the MKO in the editorial of its publication Mojahed issue 902, threatened the separated members with physical retribution. It is typical of the MKO to threaten its dissidents and ex-members to physical harassment and even liquidation. Massoud Rajavi, the MKO’s guru and leader who lives in hiding, has repeatedly and unequivocally warned dissidents of a violent backlash.
As you may well be aware, over 3,000 individuals reside in Camp Ashraf. They are completely isolated inside the camp and have no contact with the outside world. ..they are subjected to the continuous psychological manipulation and mind control techniques which are practiced in all similar cults…like many other cults round the world, cult members must not associate with members of their family. The MKO clearly states within the organization that the family is the ‘nest of corruption’ and all members should consider their relatives as their prime enemies
Like Batul Soltani and thousands of others, Arash Sametipour could’ve been trapped in Camp Ashraf all these years. He joined the MEK in the 1990s, and in 2001 he was sent from Iraq into Iran to assassinate an Iranian general. The plot failed, he lost his right hand in a grenade explosion and was imprisoned in Iran.
Immediately after I stepped in Ashraf, I figured out that I have nothing in common with MKO’s ideology and functions. Every thing was contradictory to what I saw on MKO’s satellite TV but I was afraid of expressing my idea because they would cause too much pressure on me in their so called current operations (self-criticizing meetings).
there are two Iranian dissident groups in Iraq: Mujahedin-e-Khalq and the Kurds of Iraqi Kurdistan. Do the Americans have any links with these two?
Reported by BBC originally in Persian, a group of Mojahedin-e Khalq’s detached members arrived in France. It is the first of a number of groups that managed to leave Iraq for a Western country. In the past months, groups of separated members have struggled to get to Western countries through neighboring countries
At a press conference in Paris on April 5, 2008, the first series of survivors of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organisation, aka the Rajavi cult or Saddam’s private army, announced their escape from Camp Ashraf in Iraq and their arrival in Europe. The Mojahedin, which is proscribed as a foreign terrorist entity in the US, UK, EU and Canada, was bombarded and disarmed by the US army
I was acquainted with the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organisation (MKO) in the university. They spoke about freedom and justice and also Islam and recruited me into their organisation. The same year, that is December 1987, I was sent to Iraq for a short visit and I returned back to Turkey. The following year I was asked to go to Turkey for a short visit again and I accepted. But this time my passport was taken away from me and they did not let me go back to Turkey.
… The American officer in charge recorded my particulars and after full investigation and taking orders from his superiors realised that they have been deceived by the MKO persons and I have been subject to a conspiracy where the Iraqi police was made to get involved. He asked the Iraqi police personnel to release me and after I finished my job to escort me back to my taxi that was still waiting for me, and do not let the MKO people bother me anymore or harm me. Meanwhile the American colonel talked to me on the line and assured me that there would be no problem for me and he expressed his wishes that I would make a safe return back to Baghdad …
Hoshiar Esmail says the biggest mistake of his life was to leave his safe exile in Switzerland and to return to the Mojahedin-e Khalgh (Volksmujahedin). In 1998, he went to Iraq, where the armed Iranian opposition group, equipped with weapons and money from the former Iraqi regime, led the struggle against the mullahs’ regime. But since then the political situation in Iraq has changed fundamentally. The Shiite and Kurdish-dominated government is pursuing a course of rapprochement with the former enemy Iran, which culminated in the recent visit of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.