wives of him. Some women including Batul Soltani who lives in Germany have confessed that Massoud Rajavi has sexually abused the female members systematically.
What has really shocked the world was the testimony of some former members who were child soldiers inside the organization. The documentary “the children of camp Ashraf” revealed this fact for the world. Members aged even 14 were forced to fight for Iraq against Iranian soldiers.
The discontented members have been subject to solitary confinement, torture, sham executions, and even death according to many witnesses. These types of criminal acts are still going on in the MEK camp and unfortunately the Albanian government has no control over the inside affairs of the camp.
The second is assassinations and terrorist activities inside Iran even against ordinary civilians and also inside Iraq against the Kurds in the north and Shiites in the south of the country with the cooperation of Saddam Hossein.
And the third which is also still going on now is to target the psychological security of the Iranians by forming a cyber army or troll farm in Albania. Hundreds have sat in front of keyboards and try to deceive individuals with disguised names.
This organization, which has currently located its military, security and intelligence departments in Albania, is using the Internet in my country as their main weapon to deceive the Iranian youth into sabotage activities.
How do they do it? They open different accounts with different fake names in the social media and they contact the Iranians in Iran with false identities and force them for small payments to set fire in government institutions, make explosion in parks regardless of the fact that there may be children, women, and families. Some young people have been the victims of the deception of the MEK in this respect.
Those who were arrested by the police in Iran and were imprisoned say that they (MEK) on the other side of the line were so convincing and they did not thing about the consequences of their activities.
MEK is no longer a major security issue for Iran, but rather a human rights issue for the families. Many families of the MEK members in Iran are suffering because Rajavi does not allow the members to have any sort of contact with them. They do not know anything about their loved ones trapped inside MEK for decades. They have formed the Nejat Society in Iran and trying to draw the attention of International Organizations to this human catastrophe.
I urge you to use all your capacity to demand the International and Albanian authorities to have some sort of control over the internal affairs of the camp and apply state sovereignty over that part of the territory and make sure the basic human rights are respected according to the European Convention on Human Rights.
This is all for now as there is much more to say. I would be more than happy to be able to answer your queries if there is any.
Thank you so much again and cheers