Secretary of State Mike Pompeo meets with Iranian women’s rights activist Masih Alinejad
Masoumeh (Masih) Alinejad-Ghomi, an Iranian American journalist, author and activist who currently works as a presenter at VOA Persian Service, met with Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo in the White House on February 4, 2019.
I am not sure about the significance of this meeting – there have been different and even opposite points of views expressed in the Iranian communities both inside and outside Iran.
But something I am quite sure of is that Maryam Rajavi, the so-called leader of the Iranian Resistance and self-proclaimed President of Iran in exile, has been dreaming for many years to get a visa to visit the United States. But let alone not even getting near to the White House or the Secretary of State she has had no luck whatsoever with getting her visa.
Rajavi tries to give the false impression that her so-called alternative to the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK, MKO, NCR, or the Rajavi Cult), has close ties with the US and has the support of the west, but her well paid lobbyists such as Rudi Giuliani and John Bolton did not even manage to get a visa for her to enter the States despite their extensive and expensive efforts.
I also know that for many years her well known British lawyers and parliamentary lobbyists in London didn’t succeed in getting a visa for her to visit the UK despite opening a lawsuit in the Judiciary and spend a lot of money on it.
The open meeting of Masih Alinejand and Mike Pompeo clearly proves the cold shoulder the US officials have always shown to the MEK and its leaders through the years. But why?
The answer is quite simple. For the very fact that everyone in the west and especially the United States clearly knows how this cult is hated by Iranians. Personalities such as the Secretary of State are well aware that getting near to this notorious cult will not only bring them no credit, but on the contrary would cost their own credibility.
The Trump administration might not mind using the MEK covertly for various purposes against the Islamic Republic of Iran, but surely not at the cost of losing its international reputation.
Ebrahim Khodabandeh
