Mustafa Mohammadi and Mahbube Mohammadi are in Albania. They demand that the Albanian government allow them to meet their daughter, Somaye Mohammadi, who has been kidnapped by the terrorist organization of the Mujahideen of Iran since she was 15 years old. The Iranian Mujahideen, who are sheltered in Albania by the Albanian government and the Americans, refuse to allow Mustafa and Mahbube to meet their daughter. They have taken Somaye since she was 15, and she did high school at the Toronto Collegiate Institute. Once radicalized, the jihadists left school, without marrying, without family, and held them as suicide bombers in their base in Albania. They do not let Somaye to meet with her parents….
Manipulation Techniques of the MEK cult leaders
The saga continues of an Iranian couple who want to meet their daughter who is a member of the Mojahedin (MEK) who are housed in Albania
Editorial
TIRANA – The saga continues of the Iranian couple seeking to meet their daughter who is a member of the Mojahedin (MEK) who are housed in Albania. A few days ago, Somayeh accused her father of being an Iranian agent, and through a letter asked Minister Xhafaj to expel him from Albania as he posed a danger.
Mostafa Mohammadi, the father of the Iranian, says his daughter is being held against her will inside the Mojahedin camp in Manez, and he has lodged a complaint with the police in the city. A TV report today provided the full denunciation by the 62-year-old who says that his daughter was held in Iraq by force in the MEK organization.
Mohammadi also reveals that MEK has also held his son at Camp Ashraf in Iraq, where members of the Iranian opposition against the Iranian regime were housed. Faced with the situation where the daughter accuses her father of being an Iranian agent, today her mother, Mahboubeh (Robabe) Hamza, has written a letter asking her to agree to meet with her mother rather than her father that she accuses.
Part of Somayeh’s mother’s letter:
O you crazy radicals! You MEK have imprisoned my daughter, radicalized her and pushed her toward violent extremism, made her deny her parents, because it is not logical that a normal person who has not seen their parents for 20 years would not want to at least meet with them, telling themselves that ‘I do not want to get out of this notorious camp, I do not want to live freely in Canada, but I want to do jihad against Iran for Maryam Rajavi’…
You MEK took my boy when he was 15 and I saved him when he was 20 years old. You made my son mad and for two years he was treated by a psychiatrist in Canada because you had made him crazy and you terrorized him…
However, now I publicly invite you to meet me. If you really believe that your father is an Iranian agent – even though you’ve been isolated for 20 years and don’t know where your father has been and what your father has been doing in these 20 years – can’t we meet together?…
Let’s have dinner together so I can see you with my own eyes and kiss you, then let the MEK die from that. If you can’t leave the camp, there is still a chance! Get a phone and dial the number 112 and call the police to come and save you! Come and meet me daughter. For the sake of your mother… Be brave and come out of the MEK camp. There are no Iranian agents in Tirana who want to kill you. The Albanians are good people. They stop me daily in the street and tell us they are sorry for us and how they want you to be free. Prophet Mohammad says that Paradise is under the feet of the mother. Will you leave the MEK’s devils to meet me?
The full letter of the mother of Somayeh to MEK and her daughter
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MEK Organization!
I, Mahboubeh (Robabe) Hamza, mother of Somayeh, am writing this letter. I am publishing this letter publicly to ask you to let my daughter go free. You know that we are in Albania and not in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq! Albania is a free European country, where issues are settled by law, not bullets, violence and war like in Saddam’s Iraq! Here you all have taken refuge on humanitarian grounds and are asylum seekers, you are not a paramilitary organization to treat your members as soldiers!
Please, stop!
Stop, writing letters in our daughter’s name!
Enough! Your constant accusation that we are Iranian agents, conspirators, and so on, is unjust since we have no such purpose, except to unite the family unfairly broken by you in 1997!
Enough that you use your agents to access any state office in Albania to prevent me, Somayeh’s mother, from meeting my daughter!
Your agents and subordinates attack us in every corner of Tirana with terror charges and physical attacks only because I want to see my daughter. You are burning because of that!
What did you do to my daughter you crazy radicals?
Why are you threatening my daughter you will kill her parents? Witnesses from your Manza camp, people who have abandoned your jihad and live in Tirana, tell us that you are mistreating my daughter. You are pressurising her to accuse us, her family, as agents. I met my daughter in Iraq in 2004 when the US Marines gave me permission to do so, and she was desperate and wanted to flee from that damned war and from the military organization that mistreated and continues to mistreat its members in front of her eyes all over the world. She was trembling with fear and I her mother embraced her constantly to calm her down. My daughter wrote more letters to me through the US Marines asking for help from your organization that only wants fighting, jihad and blood.
O you crazy radicals! You MEK have imprisoned my daughter, radicalized her and pushed her toward violent extremism, made her deny her parents, because it is not logical that a normal person who has not seen their parents for 20 years would not want to at least meet with them, telling themselves that ‘I do not want to get out of this notorious camp, I do not want to live freely in Canada, but I want to do jihad against Iran for Maryam Rajavi’.
Why do you isolate my daughter so that no one can meet her, neither we as her parents, nor our lawyers, journalists, or the Albanian public who are interested in knowing what kind of criminals you are for destroying a family, who keep our daughter hostage and want to make her a suicide bomber in Iran or Iraq? Frankly, why did you radicalize my daughter – at least in the letters you write – talking only about agents, fighters, killers, Iran, mullahs etc? Are you so crazy? Did Massoud Rajavi’s command not to marry, not to know love, become so bad that you dream only of war and blood?
You took my boy when he was 15 and I saved him when he was 20 years old. You made my son mad and for two years he was treated by a psychiatrist in Canada because you had made him crazy and you terrorized him. Now he has a family, has an education, has a profession in Canada. Yes, and now my daughter. Why can’t she come to Canada to be with her family? Why do you radicalize my daughter and keep her hostage in your camp while your leader Maryam Rajavi and her family live as royalty in Paris? Why can’t I have my daughter free in Toronto like Maryam Rajavi in Paris? Why do Maryam Rajavi and her family live in luxury, while my daughter lives in the prison camp in Manez, in Durrës? If my daughter really wants to do jihad against Iran, why not allow her at least to live freely in Tirana? How much anger do you have?
Who are you to deprive our daughter of this right? Why do you destroy our family and why do you not let our daughter have a family and a normal life like everyone else? Here we are in Albania and not in Iraq. Why are you pushing my daughter to carry out political and terrorist activities against a foreign state? My daughter is not related to Iran! Her homeland is Canada. Why do you not allow her to pursue the Canadian dream but want to lead her as a jihadist to make war on Iran? Why doesn’t Maryam Rajavi go to Jihad in Iran, but she will send my daughter?
We and the rest of her family left Iran for political asylum and we have a very good life in Canada. We do not care about what’s going on with politics anywhere. Every effort we have made to save our daughter is our legitimate right. You, MEK, unjustly denied us the right to parent her when my daughter was 17 years old. You have left my daughter without an education, without a Canadian passport, without a family, no children, no grandchildren, no life with all her friends. You do not let my daughter marry, have a friend or a life like all women, dress in beautiful clothes like her friends, but keep her dressed in military uniform all day long. Keep her isolated in your infamous prison in Manzas.
You have left my daughter without access to the internet, without TV, without education and without reading because you are all in a prison in a free country like Albania. Don’t you feel bad about what you do to our daughter, that you kidnapped our child? Do you realize that Allah will condemn this for ever and a day, even if your masters protect you from the law? Let other families understand what life is like when you have the slogan: “Families are agents of the Iranian regime,” which you say in the group a few times a day as a form of obedience to your organization.
From her friends who have left your group, I learned today how you threaten my daughter if she doesn’t do what you ask for. You do not let her leave the camp, make a free life, but keep her there as a prisoner inside walls guarded by armed guards in the middle of a European country. Why do you do this? Why do not you let her out of the camp? Why can’t I, her mother, meet my daughter oh criminals and murderers? Why do you put politics in between us when parenting is the legitimate right of anyone and nobody can deny it to anyone?
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Somayeh! My daughter! The light of my eyes! Owner of my life!
Now I’m writing to you, since I have no other way to communicate with you, although I know that MEK may not even tell you about this letter. But I’m making it public and bringing it to the media so that maybe someone finds it and passes it on to you!
My heart Somayeh,
I am your mother Mahboubeh Robabe Hamza and I want to meet with you. I am the woman who fed you at my breast, I held you in the crook of my arm. You are my flesh and blood.
I have come to Albania. I’m in Tirana, a few miles from you and I want to see you. I want to kiss you. To hold you. I want to have you near. I love you more than my life. I want you to be happy, to be good, to enjoy life, to be with your family, sisters and brothers, to share with the moments of our lives. We have never quit asking for you and are never going to stop, not without seeing you. I’m getting old, I am getting tired, but life is not worth living without seeing you.
I know the letters you wrote against your dad were not written by you, but your jihadist commanders frightened you with threats of “agents”, “the Ministry of Intelligence”, “the Iranian regime”, “mullahs”, and so on. I know, my daughter, that you’re scared and that you do not understand what’s going on because you have not seen daylight with your own eyes outside the MEK military camp for 20 years. I know that the jihadist commanders every day punish you with their fairy tales.
However, now I publicly invite you to meet me.
If you really believe that your father is an Iranian agent – even though you’ve been isolated for 20 years and don’t know where your father has been and what your father has been doing in these 20 years – can’t we meet together?
I am not an Iranian agent and I do not even know about politics. What do you say? Let’s leave your dad on the sidelines, and Iran and Maryam Rajavi and fighting and the whole world, and just meet as mother and daughter? What do you say?
You are well aware how as your mother, who raised you with sacrifices, it plagued my heart when I saw you trembling with fear in Iraq, how I feared that your organization would kill you because you met with us, your parents.
I do not believe the accusations against your father are in your name. I do not believe you are the one who writes them, but those pseudo-letters scary charges are made against your father. The group that prevents us from meeting you attacked your father two days ago. Did they tell you? The Mojahedin beat him!
After the attack, in the middle of the day, in the middle of Tirana, your father and I ended up in the hospital and then in the police station. While we were in the police station [giving evidential statements of complaint], the Mojahedin, under the orders of Commander Behzad Saffari, attacked police station number 4 and called us terrorists and demanded the police imprison us. Do you know about this?
And the day after the attack they sent a second letter to the media in your name.
My daughter, let’s assume you do not love your dad since he’s a bastard, an agent, a murderer, etc. the slanders that staged letter. However, let’s not disown him! (Inshallah MEK does not kill us!)
Yes, your mother, will you not meet with her? I came from Canada for you and left off earning money to see you. Well, from Canada, Morteza and Mohammed ask night and day about you. I miss and love you and want to play with you as we did when you were young. Your friends from the Etobicoke Collegiate Institute are also wondering about you and wanting to meet you. What do you say, will you leave the MEK to meet me and speak on the phone with your brothers in Canada?
Please, if you are the one who wrote those letters and if the MEK would allow you to leave the camp freely, without the supervision of that dreadful commander Behzad Saffari, come and meet me. I live near the parliament in Tirana. The Albanian police will protect us! There will be no Iranian agents to kill you because there are no killers in the country because Albanian police guard us because there is peace and security here!
Let’s have dinner together so I can see you with my own eyes and kiss you, then let the MEK die from that. If they do not allow you out of the camp, there is another opportunity! Get a phone and dial the number 112 and call the police to come and save you!
Come and meet me daughter. For the sake of your mother, be brave and come out of the MEK camp. There are no Iranian agents in Tirana who want to kill you. The Albanians are good people. They stop me daily in the street and tell us they are sorry for us and how they want you to be free.
Prophet Mohammad says that Paradise is under the feet of the mother. Will you leave the MEK’s devils to meet me?
May Allah Keep you Daughter!
Your mother in flesh and blood,
Mahboubeh (Robabe) Hamza
Shqiptarja, Tirana, Albania, Translated by Iran Interlink
The news of the arrest of a Turkish sex cult leader “who preached sermons while surrounded by glamorous women who he dubbed his ‘kittens’” was published in the mainstream media. The news rings the bells for families in the societies all over the world. This warns that the threat of abusive cults is always around.
Photos and films of Adnan Oktar illustrated the reports of his arrest. He is often shown in luxurious places surrounded by “scantily-clad and heavily made-up women — who appeared to have had plastic surgery” dancing around him as if they are mesmerized by him.
The news seems to be a special warning for those who are aware of the sexual abuses that have been committed in the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO, MEK, the PMOI, the Cult of Rajavi). Actually, these people are terribly concerned about the victims of the Cult of Rajavi because the cult’s destructive practices and sexual assaults of its leader Massoud Rajavi are not widely known to the world; the group has covered its true face under the mask of a democratic feminist political group.
Adnan Oktar, a bizarre and controversial Islamic televangelist figure, was detained in his villa in Istanbul’s upmarket Cengelkoy district by local police on Wednesday, the Daily Mail reported.
Police said accusations against Oktar include forming a gang with criminal intent, sexual abuse of minors, sexual assault, kidnapping, blackmail, fraud, money laundering and exploitation of religious sentiments, according to the report.
The accusations that Adnan Oktar is charged with, are very similar to those of other leaders of destructive cults and particularly to those of Massoud Rajavi –the disappeared leader of the MKO. However, Rajavi has never been sued for the crimes he committed against his followers inside the MKO.
In fact, the only time that an MKO leader was arrested was in June 17th, 2003 that Maryam Rajavi, the third wife of Massoud Rajavi was arrested by the French Police in her headquarters in Paris for money laundering and terrorism charges. The police raid was responded by a dozen of followers of the group who set themselves on fire to protest the arrest of their leader’s wife. Massoud Rajavi has been disappeared since then.
Dead or alive, Masssoud Rajavi is denounced by a large number of dissociated members of his cult of personality. Violations of human rights committed in the MKO include a wide range from sexual harassment to torture and death against both men and women and both adults and children. The Human Rights Watch report titled “No Exit” that was published in in 2005 documented a lot of cases of human rights abuses in the Cult of Rajavi. However, one of the most horrific revelations about Massoud Rajavi was later made by Batul Soltani a former member of the MKO’s so-called elite called “Leadership Council”. She bravely revealed horrifying facts about sexual abuse by Massoud Rajavi although she said that recalling those memoires is “awfully difficult” for her.
Soltani exposed a cultic ceremony in the MKO, called “Salvation Dance” (nude dancing) in which women of the “Leadership Council” were made remove their clothes in front of Massoud Rajavi and dance before him. ”Get close to Massoud and unite with him”, Maryam said to the dancing women.
Soltani added, “They had portrayed the issue of having [sexual] relations with Massoud Rajavi in such a way that it appeared to us as the most sacred task. Mas’ud Rajavi also used verses from the Qur`an to justify his behavior”.
Soltani together with two other former members, Zahra Mirbaqeri and Nasrin Ebrahimi once again denounced the MKO by presenting a list of 100 female members of the group who have gone under hysterectomy to be sexually abused by the Cult leader, Massoud Rajavi, to the European Parliament
Nasrin Ebrahimi had previously revealed that Rajavi had entitled the operation to remove women’s womb as “Summit” referring to women’s extreme devotion to their leader. They lose their final sign of sexuality and motherhood, or as Mrs. Singleton says” to neutralize their sexuality”.
Mir Baqeri said that the surgical operations were carriedout to take out the victims’ wombs so that they would not be pregnant afterbeing raped by Rajavi.
Women of the Leadership Council were given a necklace on which Massoud’s portrait was graved earlier than they were made married with him. Zahra Mir Baqeri has one of the necklaces to show those who are concerned.
“Maryam Rajavi invented rituals such as being washed by other women members so as to ‘spiritually purify’ them, followed by the instruction to dance naked before both the Rajavis to prove they had ‘broken the physical and mental barriers’ to their total submission to Massoud,” The British defector of the Cult of Rajavi Ann Singlton writes. “After these coercive practices, he would choose a bedmate for sex. The women have said that they did not agree to sex with Rajavi out of free will but because they had been coerced through deception into submitting to what they later came to recognize as rape.”
Soltani`s testimonies were then confirmed by male defectors too. Ghorban Ali Hossein nezhad, former Rajavi’s personal interpreter writes in his Facebook account, “They told me personally that I should erase my martyred wife from my mind and I should imagine her sleeping with Brother Massoud.”
He recalls the exact words of Mehdi Abrishamchi, MaryamRajavi’s ex-husband as telling the male members of the cult,”Your wives should follow Sister Mayam. I mean as I divorced Sister Mayam so that she could marry Brother Massoud , your wives divorced from you and married Brother massoud.”
Hosseinnezhad even recalls one of the women of the Elite Council who was his Arabic language student once told him, “Rajavi has group sex with us – members of his personal office”. Hossein nezhad asserts that the woman left the group and went to Europe, in 2007.
Compared with Massoud Rajavi What is salient about Adnan Oktar is that at least he seems to be honest in his bizarre mix of Islam and modern secularity. According to The Times, Oktar runs his own television channel, A9, on which he would “broadcast bizarre sermons from his compound on an Istanbul hilltop” that were “light on Islam but heavy on erotica”.
“Many Turks have long considered him a laughing stock,” The Times adds, and he has repeatedly been denounced by Turkey’s religious authorities. Ali Erbas, head of the country’s Diyanet religious affairs agency, said earlier this year that Oktar had “likely lost his mental balance”.
Massoud Rajavi, along with his co leader Maryam can be considered as ridiculous or mentally sick as Adnan Oktar if not more but for sure t they are more fraudulent and perhaps smarter than Adnan because they have kept all of their clandestine crimes within a very isolated cult-like establishment called Mujahedin Khalq Organization and National Council of Resistance (NCR).
Massoud and MaryamRajavi should be brought to justice just for very similar reasons even if the cult leaders deny this horrific practices. In fact, the female members of the Cult of Rajavi look pale, old, exhausted and barren with no plastic surgeries and cosmetics but they are victims of a sexist modern slavery.
Mazda Parsi
When in May2005, the Human Rights Watch published the NO Exit report on the human rights abuses committed by the Mojahedin Khalq Organization (MKO/MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi), the group’s propaganda made efforts to deny the facts that were testified based on numerous testimonies by former members of the group. The HRW responded to the allegations of the group’s propaganda and its paid supporters in a detailed report in February 2006.
The report revealed cases of human rights abuses inside the MKO’s military camps in Iraq from 1991 to February 2003, prior to the fall of their former landlord Saddam Hussein .One of the most horrific cases of imprisonment and torture in Camp Ashraf was Parviz Ahmadi who died due to severe beating and torture.
The death of Parviz is meticulously explained in the newly published book by Mohsen Zaal, titled “the Organization of Massoud” based on the testimonies of former members of the MKO:
“In another case, Parviz Ahmadi is picked up by Asadullah Mosana’s Jeep after he comes back from a dentist’s office in Baghdad. Under the pretext that the female commander Batul Rajaiee has summoned him, he is taken to prison. He is interrogated at the very night and is thrown in the cell after a few hours with torn clothes, swollen face and beaten body. He is being severely tortured even in the corridor to the cell where some of the men who are under his command are imprisoned too.
“He is faced with people who were once under his command and now he is beaten and accused of spying before their eyes. This is a disaster for him; he cries all night long. In the morning, one of the men of his unit tries to sympathize with him offer sympathy to him. This is a very unique rare moment in the organization. Two comrades get close to each other and make a personal and humane relationship rather than organizational relations which is dominated by cold regulations and duties.[…]
“Parviz accepts the cigarettes his cellmates offers him although he is not a smoker. Speaking sadly he tells them that he is accused of being the agent of the Iranian Intelligence Ministry to assassinate the Ideological leader [Massoud Rajavi]. However, some of the prisoners guess that this is a test to select operatives for the next cross border operation teams. Some others think that this is an ideological test to evaluate member’s loyalty to the organization and the leader.
“The next day Parvis is taken by Mokhtar and Nariman for interrogation an hour before Iftar [the meal after sunset in Ramadan fast] and is thrown back to the cell hours after midnight at Sahar [the meal before sunrise in Ramadan]. His catastrophic condition shocks his cellmates. He is just identifiable by his clothes. His face is awfully swollen and bruised, his nose and ears are broken and bloody. He cannot breathe by his nose. He cannot open his swollen injured eyes. Fingers are broken, hands are bruised up to elbows. His pants are torn. Legs are wounded and completely bruised. The cellmates try to help him to breathe better. They ask Mokhtar to give them some warm water but he refuses saying that “this mercenary is showing off. He is OK”. Then he closes the window of the cell and leaves. Parviz gets a seizure and passes away in the arms of one of his comrades before the tearing eyes of his cellmates. They call to Mokhtar. He takes Parviz’s dead body to the corridor indifferently. After a while Mokhtar gets back and tells Parviz’s cellmates,” Save Parviz’ meal. He will get back”. But Parviz never gets back to the cell and is not seen in the group anymore. (Jamali/ 6)
“After the death of Parviz, Massoud Rajavi brings up his case in a meeting. Admiring him, Massoud calls Parviz a martyr. He claims that Parviz has been killed in a clash with Iranian forces in Kermanshah. He even gives some details on the location and the way he was killed. (Mesdaghi/ 92/136)”
According to the writer of “the Organization of Massoud”, imprisonment and eventually torture and assassination of the rank and file increased after the dissension was on the rise in the group. During the 1990s a large number of members had started challenging the group’s attitudes. So a large number of members were arrested by the authorities of the group under the charge of being the agents of the Iranian government. The estimated number of detainees mounts from 250 to 800 people. The number is not clear because imprisonments were secret until the fall of Saddam Hussein.
That situation is very similar to the conditions ruling inside the group in Albania now. There are a large number of dissident members who seek to leave the group but they are intimidated by the group leaders who use any tools to keep members in the Cult of Rajavi.
The Albanian government and the UNHCR authorities should be watchful about what is going on inside the MKO. Human rights violations are committed in the destructive cults on the daily basis. The MKO is actually proved to be a destructive cult and documented facts about various cases of human rights abuses including the HRW report are quiet accessible to everyone.
By Mazda Parsi
Abdolkarim Karimi was a soldier fighting in Iran-Iraq war in 1988; his military service was supposed to finish in a few weeks when he was taken as a prisoner of war by the Iraqi army. His family was not aware of his whereabouts for a long period of time. Then they got to know that Rajavi has used him as bargaining chip in his treasonous deals with Saddam Hossein.
This time, their beloved son was sentenced to a long-life imprisonment in the Cult of Rajavi (the MKO/MEK/Mujahedin Khalq). He is still taken as a hostage in the group.
Mahmoud is Abdolkarim’s brother undergoing the long-time separation. “As an Iranian from Kurdish region, my brother has nothing in common with the Cult of Rajavi and its ideology,” he says. “My brother does not choose to live in the MKO by his own free will. He is just a prisoner and a hostage.”
Mahmoud feels pity for their father who died before he could visit her son Abdolkarim. Their elderly mother also suffers grieves awaiting to see his beloved son once more. In his visit to Nejat Society office in Kermanshah he asked his brother to contact their heartbroken mother and talk to her before it is too late.
When Saddam Hussein invaded his small, oil-rich neighbor in the summer of 1990, the Country Department faced its first full-scale post-Cold War international crisis. Bush’s foreign policy team forged an unprecedented international coalition consisting of the NATO allies and the Middle Eastern countries including of Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Egypt to oppose Iraqi aggression. The US-led coalition’s effective air campaign in January 1991, which was followed by “Operation Desert Storm,” a 100-hour land war, expelled Iraqi forces from Kuwait. However, this short-term operation offered Massoud Rajavi the opportunity to run his cult-like regulations over the members of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO, MEK, PMOI, the Cult of Rajavi).
At the time, the MKO forces were located in Camp Ashraf, 62 kilometers from Baghdad. Members of the group and their families including children used to live in the camp too. Children got involved in the cult of Rajavi because their parents belonged to the cult. Defectors of the MKO such as Nadereh Afshari and Hadi Shams Haeri described the horrible situation of the children who were kept in the Cult of Rajavi, in isolated separated units located far from their parents, under a very abusive control that made them undergo severe sufferings. Ali Akbar Rastgou, former member of the MKO describes the conditions of Camp Ashraf after the US-led invasion of to Iraq in his book in Persian about the history of the group that was published in Germany.
According to Rastgou, Camp Ashraf was not targeted by the coalition forces while Baghdad was bombarded all the time. However, Massoud Rajavi had ordered to permanently relocate children in the bases of the group and hotels in Baghdad in order to allegedly move them out of Iraq. Baghdad was bombarded several times of the day. Practically, the children were in more danger than the time they were at Camp Ashraf.
Purposely orphaned children of the MKO
In February 1991, finally, about 900 children from 2-months-old to 18-year-old were smuggled to Jordan with fake IDs. They were then sent to European countries including Germany, Netherlands and Sweden where they were made adopted by European families and Iranian families who were sympathizers of the MKO.
In fact, absence of emotional balances makes cult children more vulnerable than children within the larger society that enjoy normal family relationships. The stories of the bitter fate of a number of these intentionally orphaned children are accessible in the worldwide media.
Now that kids were wiped off Camp Ashraf, Rajavi was prepared to launch the next phase in the process of turning his group in to a destructive cult. The next step was “forced divorce”. The parents whose children were detached from them had to detach from their last family link, their spouse. Eventually, almost all married members of the MKO divorced their spouses in order to give their exclusive love to their cult leader, Massoud Rajavi.
By Mazda Parsi
In Tirana, the capital of Albania, an interesting workshop called “Conflicts in the Middle East – Radical Groups and Ideologies” was held at the end of November.
The conference was organized by the Free Media Institute in Tirana, because the country has increasingly become the new focus for violent extremism and terrorism experts in recent months, primarily in security circles, which see it as a “gathering center” for extremists who are either returning or sent to the Balkans from armed conflicts in the Middle East.
It is known that Edi Rama’s government has long been working in direct cooperation with the US military and security structures – working on the establishment of specialized “deradicalization centers” in Albania, about which Sputnik has written on several occasions in the last three years.
It appears that Rama’s “hard work” paid off. An article published in the Huffington Post in early December, says that there are already about three thousand members of MEK, Iranian Mojahedin (the Rajavi cult), who are violent opponents of Iran.
They were transferred to Albania from Iraq by the end of 2016, with a cash injection by the US authorities to the Rama government, and, according to the Huffington Post, under the cover of “humanitarian intervention”, ie, with the supervision of the UNHCR. The payment, according to the US outlet, was at least twenty million dollars.
Well-informed circles in Albania claim that there are already strong indications that the next group, which will also be moved to the country for “humanitarian reasons”, will be the families – widows and children – of DAESH fighters who have either left Iraq and Syria, or have been killed in fighting over the past few years.
Sputnik’s interviewee, British Anne Khodabandeh, is an expert in anti-terrorist activities and a long-standing activist in the field of deradicalization of extremists. She has written several articles and books on this subject, along with her husband, who is of Iranian origin. For years they have been working with radicalized individuals, helping them to leave terrorist organizations and reintegrate into society.
Anne is well acquainted with the situation in Albania and the movement of members of the Mojahedin, and some time ago, she reportedly received information that members of the MEK, stationed in the former building of the University of Tirana, started actively recruiting the Albanian youth into their movement – and she decided to react.
[The rest of this interview is provided below as unedited Google Translation]
For starters, it might not be a bad idea to explain to Sputnik’s readers from what kind of life and family environment these “radicalized individuals” with whom you are working come.
– They come from all layers of society. It is a mistake to assume that only some uneducated people have gone to Syria – most foreign fighters of DAES are from the middle class – mostly students, educated people … Terrorism is a global phenomenon today – there is no person whom he cannot guess. But it’s pure politics. Going to jihad is a political act. In addition, everyone has a personal reason why it becomes extremist, there is no formula, no recipes … Otherwise, it’s hard to radicalize people who have some goal in life; The escape in the extreme is the easiest thing for poor people, without a target, “casual”, “lost cases” … Their best-quality members of the extremists, they say, are recruited among violent football fans. My job today is to go around and explain to people how “radical” works. I keep repeating – no one is born as a terrorist. It’s not a talent, it’s not a career, it’s not a conscious choice. I think that I, personally, is a great example that anyone, at any time, can be radicalized, if he finds himself at the wrong time in the wrong place.
Can you explain it a bit? How is this “you, personally” example?
– When I enrolled in college, at the end of the seventies, I met an interesting group of people at the University of Manchester. There were many foreigners among students, we would all be sitting in a student club and talking mostly about politics. The Iranians then came in large numbers in England. They were friendly, different from my surroundings, they attracted me … They kept occasional meetings, I went to one of them out of curiosity, with their then boyfriend, and it turned out they were actually the mujahedin – MEK – what we call today the Raji cult . I did not understand much at that time, but I remember that they had a wonderful attitude towards me. Today, I would say that the techniques they used to attract me were, at the very least, interesting (laughing). I did not know their language, but I felt the energy. They were active, they not only sat down and talked about politics, and that attracted me. The revolution began in Iran, and I, thanks to them, had a “seat in the first place”! I was 19 years old, the boy was also in that, I was a great idealist. I was not a girl who was interested in shopping. I wanted to change the world! And this has not changed, to this day. Radicalization affects the psyche, but does not affect the type of personality. If you enter an organization as a certain person, the same will be, essentially, out of it and you go out.
Wait, you shocked me with that story … And what happened next? How long did it take?
– Twenty years. The first ten, until 1989, I practically lived a double life. I worked, I had a job, a house, a car, my normal everyday “English” life, but I spent all my free time working – for the mujahedeen. I dealt with what we call pi-ar activities today, but all friends thought that something was wrong with me. I did not want to hear anyone. I thought I was smarter than all of them. It’s part of the tactic – we are the smartest, we have others that have an incomprehensible vision, a higher goal. Separation from the family is crucial. Each radical group is organizing it with its members. At one point, my boyfriend then became violent, our relationship changed, and I turned to them. They became practically my only family. I was a computer programmer with a great salary, but I left it all because of them. I was first in the office in London – I was watching the news, writing the press … And then I went to the Middle East. Imagine !? An English woman twenty years old, from a middle class. Who would say?
Incredibly. How did that happen to you? And how is it possible that you did not have any problems with the British authorities? Still, it was an extreme group …
– Well, first and foremost, I did not choose in whom I will fall in love (laughter), it all just happened … It began with my beginning that their ideology is like “Islamic Marxism.” They began with activities during the Iranian Revolution, fought shah, they wanted to carry out a coup after the revolution; that plan failed, and they were expelled. They represented us as fighters for democracy, even as advanced, feminists – but essentially, the only “business” of ordinary members of us was to respect the leader. We should not have thought, to ask questions – you just do what they tell you. It can hardly be understood by someone who has not experienced it. You asked me about the problems with the British authorities? Well, MEK has always had the support of Western governments because we were working against Iran. That’s why they left us alone. I knew they were violent, but it did not prevent me – even though I am by the nature of the pacifist, I am very calm, I do not like violence … It only shows how they can “gain” you no longer think your head. Today, of course, I would say to them that they are a criminal organization. Only one single government ever officially recognized them – it was the government of Saddam Hussein. All others helped them “black” – politically, financially, yes, but never officially. If you would ask the British Ministry of Foreign Affairs, or German or French service, everyone would just be crazy – they would say they do not know what you’re talking about.
(continued tomorrow)
EXCLUSIVE charm offensive: Slave jihadists reveals the plan of the Islamic invasion of the Balkans
British En Kodabande is an expert in anti-terrorist activities and a longtime activist in the field of deradicization of extremists, for years before it was a pier of the terrorist movement, worked with the mujahedin, and barely, she says, pulled out of their claws.
We wrote about this part of the life of En Kodabande yesterday, and today we will give that part of the conversation that explains her life as a fighter against jihad.
You say that you spent 20 years with them. How did you go?
– My current husband was the bodyguard. We fell in love with one another, but we were forbidden to have a relationship. We started slowly to understand where we are. We believed that we were fighting against dictatorship and human rights in Iran. I worked in the office. I contacted the media, with the politicians, we called in all those talks on the UN declaration on human rights … This document, otherwise, has 16 members. When I, as we say, “lighted the light bulb”, after many years I read the Declaration, all 16 members, and realized that none of the only ones has anything to do with my work, life, position at that time. I did not have a passport, I did not have my own money, I did not dare to marry. I was their slave. Gladiator. Then I decided to withdraw. I told my husband he would have to seek asylum in Britain. And we did it. We are back. We live in Leeds, north of England. But I knew well that, if we do not oppose them publicly as soon as we go, we will flee from them all our lives. That’s why I went straight to the police. I told them who we are, what we did – of course, they sent people … they were questioning us, they wanted to know who we were, where we were … But soon they left us alone. And we decided not to hide. We have published all of our information on the Internet so that anyone who wants to make us any problems or threatens us can easily find out where we are. In some cases, the fact that you are not hiding can save your head.
Then what happened?
– My husband and I quickly decided to start working with families of members who want to leave MEK. We made a foundation, I went to Iraq, we asked for donors … I spoke with the Maliki family. We had meetings with NGOs, with government officials in Britain … And we realized very early in this process that the problem will not be solved by politics or human rights, but that we have to work on the ground, practically – but for that there was no political will, No money. Or the mujahedin was too small an organization to try the state around them, or the authorities did not have a strong desire to “settle them”.
You did not think about quitting?
– Not. After a while we infiltrated them, we began to submerge them from within. We found a way to get into all the “pores” of that group. In the meantime, I have become a “engaged activist” in Britain, as it is now known – I started publicly speaking about my experiences. We have managed to get, up to now, over a thousand people from MEK. Among other things, I also deal with prevention – by preventing extremists from recruiting new members. Not only in terrorist organizations, but also in sects … The methodology is completely the same, and the process of radicalization, through which I myself went through, almost certainly does not differ. The biggest problem is that MEK, mujahedins still exist. They regrouped. Now they are a new, reformed extreme group that operates on several levels – and that’s why I came to Albania – because they were transferred here! They have already been paid by some deputies, they have joined the Albanian mafia, and now, here in this country, they want to go to their “offensive charm” – to try to gain new supporters. According to information I have, over US $ 20 million the Americans paid to the Albanian government to transfer this group of several thousand mujahedin from Iraq here.
What do you think is the intention of the US government and the Albanian authorities? What are the possible consequences?
– Unfortunately, these people can not just “descend” to Albania just like that. They simply have to be deradicalized, otherwise the damage will be immeasurable. The public only sees the so-called. the concrete result of terrorist attacks – explosions, casualties and material damage … But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Below is a lot of things. The main activities are recruiting and collecting money. In the recruitment process, the logic is – the more people, the better. It is very dangerous when you place one such group in any country, in any environment, because they soon begin to “naturally” radicalize their environment.
This program that you are applying in the process of derading … How does it work?
– You can not deradicalize someone if you do not know how it is radicalized. These people are literally “brainwashed”. The whole process begins with a deep understanding of their position. A functional primary or secondary family is one of the basic conditions for successful deradicization. We made a foundation and we managed to pull out about a thousand people from MEK so far. But the key was that these people had already intend to leave. They themselves wanted to leave the mujahedeen – without it, nothing would make sense. So – to get back to the thesis from the beginning of the conversation – “how you enter, such a way out” – I am in the depths of the soul and still the most active activist (laughter), only now with another goal. I’ll be, I hope, such for the rest of my life.
And what are the concrete results? Let’s say, in what number of cases does the process of deradicization work?
– Many people returned to normal life. The process of “removing” someone can be very short or very long, no rules. When people leave the extremist group, they should first understand what was happening to them. Some of them, but remain radicalized for years – remain what they were while they were with extremists. Certainly, specialist help is needed. If you leave the group because you have “turned on the light bulb”, if you “woke up”, as it happened to me and my husband, only in that case do not have much effort to make you understand what happened to you, that you lied and exploited. But almost always help is needed.
You mentioned “recruiting staff”. Tell us more about them. Who are these people?
– I think everything starts and ends with some kind of attraction. Examples are groups that fight for animal rights; first organize a public protest. Then someone suggests something radical, let’s say, let’s call them individually. You can easily “slip” it into an extreme version of belief. Extremes are attractive. Those people, those who do not think like you, actually need to – die. There, say, all those who torture animals … Let them die! Then the real plan is to put a bomb under the car? From the idea, through firm belief, to concrete action. Through this process, this “recruitment staff” is guided by you – but it is an emotional journey, you pass it together, and you’re getting closer. The real “recruitment officers” are people who absolutely believe in the idea of leadership, think that this idea should attract as many followers; they are convincing; they know how to instill people into something that they would not otherwise be at the edge of their minds. Let’s say – to travel to Syria or Iraq to join the jihadists. The key is intuition. Questions about you. The problems that you have – they signal what the target is, where the man is “thin”, where he can be “pressed” harder. They like to use what we call “car sales techniques” – the so-called “lifestyle sails”. “You have to think about this, imagine how cool it would be to drive this car!” But, with the car, there’s always the option to change your mind – but the belief system is sold so you do not even know that they sold you. I like to say that the extremist group as an arc – many layers, a very clear, closed structure, within which everything is under absolute control. And every bow is very different from the outside, as every extreme organization is very different, but from within, they all have, in essence, the same structure.
Part One https://rs-lat.sputniknews.com/intervju/201712101113756669-bila-sam-pi-ar-terorista-/
Part Two https://rs-lat.sputniknews.com/intervju/201712111113766247-En-Kodabande/
You usually can’t just rescue someone from a cult. The point is that once someone is in a cult, it is very difficult for him /her to leave. This is why it is considered a cult. Therefore, the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/ the MEK, Cult of Rajavi ) perfectly falls in to the category of being a cult.
Also by definition, a the cult member doesn’t believe that he or she is in a cult. Instead, members have been brainwashed by believing that they have achieved a high status just by having the opportunity to be in the cult which ultimately brings them salvation, for instance members of the Cult of Rajavi are called “unique gems” (Goharan Bibadil). This status is the result of a manipulative system that prevents victims from thinking freely.
What most people don’t know is that mind control can be even more powerful than a gun to the head because the victim believes that the person doing the manipulation is actually a friend, or a lover, or a master, who seems to be caring and honest.
Most of the rank and file of the Cult of Rajavi were deceived in to the establishment by their apparently loving caring recruiters who promised them a prosperous ideal life in a classless society. Once they were recruited they underwent the severe mind control techniques including self-criticism sessions in which peer pressure and suppression was the key tool to destroy their entire individuality.
Studying the survivors of the cult, the experts believe that the golden rule to save a loved one who is stuck in a cult is simple: Do whatever you can to keep the communication channels open with your loved one or friend. This is why the leaders of Rajavi`s Cult try to prevent members from seeing any outsiders. Leaders of the cult of Rajavi panic this rule. So, they establish their own filthy rule, looking for any reason to shut outsiders off their hostages.
The golden rule sounds simple but you can’t do anything later on if you can’t communicate with the one you’re trying to help and the MKO leaders know it well. These days, they are transferring members to the remote Camp Ashraf Three to close the least possibilities for them to have access to the outside world. Members are even forced to sign a commitment paper titled “irrevocable membership” that requires them to admit long life membership in the cult.
Living in an isolated residential camp means that cult members will not be able to have the slightest idea of what`s going on outside the camp and in the free world; they will not be able to see ordinary people on the beaches or to hear the cries of children playing in parks of Tirana. Isolation means total obedience to the absolute power of Rajavi and eventually more severe cases of human rights violations in the Cult of Rajavi.
Definitely, this will result in a human disaster. The Albanian government and the UNHCR should be warned that the MKO’s lobbying campaign in Washington and Europe is an attempt to falsely portray itself as the representative of the Iranian people and the democratic alternative to the Iranian government but the truth –based on many testimonies—is that the MKO is actually a political cult that is endeavoring to survive by maintaining its hegemony over its members with almost no popular support among Iranians. This dirty policy should be stopped.
By Mazda Parsi
Manuchehr Abdi is a newly defected member of the Mujahedin-e Khalq cult. He spent 14 years in the cult of Rajavis. He is now 55 years old.
” When I was in Tehran I wanted to immigrate to abroad. My friends told me about the MKO. They said that the organization was in Iraq and would help me go to Europe. Once I joined the MKO in Iraq, I had no way out any more”, Abdi says in an interview with the Sahar Family Foundation.
In Albania he managed to contact his family by the help of some former members, however the cult authorities got to know and punished him,” I was suppressed because according to the MKO rules, contacting your family is a crime..”
Fortunately he managed to liberate himself from the cult barriers. He now lives a free life in Albania.
Abdi says:” In Albania the cult condition is so fragile .Members are under severe mental pressure and most of them take anxiety drugs and high doses of nerve calming tablets. Members have to work up to midnight in addition to participating different brainwashing sessions.
Asking about the group’s plan in Albania and the members’ fortune was taboo and nobody replied us.
It was forbidden to go out of the camps lonely. We had to go out in accompany with the person who was responsible of our unit. Beside this we were stopped every 50 meters and forced to describe our feelings about seeing the environment, people and everything else which might deviate our mind from the group objectives. This brainwashing sessions which are held beside the streets are called “ablution in the moment”.
To escape such pressures, some members preferred not to take step out of the cult Camps.
While members of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO/MEK/ PMOI/ the Cult of Rajavi) are being relocated in the remote camp called Ashraf 3 in the northern suburb of Tirana, the leaders of the group force members to sign a document of commitment to irrevocable membership.
“MEK members must say they are voluntarily going to Ashraf Three,” reported Iran-interlink that has received a copy of the document. “They are committed to violent regime change (sarneguni). They accept that MEK membership is for life and they cannot leave. They reject the bourgeoisie life style of the West and will not be tempted by it. They are committed to Maryam’s Revolution (which means celibacy and childlessness).” [1]
Provisions of the document explicitly titles its principal, “irrevocable membership” in the People’s Mojahedin of Iran (PMOI). This indicates that a political group can be involved in a cult-like system.”People don’t think of political groups as cults,”Dr. Alexandra Stein, a cult survivor and a cult expert now says.”But they can be. There are zillions of political cults around the world.”[2]
The ten points that are included in the commitment paper of the Cult of Rajavi meet the very criteria that Dr. Stein defines as features of a cult-like system. She has a five-point definition of a cult:”One: The leader is charismatic and authoritarian. Two: The structure of the group isolates people. The third thing is total ideology, like, ‘You only need me and no other belief system has any relevance whatsoever.”The fourth thing is the process of brainwashing. The fifth point: creating deployable followers who will do what you say regardless of their own self survival interests.”
As a matter of fact, leaders of the Cult of Rajavi who make members sign the “irrevocable membership” paper, demonstrate the authoritarian system of their organization. Besides, the new camp Ashraf 3 paves the way for more isolation of the rank and file of the group where the brainwashing process can be accomplished more easily.
According to Dr. Stein, in the isolated atmosphere cults operate on a cycle of fear and attachment. Members are extremely dependent to the group because they have no other choice. For instance, in case of the MKO members, having signed the “irrevocable membership” paper, they would be taken as hostages as long-life hostages of the group.
“You can’t confide in anyone in a cult,”she says.”If you say, ‘There seems to be a problem here,’ you will be likely to be punished, so there’s nowhere to go. You’re scared but you’ve got nobody else left in your life, so you cling to the very people who are causing you that fear.”
Therefore, Ashraf 3 is likely to turn into the very place in which victims of the Cult of Rajavi have to cling to the Rajavis and their successors. This is what Maryam Rajavi longs for.
By Mazda Parsi