Editor, Author at DeList MEK

Tehran’s Anti-MeK Propaganda Machine

October 27, 2011 by Raymond Tanter

THE NATIONAL INTEREST

If disinformation is defined as deliberate and covert efforts to plant false information to bias media reporting and intelligence collection, the UN’s Durban conferences constitute a prime example. Although organized around an “anti-racist” agenda, they focus on ways to delegitimize Israel and are an icon of intolerance.

A participant in the Durban conferences is the Islamic Republic of Iran. Just as it tries to delegitimize Israel, Iran does the same to its opposition while portraying itself as defender of human rights. By releasing American hostages as a “humanitarian” gesture to “improve” the standing of the regime as President Ahmadinejad arrived at the UN, Tehran shows it is a past master of propaganda.

The Islamic Republic treats Israel and Iranian oppositionists in the same way because both are committed to the rule of law rather than to rule by clerics. In research for my forthcoming book on how to facilitate Iranian democracy, I concluded that the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MeK), an Iranian opposition group, is genuinely committed to democracy and not pretending just to gain support. My conclusions echoed those of under secretary of state George Ball, who stated in 1981 that the MeK intended to replace the Islamist regime “with a modernized Shiite Islam drawing its egalitarian principles from Koranic sources rather than Marx,” and of a State Department report of 1984 asserting: “The Mujahedeen unsuccessfully sought a freely elected constituent assembly to draft a constitution.”

The Iranian regime also misinforms publics, delegitimizes and seeks to destroy the MeK because it challenges clerical rule. By contrast, other dissident organizations, such as the Iranian Green Movement faction headed by Mir Hossein Mousavi, accept clerical rule.

Intelligence communities are targets of Iran’s disinformation. Consider a letter of August 2, 2011, called the “Joint Experts’ Statement on the Mujahedin-e Khalq.” One signatory stands out because of his distinguished background in intelligence: Paul Pillar, former National Intelligence Officer for the Near East and South Asia and now at Georgetown University.

The letter repeats false allegations of the Iranian regime, such as, “Widespread Iranian distaste for the MeK has been cemented by MeK’s numerous terrorist attacks against innocent Iranian civilians.” It resembles regime propaganda against the MeK; see an allegation in the Fars News Agency, the Islamic Republic’s radio and television network, which broadcast alleged statements of two MeK members who “confessed” they had planned to set off homemade bombs in Iran during June 2010. The broadcast includes an interview with Intelligence Minister Moslehi. But when recounting “terrorism” of the MeK, he only pointed to the group’s political and public-relations activities, including sending information outside the country, rather than actions against civilians.

A search of the Worldwide Incidents Tracking System for that period fails to link the MeK to the alleged incident described in the Fars Broadcast. Since 2001, there have not been any military attacks by the MeK, even against regime targets, much less against civilians. Consequently, there is growing bipartisan support for removing the terrorist tag on the MeK, e.g., at least 96 members of Congress, including Chairs of the House Select Intelligence, Armed Services and Foreign Affairs committees.

As Iranian-Americans rallied in pro-MeK protests against Ahmadinejad when he spoke at the UN in 2010 and 2011, such well-attended rallies indicate support for the MeK among émigrés, which in turn can be read as evidence of support within Iran. One Iranian specialist who studies the MeK also finds support for the organization in Iran: Patrick Clawson of The Washington Institute for Near East Policy states:

One of the signs that the MEK still has supporters in Iran is that they occasionally provide blockbuster revelations about Iranian clandestine activities. None was more explosive than their revelations about the Iranian nuclear centrifuges at Natanz—revelations that led to inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the subsequent unraveling of Iran’s eighteen-year tissue of lies about its nuclear activities, repeatedly condemned by the IAEA and the U.N. Security Council.

More recently, based on similar MeK sources, there was an August 2007 revelation about how the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) dodged international sanctions by using front companies to import nuclear enrichment equipment and take over the Iranian oil and gas sectors, mainstays of the economy. In October 2007, the U.S. Treasury imposed sanctions on the IRGC.

Another revelation on October 14, 2011, exposed the role of the IRGC-Quds Force (QF) in a plot to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador to the United States and blow up the Saudi Embassy in Washington. That disclosure reinforced additional sanctions Treasury placed on the IRGC-QF three days earlier.

And what is Tehran’s response to evidence of complicity in the assassination plot? The regime blames Israel and the United States and asserts MeK involvement. The State Department promptly denied MeK responsibility and accused Tehran of “fabricating news stories” and spreading “disinformation” to exploit skepticism about the plot.

In its efforts to suppress dissent, the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS) shapes opinion about the MeK throughout the world. The MOIS also targets the American intelligence community. The ministry plants false stories in the media; then they are used by U.S. intelligence to justify a false narrative against the MeK.

On September 12, 2007, the Mehr News Agency, a MOIS news outlet, announced that before one of the bombings in Karbala, closed-circuit cameras around the Imam Hossein shrine caught a woman and a youngster gathering information from various entrances of the shrine: “After their arrest, it became clear that they had been sent by the Mojahedin Khalq Organization [MeK] to locate ways to sneak into the shrine for terrorist operations, ”states Mehr.

Iran’s Habilian Society, a regime-sponsored group posing as a human-rights organization, published a U.S. Federal Appeals Court’s description of declassified American documents. One carried Iranian stories alleging MeK involvement in Karbala. Several state-run media reproduced the report. On August 14, 2010, Fars wrote:

According to reports recently published by the U.S. intelligence community, the Monafeqin [MeK] maintain their readiness to conduct terrorist attacks and resort to violence; based on recently declassified documents, the U.S. intelligence community emphasized…that…[the MeK] claim regarding having voluntarily renounced violence in 2001 was nothing but a hoax, and this organization maintains its capability to conduct terrorism.

The U.S. intelligence community classified a news account that had been planted in the media by the Iranian regime, allowing it to complete a disinformation cycle—a news-intelligence-news loop. The MOIS plants false allegations in its media, which become classified U.S. documents in the middle and end with Tehran reporting declassified U.S. intelligence as “proof” of MeK involvement in terrorist planning. But during this time period, the MeK in Iraq was under U.S. or Iraqi electronic surveillance. Thus, the MeK could not secretly plan or implement attacks on Karbala without being detected.

Under pressure of the Federal Court order, the State Department on May 20, 2011, released additional classified documents relevant to the terrorist designation of the MeK. One was an AP report of February 9, 2008, about alleged MeK involvement in Karbala plotting. In addition to the irony of classifying a public report later used to justify redesignating the MeK, the report also recalled statements about MeK training of suicide bombers placed in the media by Tehran.

General James Conway, U.S. Marine Corps (retired), former commandant of the Marine Corps who participated in the 2003 invasion of Iraq and the first battle of Fallujah, paints a picture of disinformation by the Iranian regime against the MeK:

The MOIS plants stories in the press of potential threats faced by American military commanders. And then the MOIS goes to those individuals and says, ‘You know, Camp Ashraf, where MeK members reside in Iraq, is a den for suicide bombers. The MeK is training them, and that’s a threat to American forces.’

Regarding Paul Pillar, he is a noted critic of “politicization of intelligence”—and thus it is surprising to find his name among those who wish to keep the MeK listed as a terrorist group. Because the absence of terrorism or terrorist activities during a legally relevant period of two years prior to a redesignation decision does not support maintaining the MeK on the list and there is hard public evidence of a political motivation for the listing, those who oppose politicization of intelligence should also support removal of the MeK from the Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO) list.

As Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton makes her decision whether to remove the MeK, there is also a need to encourage others to act against bona fide terrorists. So long as the MeK is on the terrorist list despite its absence of terrorism and terrorist activities, the list is politically suspect. And if a decision to redesignate a group as terrorist were made on political grounds instead of evidence, the list would become a political instrument and reduce counterterrorism utility.

Finally, as the State Department dithers in its decision to remove the MeK terrorist designation, Tehran delegitimizes its main opposition, and the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps-Quds Force pressures Baghdad to destroy members of the MeK in Camp Ashraf Iraq near the Iranian border.

Monday: Muhammad Sahimi, lead political columnist for Tehran Bureau, responds to Dr. Tanter.

Raymond Tanter served on National Security Council staff and as personal representative of the Secretary of Defense to arms control talks in the Reagan-Bush administration. A professor emeritus at the University of Michigan, he is currently an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. His most recent book is Terror Tagging of an Iranian Opposition Organization (Iran Policy Committee, December 2011).

http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/tehrans-anti-mek-propaganda-machine-6097%3Fpage%3D2?page=1

Filed Under: Luminaries, News

Opposition group could give Iran trouble

October 24, 2011 by Hugh Shelton

The foiled plot by agents of the Iranian regime to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States has officials in the Obama Administration furiously scratching their heads for an “ appropriate” response.

All too often with Iranian provocations, U.S. policy options swing ineffectually between the uncreative (economic sanctions) to the unrealistic (military strikes). One option sure to get the attention of the ruling mullahs in Tehran — and that could help set the stage for a future democratic transition there — is to unleash Iran’s main opposition group, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MeK), which remains constrained by an ill-advised U.S. policy.

The MeK was put on the U.S. list of “Foreign Terrorist Organizations” during the Clinton administration as a well-intentioned but naive attempt to gain the confidence of Iran’s new and, it was hoped, reform-minded President Khatami. However, Iran continued to be the world’s No. 1 state sponsor of terrorism and continued to develop its nuclear program.

The Bush administration followed suit, fearful that the delisting of the MEK would prompt Tehran to send IEDs to murder U.S. soldiers. That decision was also ill-advised, as the Iranian regime not only sent the deadly explosives to Iraq, but has continued to train, arm and finance an assortment of terrorist groups, which have been responsible for hundreds of U.S. service members being killed or wounded.

Today, 3,400 members of the MeK sit in Camp Ashraf, attacked and massacred as recently as this April by Iran’s proxies in the Iraqi military, useless to America’s larger strategic objective to contain and neutralize Iran’s radicalism.

A large number of prominent former national security officials agree that not only is the MeK not a security threat to the U.S. (the group has dedicated itself to secular, democratic governance in Iran), it has already proven an able and willing partner to the U.S. by providing critical intelligence on Iran’s nuclear program, and the regime’s role in attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq.

So what’s the hold up?

While the Federal Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C. ruled in July 2010 that the U.S. government had erred in not delisting the MeK and remanded the case to the State Department for a thorough review, the department has yet to announce its decision.

A well-organized lobbying effort, again by proxies of Iran operating freely in the U.S., has mischaracterized the MeK as a cult with terrorist intentions. But this runs counter to all of the experience by the top brass of the U.S. military as well as intelligence officials who have worked closely with and studied the MeK over the years. It also flies in the face of eight different court rulings in the United Kingdom, the European Union and France, which have resulted in the group’s delisting in those countries.

The still-unraveling plot against the Saudi ambassador demonstrates the skill and reach of the Iranian regime in attempting to threaten and destabilize the U.S and our allies. It is somewhat ironic that while Tehran’s agents are running loose in this country, hatching terrorist bombings and assassinations of foreign diplomats, our government has shackled the main opposition, which the mullahs fear the most.

It is time to revisit this policy. While the administration, obviously caught off guard, is scrambling to find the proper response, delisting the MeK is the strongest signal the U.S. can send to the mullahs of Tehran. The timing could not be better.

Gen. Hugh Shelton is the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. This article was originally published in The Charlotte Observer.

http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/editorials/2011/10/24/opposition-group-could-give-iran-trouble.html

Filed Under: Luminaries, News Tagged With: Blacklist, Camp Ashraf, Delist MEK, FTO, Iran, Iranian Resistance, Iraq, MEK, MKO, Mojahedin, Mujahedeen, Mujahedin, NCRI, PMOI, Secretary Clinton, Terrorism

Iranian Americans call on U.S. to protect Iranian exiles in Iraq

October 23, 2011 by Katherine Shaver

THE WASHINGTON POST

Hundreds of Iranian Americans rallied outside the White House on Saturday, saying they’re worried that the Obama administration’s newly announced plan to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq by year’s end will leave 3,400 Iranian exiles vulnerable in a settlement outside Baghdad.

The protesters also called on the Obama administration to remove Mujahedin-e Khalq, or MEK, the group affiliated with the exiles, from the State Department’s list of foreign terrorist organizations. The designation, protesters said, gives the Iraqi government an excuse to persecute residents of Camp Ashraf, which has been more like a small city, 40 miles north of Baghdad, since the mid-1980s.

Supporters from the Washington area and across the country said Iraqi forces are not allowing medicine into the 10-square-mile Ashraf compound and have twice attacked its unarmed residents since July 2009, killing about 45 people and injuring hundreds. Many protesters said they fear a massacre there after U.S. troops leave Iraq.

Former Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge speaks to a crowd of hundreds protesting in front of the White House in Washington Saturday, Oct. 22, 2011. Ridge spoke in support of the call for the de-listing of an Iranian opposition group, Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) from the U.S. terror list. The group also called on President Barack Obama to protect Ashraf, the Iranian refugee camp in Iraq. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

“Whenever the U.S. says ‘Don’t execute these people’ or ‘Don’t send them back to Iran,’ they [Iraqi authorities] can say ‘Why not? We’re killing terrorists for you,’ ” said Amir Emadi, a graduate student from San Diego. His parents and 19 relatives live in Ashraf.

MEK formed in Iran in the 1960s to overthrow the U.S.-backed shah, and in the 1970s it assassinated several U.S. military personnel and American civilians working in Tehran, according to a 2007 State Department report. It also “supported the violent takeover in 1979 of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran,” the report said.

In the mid-1980s, the group moved to Iraq, where it helped Saddam Hussein’s regime fight in Iraq’s war against Iran.

After the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the United States agreed to protect the residents of Ashraf if MEK gave up its weapons. The United States transferred Ashraf to Iraqi control in 2009. Iraq’s government, eyeing MEK’s past affiliation with Hussein, has tried to make the Ashraf residents leave.

Obama administration officials have said the MEK, headquartered in Paris, has been listed as a foreign terrorist organization since 1997 because of its history of violence. The State Department reportsaid “MEK’s leadership and members across the world maintain the capacity and will to commit terrorist acts in Europe, the Middle East, the United States, Canada and beyond.”

On Saturday, joined by former Homeland Security secretary Tom Ridge and former Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell, several protesters said recent allegations of an Iranian plot to kill the Saudi ambassador to Washington prove that the Obama administration needs to take a harder line.

“You cannot negotiate with Iran!” Ridge exclaimed to cheers, beating drums and chants of “MEK, yes. Mullahs, no! They are terrorists. They must go!”

Since renouncing violence in 2001, protesters said, MEK has not been linked to any attacks.

Demonstrators chant during a march in Washington after rallying in front of the White House Saturday, Oct. 22, 2011. Hundreds of people rallied, demanding that an Iranian opposition group, Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) be removed from a U.S. terror list. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

At Homeland Security, Ridge was given a daily list of terrorist threats, he said. “Never once did I see a threat to the people of the U.S. from the people of Camp Ashraf,” he told the crowd.

A similar protest outside the State Department in August drew thousands. Saturday’s protesters on Pennsylvania Avenue hoisted yellow flags saying “De-list MEK” and “Protect Ashraf,” as curious tourists looked on. The rally was organized by the Iranian American Professionals and Scholars of Maryland.

Rally leaders said the United States should protect Ashraf with its own troops or urge United Nations security forces to guard it until the exiles can be repatriated.

“We gave our word to protect these people,” Rendell said.

Majid Sadeghpour, a pharmacist who lives in Falls Church, said his brother was executed in Iran in 1989 after being imprisoned for carrying an MEK newspaper. The MEK’s listing as a terrorist group undermines the work of those who want to see Iran governed by a secular democracy, he said.

“We can’t do that,” Sadeghpour said, “when our most organized, capable resistance has been tagged as terrorists.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/iranian-americans-call-on-us-to-protect-iranian-exiles-in-iraq/2011/10/22/gIQAJotj7L_story.html

Filed Under: October 22 Rally Tagged With: Blacklist, Camp Ashraf, Delist MEK, FTO, Iran, Iranian Resistance, Iraq, MEK, MKO, Mojahedin, Mujahedeen, Mujahedin, NCRI, PMOI, Secretary Clinton, Terrorism

Hundreds Rally For Iranian Opposition

October 23, 2011 by Matt Laslo

WAMU Radio

Hundreds of Iranian Americans rallied in front of the White House Saturday demanding the Obama administration do more to help the Iranian resistance movement.

The protestors are asking the U.S. government to take the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) off the State Department’s list of terrorist organizations. The group was once allied with Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi regime, but MEK officials say they renounced violence a decade ago.

Former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge was among the protesters. He says U.S. officials haven’t been helping the process.

“The State Department has been horribly naïve – not just this administration but the previous administration – thinking that you negotiate with Iran,” says Ridge.

Amir Emadi traveled to D.C. from San Diego to pressure the administration to assist protestors in Iran.

“I think that the Iranian people deserve a lot more attention than does the Iranian government,” says Emadi.

International attention came back on Iran after U.S. officials foiled an alleged plot to assassinate the Saudi Arabian ambassador at a restaurant in D.C. But for these Iranian Americans their native country never left their minds.

http://wamu.org/news/11/10/23/hundreds_rally_for_iranian_opposition

Hundreds rally in support of Iranian opposition

October 22, 2011 by Editor

ASSOCIATED PRESS

WASHINGTON (AP) — Hundreds of people rallied outside the White House on Saturday, calling on President Barack Obama to remove an Iranian opposition group once allied with Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi regime from the U.S. list of terrorist organizations.

Former Pennsylvania Govs. Tom Ridge and Ed Rendell were among the speakers urging the U.S. to take the Mujahedin-e Khalq off the State Department’s list. Ridge, a Republican, was the nation’s first homeland security secretary. Rendell is a top Democrat who helped elect Obama.

“The only group that should be on the list is the country of Iran itself, under the rule of the mullahs,” Ridge said, noting recent U.S. allegations of a foiled Iranian plot to assassinate Saudi Arabia’s ambassador in Washington.

The U.S. added MEK to its terrorist list in 1997. But last year a federal court ordered the State Department to reconsider and meanwhile the group has rallied many members of Congress and former high-ranking U.S. officials to its cause.

Delisting would allow the Paris-based group to raise money and operate in the U.S., which it is currently prohibited from doing.

The MEK carried out a series of bombings and assassinations against Iran’s clerical regime in the 1980s and fought alongside Saddam’s forces in the Iran-Iraq war. But the group says it renounced violence in 2001.

Ridge and Rendell said the MEK has not been linked to any terrorist attacks since that time. They pointed out that the European Union and the United Kingdom have concluded that the MEK is not a terrorist organization and called on Obama to reach the same decision.

Critics of the MEK say it has cult-like characteristics and that delisting it would be seen even by moderate Iranians as an endorsement by the U.S. of terrorism. A 2010 State Department report on the MEK said: “The group’s worldwide campaign against the Iranian government uses propaganda and terrorism to achieve its objectives.”

Demonstrators protest in front of the White House during a freedom rally outside in Washington Saturday, Oct. 22, 2011. Hundreds of people rallied, demanding that an Iranian opposition group, Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) be removed from a U.S. terror list. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

MEK spokesman Ali Safavi called the State Department’s description “a political statement and not a factual one.” He said the group would not have such broad Congressional support if it was engaged in terrorist activities.

Saturday’s noisy protest took place outside the wrought iron gates of the White House.

“We want President Obama to hear us,” said Rendell, a former Democratic Party national chairman.

Obama left the White House for the drive to Andrews Air Force Base in suburban Maryland to play golf as the demonstration began, and it’s not clear if he heard any of it.

During the rally, the mostly Iranian-American crowd broke into regular chants of “MEK, yes. Mullahs, no. They are terrorists. They must go,” and “President Obama, listen to us. MEK listing is unjust.”

The event was organized by the Iranian American Professionals and Scholars of Maryland.

Organizers say the MEK was put on the terror list to appease Iranian leaders, but that has only given the regime an excuse to arrest and kill dissidents in Iran and Iraq. They contend that delisting would strengthen a major Iranian opposition group.

The MEK has revealed the existence of several important Iranian nuclear facilities.

U.S. officials say that Iran is laying the groundwork for a nuclear weapons program, although its leaders may not have decided to build a bomb. Iran says its nuclear ambitions are entirely peaceful.

Speakers at the protest also urged the U.S. to continue supporting more than 3,000 former MEK fighters and others living at Camp Ashraf near Iraq’s border with Iran. The Iraqi government wants to close the camp and Iraqi security forces have twice raided Ashraf, most recently in April. The U.N. said at least 34 people were killed in that incident.

The U.S. has pledged to protect camp residents from violence, but those rallying outside the White House said Obama’s announcement of a complete pullout of U.S. troops from Iraq by the end of the year could make that promise difficult to keep.

Iran exiles demand delay of Iraq camp closure

October 22, 2011 by AFP

Demonstrators holds up petitions to President Barack Obama to protect the Iranian Ashraf refugee camp in Iraq during a freedom rally in front of the White House in Washington on Saturday, Oct. 22, 2011. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

AGENCE FRANCE PRESSE

WASHINGTON, October 22, 2011 (AFP) – Hundreds of protesters gathered Saturday at the White House to demand that the closure of a refugee camp for Iranian exiles in Iraq be postponed, arguing that a massacre will occur when US troops leave.

Wearing yellow hats and waving banners demanding “protection for Camp Ashraf,” the demonstrators also called on US President Barack Obama to remove the People’s Mujahedeen of Iran group from a blacklist of terror groups.

“By illegally insisting on the continued listing of the PMOI, the United States has blocked the path to change in Iran while paving the way for a massacre in Ashraf,” the movement’s leader Maryam Rajavi said in a message broadcast live from Paris, where she lives in exile.

Rajavi has previously said that Iraqi forces have finished training for an assault on the camp, home for the past 30 years to 3,400 Iranian dissidents who are facing expulsion by year’s end on the orders of the Baghdad government.

On Saturday, she asked the United States, United Nations and other governments to pressure Iraq to push back the December 31 deadline for closure of the camp, and also asked that UN monitors be sent to Ashraf.
A similar demonstration took place earlier this week in Brussels.

The camp, which has become a mounting international problem, has been in the spotlight since an April raid by Iraqi security forces left 34 people dead and scores injured, triggering sharp condemnation.

The camp was set up when Iraq and Iran were at war in the 1980s by the People’s Mujahedeen and later came under US control until January 2009, when US forces transferred security for the camp to Iraq.

The group has been on the US government terrorist list since 1997.

http://en.cumhuriyet.com/?hn=287680

Demonstrators Call for Iranian Opposition Group to Be Removed From US List of Terrorist Organizations

October 22, 2011 by Editor

FoxNews

[oqeygallery id=2]

WASHINGTON – Hundreds of people rallied outside the White House on Saturday, calling on President Barack Obama to remove an Iranian opposition group once allied with Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi regime from the U.S. list of terrorist organizations.

Delisting would allow the Paris-based group to raise money and operate in the U.S., which it is currently prohibited from doing.

Critics of the MEK say it has cult-like characteristics and that delisting would be seen even by moderate Iranians as a U.S. endorsement of terror. A 2007 State Department report said the MEK maintained “the capacity and will” to mount attacks in the Middle East, Europe and the U.S.

Saturday’s noisy protest took place outside the wrought iron gates of the White House.

“We want President Obama to hear us,” said Rendell, a former Democratic Party national chairman.

Obama left the White House for the drive to Andrews Air Force Base in suburban Maryland to play golf as the demonstration began, and it’s not clear if he heard any of it.

The event was organized by the Iranian American Professionals and Scholars of Maryland.

The MEK has revealed the existence of several important Iranian nuclear facilities.

U.S. officials say that Iran is laying the groundwork for a nuclear weapons program, although its leaders may not have decided to build a bomb. Iran says its nuclear ambitions are entirely peaceful.

Grassroots Campaign to Liberate Iran Spreads Across America

October 21, 2011 by Iranian Community of Northern California

PRNewswire

More than 30,000 Sign Petition to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton

BERKELEY, Calif., Oct. 21, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — A groundswell of American people from all walks of life have petitioned the U.S. Government to remove the main Iranian opposition organization, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), from the State Department’s Foreign Terrorist organization list. The more than 30,000 people who signed the letter to Secretary of State Clinton join a growing roster of prominent American national security experts and human rights advocates who believe the designation is unjustifiable, inhumane and counter to U.S. interests. More than 4,000 parliamentarians around the world have called for the delisting MEK in parliamentary declarations and one hundred thousand Iranians rallied on June 18, 2011 in Paris demanding delisting.

The petition is to be delivered to the State Department for the attention of Secretary Clinton next week.

As the main opposition group to the regime in Iran, the MEK has endorsed democratic institutions, secular governance, an end to Iran’s nuclear program, and broad expansion of human rights. The group has come under violent persecution by the Iran regime and its proxies, including two major attacks against the group’s increasingly vulnerable base in Iraq known as Camp Ashraf.

The United Kingdom and the European Union removed the MEK from their blacklists in 2008 and 2009, following findings by courts that the group is not engaged in terrorism.

“Nearly 3,400 members of the MEK presently live in Camp Ashraf in Iraq. In 2009, against the wishes of the residents, the U.S. transferred the responsibility for protection of Ashraf to the Iraqi authorities. Since then, there have been two unprovoked attacks by Iraqi forces, killing dozens of innocent and unarmed residents and seriously wounding hundreds. We fear that another attack on Camp Ashraf is imminent if immediate action, including delisting, is not taken,” said Ross Amin, Vice President of the Iranian-American Community of Northern California.

While under U.S. protection, every resident of Ashraf signed an agreement in which they confirmed their rejection of violence and terrorism. In return the U.S. promised to protect them until their final disposition.

Still, the perilous situation at Ashraf remains a matter of grave concern, and the signers of the petition called it the “legal and moral duty” of the United States to protect the residents of the Camp.

SOURCE: Iranian Community of Northern California

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/grassroots-campaign-to-liberate-iran-spreads-across-america-132322813.html

Filed Under: News Tagged With: Blacklist, Camp Ashraf, Delist MEK, FTO, Iran, Iranian Resistance, Iraq, MEK, MKO, Mojahedin, Mujahedeen, Mujahedin, NCRI, PMOI, Secretary Clinton, Terrorism

Mislabeling Iran’s enemies

October 21, 2011 by Gen. Hugh Shelton

NEWSDAY

The death last week of Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi means focus will soon shift back to the single most significant threat America is facing: Iran. Officials in the Obama administration are still scratching their heads for an appropriate response to the foiled plot by agents of the Iranian regime to assassinate the ambassador of Saudi Arabia in Washington. All too often with Iranian provocations, U.S. policy options swing ineffectually between the uncreative (economic sanctions) to the unrealistic (military strikes).

One option sure to get the attention of the ruling mullahs in Tehran — and that could help set the stage for a democratic transition there — is to unleash Iran’s main opposition group, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), which remains constrained by an ill-advised U.S. policy.

The MEK was put on the U.S. government’s list of foreign terrorist organizations during the Clinton administration as a well-intentioned but naive attempt to gain the confidence of Iran’s new and, it was hoped, reform-minded President Mohammad Khatami. However, Iran continued to be the world’s No. 1 state sponsor of terrorism and to develop its nuclear program.

The Bush administration left the group on the list, fearful that delisting it would prompt Tehran to escalate its efforts to murder U.S. soldiers in Iraq. That decision was also ill-advised; the Iranian regime not only sent explosives to Iraq, but has continued to train, arm and finance an assortment of terrorist groups, which have been responsible for the deaths and injuries of hundreds of U.S. service members.

Today, 3,400 members of the MEK sit in Camp Ashraf, their Iraq-based home for the past quarter century, after they fled persecution in Iran. After protecting them for six years, the U.S. military handed over the camp to the Iran-backed Iraqi government, which was responsible for two deadly attacks on the camp. At Camp Ashraf, they are useless to America’s larger strategic objective to contain and neutralize Iran’s radicalism.

A large number of prominent former national security officials, including former directors of the CIA and the FBI, James Woolsey and Louis Freeh, President Barack Obama‘s former National Security Adviser James Jones, and President George W. Bush‘s Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge, agree that the MEK is not a threat to the United States. They point out that the group renounced violence against the Iranian regime years ago and has dedicated itself to secular, democratic governance there. It has already proven an able partner by providing critical intelligence on Iran’s nuclear program and the regime’s role in attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq.

So what’s the holdup?

After the MEK appealed a 2009 decision by the State Department to maintain its designation, the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington ruled that the government had erred and remanded the case to the State Department for a review. Fifteen months after the ruling, the department has yet to announce its decision. Rep. Ted Poe (R-Texas) has introduced a congressional resolution urging the State Department to delist the MEK, and it has garnered 95 co-sponsors, including the chairmen of the Armed Services and Select Intelligence committees.

A well-organized lobbying effort by proxies of Iran operating in the United States has tried to demonize the MEK as a cult with terrorist intentions. But this runs counter to all of the experience by the top brass of the U.S. military, as well as intelligence officials who’ve worked with and studied the MEK over the years. It also flies in the face of eight different court rulings in the United Kingdom, the European Union and France, which have resulted in the group’s delisting.

This propaganda war has served Iran faithfully by keeping the MEK in shackles. The MEK’s terrorist designation gives Iran a license to kill its members at will. In addition to the dozens who have already died in Camp Ashraf, many more were hanged by Iranian authorities.

The still-unraveling plot against the Saudi ambassador demonstrates the reach of the Iranian regime in its attempts to destabilize the United States and our allies. It’s ironic that while Tehran’s agents are running loose in this country and may be planning terrorist acts, our government has hampered the opposition the mullahs fear most.

It’s time to revisit this policy. Delisting the MEK is not only warranted by law, it’s the strongest signal the United States can send to the mullahs of Tehran. The timing could not be better.

Gen. Hugh Shelton was chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1997 to 2001.

http://www.newsday.com/opinion/oped/shelton-mislabeling-iran-s-enemies-1.3264024

For an effective response to Iran, remove MeK from terror list

October 20, 2011 by Gen. Hugh Shelton

THE CHARLOTTE OBSERVER

General Hugh Shelton, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

The foiled plot by agents of the Iranian regime to assassinate the Saudi Ambassador to the U.S. has officials in the Obama administration furiously scratching their heads for an “appropriate” response. All too often with Iranian provocations, U.S. policy options swing ineffectually between the uncreative (economic sanctions) to the unrealistic (military strikes). One option sure to get the attention of the ruling mullahs in Tehran – and that could help set the stage for a future democratic transition there – is to unleash Iran’s main opposition group, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MeK), which remains constrained by an ill-advised U.S. policy.

The MeK was put on the U.S. list of “Foreign Terrorist Organizations” during the Clinton administration as a well-intentioned but naïve attempt to gain the confidence of Iran’s new and, it was hoped, reform-minded President Khatami. However, Iran continued to be the world’s number one state sponsor of terrorism and continued to develop its nuclear program.

The Bush administration followed suit, fearful that the delisting of the MEK would prompt Tehran to send IEDs to murder U.S. soldiers. That decision was also ill-advised as the Iranian regime not only sent the deadly explosives to Iraq, but has continued to train, arm and finance an assortment of terrorist groups, which have been responsible for hundreds of U.S. service members being killed or wounded.

So what’s the hold up?

While the Federal Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C. ruled in July 2010 that the U.S. government had erred in not delisting the MEK and remanded the case to the State Department for a thorough review, the department has yet to announce its decision. A well-organized lobbying effort, again by proxies of Iran operating freely in the U.S., has mischaracterized the MeK as a cult with terrorist intentions. But this runs counter to all of the experience by the top brass of the U.S. military as well as intelligence officials who have worked closely with and studied the MeK over the years. It also flies in the face of eight different court rulings in the UK, EU and France, which have resulted in the group’s delisting in those countries.

The still-unraveling plot against the Saudi Ambassador demonstrates the skill and reach of the Iranian regime in attempting to threaten and destabilize the U.S and our allies. It is somewhat ironic that while Tehran’s agents are running loose in this country, hatching terrorist bombings and assassinations of foreign diplomats, our government has shackled the main opposition, which the mullahs fear the most. It is time to revisit this policy. While the administration, obviously caught off guard, is scrambling to find the proper response, delisting the MeK is the strongest signal the U.S. can send to the mullahs of Tehran. The timing could not be better.

Gen. Hugh Shelton is the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff