We are only half way through January and the EU terrorism list (from which the Mojahedin Khalq Organisation has been removed) has still not been announced but the MKO (aka the Rajavi cult, MEK, NCRI, NLA) has been unable to refrain from showing its true nature.
Iraq’s National Security Advisor has reported the arrest of an MKO member who is currently in custody after surrendering himself to an Iraqi security unit. The man, who is a resident of Camp Ashraf, was about to perform a suicide mission, but could not go through with it. According to a statement from the office of the National Security Advisor, the MKO member has claimed the MKO use severe torture and brainwashing on its members. He claims that: “I was sent with a clear and precise plan to perform a suicide mission in this Iraqi base”.
http://iran-interlink.org/?mod=view&id=5720
This news will come as no surprise to those who know the MKO. Looking at Massoud Rajavi’s track record over thirty years, nothing more or less than this could be expected. While he was able to send over 2,000 civilians their deaths back in 1988 in the failed Eternal Light operation, he has since then sent numerous smaller groups to perform suicidal terrorist attacks in Iran with the added instruction that if captured the person should use their cyanide pill to kill themselves. More recently, MKO were instructed to set fire to themselves to protest the arrest of Maryam Rajavi on terrorism charges in Paris. Two died and several others sustained serious injury with their permanent disfigurement and disability a direct result of Rajavi’s order.
Massoud Rajavi who owns the MKO also owns the blood of the members and will spill it whenever he needs to. In this case to rescue himself from the mess he has made in Iraq. The MKO members are his capital which buys him power. They are expandable assets which have been used and reused shamelessly by western agencies who have found this a useful and cheap resource in their ‘regime change’ armoury. It is clear that the neoconservatives and Zionists are using the MKO against the Iraqis, and are helping them by facilitating the impunity enjoyed by MKO leaders at the cult’s headquarters in Europe.
This latest fiasco in the Rajavi saga is surely the result of negligence and apathy of the European Union toward the MKO which apparently couldn’t summon the energy or interest to properly investigate the MKO and deal with it accordingly. A feat which has been assiduously performed by successive US Governments since 1994 and which has resulted in the MKO retaining its terrorism designation to date with the added information that the group is a cult. However, the Bush Administration has also proved itself to be overly greedy in wanting to have their cake and eat it. The US army has ‘protected’ this ‘terrorist’ outfit for five and a half years in Iraq in spite of repeated demands by the Iraqis for removal of this known FTO, which collaborated with the former regime, from Iraqi territory.
It is surely time for the international community as represented by the UNHCR and UNCHR to to help the Iraqis ensure that all the individuals held captive in Camp Ashraf are accorded their basic human rights. Rajavi’s victims must be given the opportunity to renounce violence and to leave Camp Ashraf for third countries or to accept voluntary repatriation to Iran. Any delay in dismantling this notorious cult is to condemn the inhabitants to enforced membership of an illegal paramilitary terrorist group.
Mojahedin-e Khalq rewarded for cooperation against Iran?
The State Department has again decided to keep the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MKO) with all its aliases on the US terrorism list. There are a growing number of people who are calling for the US to have done with the group once and for all. Commentators on several blogs and articles suggest the leaders be ‘tried in internationally approved courts and let the membership go home.’ But this ignores the heavy price that has been paid for the group both politically (Iran has constantly accused the US and Europe of double standards on terrorism for their palpable support for the MKO) and financially (one of the key indicators of the actual irrelevance of adding the MKO to western terrorism lists is the tens of millions of dollars, euros and pounds the group has been able to spend on legal challenges and propaganda to keep itself alive – money which must come from somewhere).
With MKO personnel permanently camped-out in most of Europe’s parliaments for the past two years it should come as no surprise that the group will be removed from Europe’s terrorism list when it is announced on January 15. In July 2008, the EU announced that there were “no grounds” to amend the list of terrorist organisations, which includes 48 groups, and EU officials insisted that the decision to keep the MEK on the list of the terrorist groups is not related to the Western efforts to persuade Iran to halt its nuclear enrichment program.
What is behind this peculiar change which will redefine the group as non-terrorist in Europe?
As with removal from the UK terrorism list in June 2008, no material difference will accrue to the MKO. In his book on the Mojahedin Dr. Ronen A. Cohen says the MKO “does not have the characteristics of a classic terror organization as it does not initiate terror against innocents” – although the indiscriminate nature of many of its attacks mean 12,000 civilians have been killed in MKO operations inside Iran over two decades.
The most pertinent explanation for why removal from the lists is irrelevant is because the MKO even at the height of its military prowess in 1988 and with the full backing of Saddam Hussein and the west was unable to fulfil its aim of replacing the Islamic Republic with its own rule. Massoud Raajvi’s long term premise that such change would come about as a result of a popular uprising has been pragmatically replaced in the past five years with the conviction that regime change would be imposed on Iran from external powers – the USA, Israel – and that the MKO could reap the benefit of being there as a viable alternative when that happened.
Of these two, perhaps the latter version is currently more possible and perhaps probable even with a new US Administration in place.
So, what use do the MKO’s backers envisage for the group?
The protection of a uniformed anti-Iran mercenary group in Camp Ashraf in Diyali province for five years has been intentional. The price paid has been too great to allow jettisoning the group now, both politically and financially. However, it is important to note that even if it is removed from the UK, EU and perhaps US terrorism lists, the MKO does not enjoy governmental recognition or legitimacy anywhere in the world. Nor does any country need to give the group legitimacy in order to make use of it.
Essentially the use of the MKO is, as Rajavi himself has used them, as perpetrators and victims of violence. The MKO’s talent is that they are trained to kill and be killed according to Rajavi’s order. That they will do this to fulfil a western agenda without needing western approval is the group’s unique selling point and is enough to justify not continuing to label them as terrorists.
There is no doubt that for many observers the removal of the MKO from the European list will clarify the European position toward terrorism. Public opinion in the Middle East has never regarded western terrorism lists as about terrorism per se but as lists of enemies of western interests.
Inclusion of the violently anti-Iranian MKO along with groups which are genuinely anti-western has been a major discrepancy of all the western terrorism lists, a glaring error of political judgement. The MKO may have begun life as an anti-imperialist group with armed struggle its core value, and continued this path under the patronage of Saddam Hussein. But, since its forced disarmament at the hands of the US army, the group has been able to beguile western powers, including Israel, into believing it shares common cause against Iran and is a friend and ally of at least some in the west.
After spending hundreds of millions of dollars on propaganda and legal fees to keep the MKO alive, these backers are now obliged to use this blunted tool in any way they can, perhaps to justify the expenditure, perhaps because they really believe the MKO can be an effective tool against Iran.
Anne Singleton, an expert on the MKO and author of ‘Saddam’s Private Army’ explains, “With a new Administration in the White House a pre-emptive strike on Iran looks unlikely. Instead the MKO’s backers have put together a coalition of small irritant groups, the known minority and separatist groups, along with the MKO. These groups will be garrisoned around the border with Iran and their task is to launch terrorist attacks into Iran over the next few years to keep the fire hot.
“The role of the MKO is to train and manage these groups using the expertise they acquired from Saddam’s Republican Guard. The price the MKO has had to pay is to accept their removal from their main base Camp Ashraf and relocate to other bases not their own. The inducement will be to remove the group from the terrorism list in Europe.”
Once the MKO has been declared in Europe as ‘no longer terrorists’, the group’s overt backers, Lord Corbett, Struan Stevenson MEP, Paulo Casaca MEP, and others who see the world, and in particular Iran, through neoconservative/Zionist tinted glasses will move to promote this coalition in their various circles.
Although it is tempting to cast this move into the sphere of betting both ways on the new Obama Administration’s Iran policy, the key trigger for this move has been the Iraqi government’s insistence on the removal of the MKO from Iraq and the handover of Camp Ashraf to Iraqi sovereignty. This has not been an unreasonable request of US forces over a five year period. However, it is only since the agreed handover of control of Camp Ashraf on January 1 that this became an inevitable outcome. For over a year, MKO backers in western parliaments have lobbied for the MKO to remain in Camp Ashraf on the grounds that the group would be massacred by vengeful Iraqis or forced back to Iran to face certain torture and execution. The falsity of this position has become exposed as the Iraqi government has continued to protect the group and has given repeated assurances that no one will be forced home against their will. Beyond this, the Iranian government’s own position on prosecuting leading members has made it impossible to send anyone back that Iran does not want.
The reason for the insistence on maintaining the MKO in Camp Ashraf – and now in new border based garrisons alongside other armed groups – has been because the only use for the group is to act as an irritant against Iran. If a full scale military attack could not be manufactured which would involve them, then small scale terrorist attacks are the next best alternative.
What all this overlooks, of course, is the human aspect of this group. For years former members of the MKO have warned of severe human rights violations perpetrated against the members. Human Rights Watch conducted its own investigation into the group’s recent history in 2005 and published a damning report titled No Exit. But more recently, those who escaped the camp since its capture by American forces in 2003 and who have managed to reach Europe, are alleging continued cruelties including unnecessary hysterectomies imposed on women to rob them of any hope of having children.
For five years the American army has effectively prevented any independent investigation into these allegations. The primary task of the Iraqi military now in charge of the camp must be to allow humanitarian agencies to access the camp’s residents and individually assess their mental, physical and emotional status. Anything less than this is to condemn 3,250 people to being part of an illegal paramilitary group without their active consent.
This still leaves the fundamental question of what the west will get from its investment in the MKO. It is looking likely that the US will cherry-pick whoever it wants from the MKO to perform in its new coalition strategy. The old, sick, disabled and disturbed will be left for the Iraqi government to deal with.
In view of western patronage of this group, albeit largely covert in nature since it does not acknowledge that it is the group’s willingness to die that is its main use, then it is western countries which ultimately have a responsibility, if not an outright duty, to rescue the group from Iraq. If the group’s membership is indeed moved to other bases in Iraq to continue involvement in acts of violence, then any blood shed will be on western hands not those who are defending their country’s security.
The non-Iranian Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO), since the overthrow of the regime of Saddam Hussein in Iraq, is seeking another alternative in the west. The MKO strove under the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein to become the Iraqi MKO and now is striving to become the Israeli MKO.
Since 1985 when the Internal Ideological Revolution and the Divine Leadership of the Rajavis were introduced within the MKO, and the cultic characteristics reached their full development, and since 1986 when the leadership of the MKO moved to Iraq under the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein and participated in the war against Iran and as well as suppressing the people of Iraq as Saddam’s private army, the organization not only had no presence inside Iran but it was also much hated as far as the Iranian people were concerned.
Since then until the fall of Saddam Hussein, the activities of the MKO against the Iranian regime included border assaults and sabotage activities and sending terror teams from Iraq inside Iran with the aid of the security forces of Saddam Hussein as well as political propaganda in the west. The assaults and terrorist activities were of course ceased when the dictator was toppled in Iraq and the organization was disarmed by the American forces in 2003, and therefore the activities of the MKO were limited to political propaganda in the west; the sort of propaganda of course which would pave the way for terrorism in the future.
Hence since that point up to now the MKO and its leadership have relied not on the Iranian people but on foreign powers to gain rule in Iran and at the present time they are seeking an alternative for Saddam Hussein (this time in the west of course) and have based their strategy on gaining support from potential enemies such as the US, Israel and the UK in place of the previous toppled enemy.
Therefore the presence of the MKO now is merely in the form of the Ashraf garrison (the MKO base in Iraq) and the Maryam garrison (the European base of the MKO in France) which initially is the problem of the newly formed government of Iraq and then the western countries, and is by no means the concern of the Islamic Republic of Iran.
As far as the Iraqi government is concerned, this government knows the MKO as a terrorist group and one of the many miseries left from the era of Saddam Hussein for the people of Iraq and a threat for Iraq’s internal security; and therefore the Iraqi government is demanding that the Ashraf garrison be closed forever, and righteously expects the western governments who have had their use of the organization against Iran to accept them in their countries for their retirement stage.
The political process to de-proscribe the MKO in the EU was begun some time ago. As the UK initiated the proscription of the organization (for any reasons), now the UK is again stepping forward to remove their name from the EU list of terrorist groups, and most likely this will be done in the very near future.
What consequences will arise if the MKO is kept in or removed from the EU list of terrorist groups?
As far as Iran is concerned, the MKO is a matter for the past and whether they are designated as a terrorist group or not would not have the smallest effect. Neither when they moved into the list were any facilities created for the Iranians and nor when they move out will any problem arise in their way. The opposite of course applies for the MKO.
As far as the European countries are concerned they know best how to deal with a terrorist cult in their own territory regarding their national security. If the EU is convinced that the organization is no longer a terrorist group so be it, and we do hope that their judgment is right and the MKO and its leader have truly put aside terrorism; although we do not have any indications for such assumptions.
From the Iraqis’ point of view, who demands that the MKO (who have cooperated with Saddam Hussein in killing innocent people) leave Iraq, de-proscribing the MKO in Europe is good news since the west has no excuses for not accepting them in their countries any more. In the last meeting we had with the Iraqi ministry of foreign affairs they explained that the ministry had invited all European ambassadors in Baghdad to a meeting and urged them to accept the members of the MKO in their countries as political refugees, but they all rejected the request and their excuse was that the group has been designated as a terrorist organization by the EU. But now the Iraqis can of course put their demands forward again.
But the only side who would really suffer from de-proscribing the MKO in Europe is of course the prime victims of such a destructive cult, meaning the members who will be more mentally manipulated when this is shown to them as a victory of the cult and will ensue their continued mental captivity; and therefore their families must pay the price by being away from them and have no news from their beloved ones.
On the issue of closing the Ashraf garrison in Iraq, the MKO is trying hard to make it an entirely Iranian concern. The west is also following the same pattern and demanding an increase in the price of the MKO supposedly for a deal with the Islamic Republic, and perhaps the policy of de-proscribing them in Europe which has started sometime ago is in this line. The MKO is pretending in its propaganda that it is a major issue for Iran and they claim to the world that Iran is striving to get hold of the inhabitants of the Ashraf garrison to take them to Iran and put them on trial and torture them and eventually kill them. Anyone who has the least of knowledge of the MKO surely knows that the claim made by the MKO is somehow ‘escaping forward’ [farar be jelow]. The MKO is merely trying to create such an atmosphere in order to falsify the main issue. Certainly the Islamic Republic is not seeking to get back dead bodies which the owners don’t want anymore. On the contrary Iran logically is trying to smartly use the dissidents of the MKO against it (refer to the quotations made from a western diplomat in Iran in an article written by Geroges Malbrunot in Le Figaro dated December 23) and it is obvious that the Iranian regime is more eager that they are moved to Europe in order to send back the products of a terrorist cult in the shape of human robots to their original place. It is also worth mentioning that in the time of Saddam Hussein’s rule in Iraq, Massoud Rajavi the leader of the MKO did not send the group’s defectors to Europe and instead handed them over to the Iranian regime. He said clearly on many occasions that the Iranian regime would not do anything to the members of the MKO who have no arms in their hands.
The leaders of the MKO claim that if the US forces move from the Ashraf garrison and leave the posts for the Iraqis, they would not have security in Iraq. This could be true since many Kurdish and Shiites groups in Iraq know this organization as their ruthless enemy who cooperated with Saddam Hussein to suppress them and would wish to take revenge. The solution of course is not for the US to keep their forces there for their security forever. The answer to this problem is that the western governments take them back to their own countries in order to preserve their security. It is worth pointing out that most of these people were political refugees in the west and have been recruited and sent to Iraq from there to join in the National Liberation Army.
Whether the MKO is designated as a terrorist entity or not and whether the US forces stay outside the Ashraf garrison or not makes no big difference to anyone and we are not much concerned about it. As far as the Sahar Family Foundation in Iraq is concerned and we have focused our attention on it, the inhabitants of the Ashraf garrison must enjoy free meetings with their families in some place outside the garrison and without the presence of the MKO authorities and they must have the benefit of having contacts with the outside world and also to have the mental pressures and thought controls lifted from them; and we will stay firm in Iraq and continue our activities until we reach this very important humanitarian goal.
Two MKO members with a long history of terrorist activities have reportedly been apprehended by the Interpol police in Finland.
Two men were taken into custody upon entering Finland on Sunday, according to Finnish daily Helsingin Sanomat.
Hadi Roshanravani and Mohammad-Ali Jaberzadeh Ansari are said to be the two
who were arrested.
The men have traveled to Finland to pave the way for a visit by Maryam Rajavi, the wife of the founder of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO), who is herself a high-ranking member of the terrorist group.
Officials in Helsinki believe the two men do not pose a threat to Finnish national security but are set to decide on whether the country will extradite the criminals to Iran to face trial.
The 62-year-old Hadi Roshanravani is the top MKO operations intelligence official. He had been conducting espionage operations in Iraq and Europe for decades with the support of the last Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein.
The 60-year-old Mohammad-Ali Jaberzadeh Ansari is a high-ranking MKO theorist that had been tasked with legitimizing the various terrorist operations carried out by the group in Iran and Iraq.
The MKO has committed acts of aggression against both Iranian and Iraqi nationals and remains banned by the European Union and the United States. In a recent move, however, Britain removed the MKO from its blacklist of terror organizations.
The UK initiative has prompted the European Union to establish relations with the exiled organization now based in Paris. The European Court of First Instance threw its weight behind the MKO on Thursday and annulled its previous decision to freeze its funds.
The recent support for the MKO has led the group to initiate various trips to Europe and the United States to lobby for its removal from the lists of terrorist organizations banned by Western countries.
Evidence links the group to the June, 1981 bombing of the offices of the Islamic Republic Party, in which more than 72 Iranian officials were killed, including then Judiciary chief Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti.
The assassination the following August of Iranian president Mohammad Rajae’i and prime minister Javad Bahonar has also been attributed to the group.
The Canadian Minister of Public Safety, the Honourable Peter Van Loan announced completion of the two-year review of the Criminal Code list of terrorist entities, and that the Governor in Council has accepted his recommendation that the forty-one entities currently listed should remain on the list.
“The Government is committed to the listing process as an important means to protect national security and counter the financing of terrorist groups and their activities worldwide. Part of the process is conducting a thorough review of the list every two years,”said Minister Van Loan.
Mojahedin Khalq Organization maintains on the list after it was first listed on 24 May, 2005.
Mujahedin e Khalq (MEK)
Also known as
Sãzimãn-i Mujãhidn-i Khalq-i Irãn (Holy Warrior Organization of the Iranian People) / Sazman-i Mojahedin-i Khalq-i Iran (Organization of the Freedom Fighters of the Iranian People) /Sazeman-e Mojahedin-e Khalq-e Iran(Organization of People’s Holy Warriors of Iran) / Sazeman-e-Mujahideen-e-Khalq-e-Iran, Mujahedin-e-Khalq(MEK), Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization(MKO), Mujahiddin e Khahq, al-Khalq Mujahideen Organization, Mujahedeen Khalq, Modjaheddins khalg, Moudjahiddin-é Khalq, National Liberation Army of Iran (NLA) (the military wing of the MEK) / Armée de Libération nationale iranienne(ALNI) and People’s Mujahidin Organization of Iran (PMOI) / People’s Mujahedin of Iran(PMOI) / Organisation des moudjahiddin du peuple d’Iran(OMPI) / Organisation des moudjahidines du peuple
Description
Formed in the 1960s, the Mujahedin-e-Khalq(MEK) is an Iranian terrorist organization that is currently based in Iraq. MEK’s principal objective is the overthrow of the existing Iranian regime. Its aim is to install a new government under the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), a political coalition of Iranian opposition groups affiliated with MEK. To achieve their objectives, the MEK has used physical force, including armed attacks. The group has or had affiliations with Saddam Hussein, Amal, the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI), the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), Al Fatah, and other Palestinian factions.
Date listed
24 May, 2005
Date reviewed
20 November, 2008
Nothing to impede Iran-Italy friendly ties: Italian ambassador Service: Foreign Policy
Italian newly-appointed ambassador to Iran Alberto Bradanini stressed no issue could impede Iran-Italy friendly ties.
Italy has always fully endeavored to boost the level of all-out cooperation with Iran, Bradanini said at a meeting with Iran’s Parliament National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Alaeddin Boroujerdi.
The ambassador also underlined the influential role of Iran-Italy parliamentary friendship group on promoting bilateral cooperation and called for setting up the group.
Elsewhere in his remarks he referred to Mojahedin Khalq Organization (MKO) and assured that Italy considers the group as a terrorist one and will not shift its stance regarding the band.
Boroujerdi for his part said grounds for mutual cooperation on economic, industrial and political sections are available.
He also called for Italian government to prevent MKO moves in the country.
Also concerning Iran’s nuclear technology, Boroujerdi emphasized on the Parliament approval of the plan for building twenty nuclear power plants and said the Europe particularly Italy can take part in construction of the plants to create a new positive development over mutual ties.
Europe needs to review its policy regarding Iran to open a new room for a constructive interaction and mutual regional cooperation.
The annual report of “The Guarding Constitution Department “of Westfalen province, Germany, on MKO does not include so many changes regarding its last year’s report. The report contains two pages in which there are various notes on Mujahedin Khalq.
The report reads that the sympathizers of MKO/PMOI in Germany are about 900 people and in Westfalen province the number mounts to 400 people. The report declares their organization as Mujahedin, their TV channel as NTV in London saying that their activities on internet are multi-lingual.
The goals of MEK and NCRI are described briefly as to overthrow the Iranian regime and along with their goals MEK/PMOI has established “National Liberation Army” which acts as the military wing of MEK in Iraq.
Following the above –mentioned description, the report concludes that “the MEK/PMOI/MKO which is using violence and providing support for violent activities, threatens the foreign interests of Germany (The paragraph 1-3 of Guarding Constitution)MEK is a powerful violent dissident Iranian group that claims to be “ the only democratic alternative “ against the Iranian regime.
The movement is consisted of a hierarchical structure with revolutionary Marxist rules mixed with Shiite Islamism “the report says. The report continues with MEK’s clashes with Islamic Regime of Iran and the election of Maryam Rajavi as the “ President Elect “ of the “ Resistance “,adding that “ MEK was listed as a terrorist organization by the EU in 2002 but the political wing has excluded from the approach.
On September 12th, 2006, the European Supreme Court annulled the EU’s decision based on the designation of MKO as a terrorist organization, the reason of this ruling included lack of hearing for MKO. But MEK became disappointed of the removal of their name from the terror list and on June 29th, 2007, after MEK’s hearing the EU Council made serious decisions against terrorism especially MEK and NLA which still have been on terror list.”
“In their struggle against Iranian regime, the MEK follows two strategies: political activities, lobbying and fundraising campaigns and also military operations which were supported by Saddam Hussein. The NLA in Iraq launches its attack against Iranian interests and authorities. MEK’s political cadre (NCRI) has always attempted to discredit Iranian leaders outside Iran. The organization uses violent acts as a legal mean, especially while Iranian government authorities visit Germany “the report notes.
Translation – Nejat Society
According to many MKO ex-members as well as political activists, terrorist and suicidal attacks ordained by Mojahedin leadership constitute an integral part of the cult approaches adopted by the organization. A brief look at the Mjahedin activities in recent years clarifies the fact that they have resorted to all means and strategies in order to achieve their main objective, i.e. seizing political power. Although they abuse international levers like human rights declarations and democracy to win legitimacy on the part of western countries, their true cultic and terrorist nature is fully disclosed when reaching political impasses.
The messages sent by Rajavi in recent years on the potentialities of Mojahedin to carry out terrorist attacks all around the world parallel to that of Al-Qaeda as well as his statements on the degeneration of a number of European MPs aim to pave the way for the initiation of terrorist actions therein. Likewise, Maryam Rajavi has repeatedly declared that Mojahedin can tear into the Europe by means of suicide actions in case Masoud Rajavi issues an order to do so. June 17th self-immolation of MKO members in Paris is convincing evidence confirming the anti-social and defiant nature of Mojahedin.
Mojahedin made use of unique self-destructive tactics in their early years of struggle against Pahlavi regime in Iran. They all carried cyanide capsules to use if arrested alive and being defendants, they struck an aggressive attitude in the regime’s courts to be sentenced to death believing that it might result in their political victory. In addition, in early 1980s, when the organization entered a new phase of armed struggle, this time against the new established regime in Iran, its terrorist activities reached their peak. Not the key figures but the innocent citizens were also killed and injured in terrorist attacks. There are evidences that Mojahedin have been moving on the armed tactic for more than four decades especially whenever they faced a critically political and strategic failure or stalemate. Interestingly, Mojahedin as well as their advocators are proud of having staged terrorist operations they refer to as revolutionary activities inside Iran.
Recently, Bijan Niyabati, one of the major spokesmen and theoreticians of MKO, in an interview with Khabargah, has referred to the fact that Mojahedin have been the founder of suicidal operations in the contemporary Iran at a time when no political trend or individual was even thinking of it. When asked to elaborate on the probability of Mojahedin’s committing terrorist and suicidal actions against Western countries and citizens, he replied, ‘It is unlikely as long as the Mojahedin leadership is not intruded.’
These statements on the part of political advocates of Mojahedin imply the extent to which they hope to misuse democratic potentials of the West for the fulfillment of their totalitarian objectives. The point worthy of note is that Niyabati openly refers to the ultimate target of their terrorist actions in the Europe. In a doublespeak, he makes an attempt to deny the accusations made against MKO on their terrorist nature and at the same time lets the outside world know the serious danger of Mojahedin, stating:
Self-immolations in France revealed that if the organization had terrorist intentions, it was much simpler for its members to destroy the Europe by suicide bomb attacks instead of setting themselves on fire.
This is considered to be a real threat for the west implying the fact that the deliberate negligence of Westerners and the advocates of Mojahedin due to some political considerations may inevitably lead to considerable costs to be paid by the global community. The extent to which Western countries realizes the danger of MKO depends on their unbiased investigation on the real nature of the organization just by reflecting upon the assertions of MKO theoreticians. Westerners have repeatedly acknowledged the fact that Mojahedin lack any social support inside Iran, therefore it may not be considered a threat for the Iranian regime. In that case, would not the Western citizens be the main target of brutal actions of this cultic terrorist group living among them?
A close study of the statements made by Masoud Rajavi in his lecture in 2007 as well as the clear warnings of Niyabati on the consequences of violating the sanctum of the leadership gives us a deeper understanding of the threat of the organization against the global community in general and Western countries in particular. He even refrains to specify what he means by MKO leadership: the ideological leader living in the hideout or the main suspect of France June 17th case, Maryam Rajavi.
The black tunnel – A U turn toward being a political organization
The Mojahedin Khalq Organization (MKO) believes that keeping the name of this
organization in the list of terrorist organizations is a direct result of a plot between the Iranian regime and European countries. They believe that this ‘black tunnel’ has been created by the Iranian regime and that the organization has no other choice except to follow it to the end in order to come out the other side.
“… The policy of appeasement up to now has given time to the mullahs to proceed with their plans to produce atomic bombs. Of course an external war is not the answer. So could we say that we are stuck in a black tunnel created by the mullahs’ regime? …"
Informed political sources know so well that the MKO has devoted all its resources in the past five years in concentrating on coming of the lists of terrorism; and of course with no success to date.
Now the question is, considering the past five years of activities of the organization would they carry out military attacks against Iran if they have the chance to carry out such attacks successfully? The answer is no. Today’s MKO has reached a point where even if it had the opportunity to carry out successful military actions in Iran, it would not do so. Because any military action by the MKO will damage severely the picture they have tried to portray of themselves over the past seven years in order to get refuge and continue their existence as a political organization in Europe and, although they have not reached this goal yet, we should remember that after Iraq and the fall of the regime of Saddam Hussein, Europe is all that is left for the Mojahedin and this is why they would never carry out any military operations inside Iran at least in the short term.
Of course, this is not to say that the Mojahedin have rejected their original ideas as they try to pretend by signing secretly kept papers behind the closed doors of a court. The realities of today’s world as the MKO put it themselves and blame the Iranians for it is the ‘dark tunnel’ which is forcing the Mojahedin Khalq to change itself from a military to a political organisation.
The future of the MKO will be decided accordingly and the era of the Mojahedin’s military operations inside Iran has apparently come to an end unless the situation in Iraq and in Europe becomes so hard for them that they could no longer follow their aims using peaceful means like gatherings, meetings, etc. In that case they will go back to their original military activities. This is highly unlikely as the European political decision makers do not have this in their minds and, on the contrary, have decided to push the organisation toward using non-violent means.
One should welcome the transformation of an organisation from a military to a political entity. As the former Chancellor of Austria said once, "The hardest day for a rebellious warrior is the day that they take his arms from him and ask him to come to the negotiation table and talk, and he has nothing to say".
It may be that history has left no other way for the Mojahedin except to following the path of the Irish Republican Army. The MKO knows only so well what path they are now on, but do not like to talk about it. They know that they will not be able to answer the hundreds of their members in Iraq. It is better for them to pretend that they have been brought to this path forcefully and they never wanted that. It is of course more interesting when they claim that this is being done by the Iranian regime and not by western strategists. Nevertheless, the creators of this strategy should be congratulated if the outcome of this is the change of a military organisation into a political entity.
The activities of the MKO to be removed from the lists of terrorist groups is the first step towards getting out of the dammed black tunnel which has turned the days of the Mojahedin as dark as nights. By following this strategy is seems that:
1- MKO will find a new legal identity in Europe and this is the time when one can confront a legally recognisable, accountable body which can be brought to justice and can be expected to take responsibility for what it has done in the last quarter century.
2- Many of those captured in Ashraf Camp will have the opportunity to be accepted somewhere in European countries and therefore have more chance of separating from the organisation and, with the existing guarantees by human rights organisations such as the Red Cross, one can expect that with emphasis on their right to think independently and choose independently, they will be able to choose their path for a better future without being forced to return from Iraq to Iran.
3- Above all, by coming off the lists of terrorist organisations, the MKO will become a political organisation and with the change of the head of the organisation one can hope that they would move towards normality and distance themselves from cult culture and cultish practices.
Iran has expressed formal protest to Italy for its support for the terrorist Mojahedin Khalq Organization (MKO), Foreign Ministry spokesman, Hassan Qashqavi, said on Monday.
Qashqavi made the remarks commenting on Rome’s recent decision to unfreeze the terrorist group’s assets.
MKO is recognized as a terrorist group for many cases of bombings, killings and attacks against civilians and government officials.
The group is also well known for collaboration with Iraqi dictator Saddam Hossein to suppress the Iraqi Kurds.
"We have expressed our protest through diplomatic channels to say that the sectarian and terrorist nature of MKO has not changed," he said in his weekly press conference.
Noting that MKO was responsible for killing of 12,000 innocent Iranian, Kurd and Iraqi Shiite people, Qashqavi said the group is still in the list of terrorist organizations for its crimes.
"The Western intelligence agencies have massive information about MKO’s crimes and cannot claim that it has gone through any change," the spokesman added.