Abdulrahim Nazari was deceived by the Mujahedin Khalq (MEK) recruiters in Turkey and taken to Camp Ashraf, Iraq while he had no idea about the group.
Abdulrahim was a young Iranian Turkman that traveled to Turkey to find a job in 2002. He was married but he left his wife and children in Iran in order to make money in Turkey. “I was looking for a job in Ankara,” he recounts. “I was running out of money when I ran into an Iranian man there. He claimed that he had a god job offer for me.”
The man was called Ali Ankarai who was the MEK’s recruiter in Turkey. Most of MEK defectors name him as the person who deceived them to go to Iraq and join the MEK. He took Abdulrahim to a hotel and paid all his expenses for a few days.
“He insisted that I not leave the hotel,” Abdulrahim says. “After a few days, Ali Ankarai came to the hotel and told us about an excellent job with an excellent payment in Germany. He said that we had to stay in a three-months quarantine in Iraq and then we would be transferred to Europe. Then he began playing some films of Massoud and Maryam Rajavi for several days. I did not know who the MEK was.” The brainwashing process had been started.
Abdulrahim Nazari , MEK Ex-member
Together with six other people, Abdulrahim was taken to Camp Ashraf, Iraq. He recounts the day they entered Camp Ashraf, “When we arrived in Camp Ashraf, a number of female commanders of the MEK received us. To our surprise, they gave us some military uniforms! We asked, ‘why’. We were answered ‘you are a member of Mujahedin Khalq now’. We protested and asked to leave the group but exit was forbidden. They said ‘You know Camp Ashraf now. We cannot let you go. If you really want to go, we will submit you to Iraqi police and they will jail you as spies and eventually you will be sentenced to at least eight years of imprisonment.’ “
This was the beginning of the three-year stay for Abdulrahim Nazari in Camp Ashraf. “I cried all day long the first day I entered Camp Ashraf,” he says. “After a few days commanders started the brainwashing sessions. They held so many sessions that we were left no time to think.”
After the American invasion to Iraq in 2003, the MEK was disarmed by the US military and Camp Ashraf was guarded by them. The US army commanders set up a camp called TIPF in order to settle those who want to leave the MEK. Abdorahim Nazari could manage to leave Camp Ashraf and join TIPF. He ultimately returned to Iran and got back to his family in his home town, in 2006.
His wife who had suffered a lot in the absence of Abdurahim soon died after her husband came home. “This is the fault of the traitor leaders of the MEK that I lost my first wife,” he says. “She could not survive those huge sufferings. She has a heart stroke and passed away. I do not forgive leaders of the MEK.”
Abdulrahim was depressed after his wife’s death. It took him some time to encourage himself to keep on. He got married again. About his new life he says, “Thank God. I have a happy life now and I try to keep up our happiness. I am hopeful about my future. I am very grateful to God because he helped me leave the MEK.”
As a defector of the MEK, Abdulrahim Nazari supports the action taken by 42 defectors of the group to complain against Massoud and Maryam Rajavi and other high-ranking members of the MEK in the International Court of The Hague.