March 29, 2024

Why Tehran Cannot Stop Nuclear Enrichment

 OfficialWire.com

Iran has posed the most serious nuclear challenge to the international community, and experts believe that it is only steps away from getting the nuclear weapons capability. Yet, international efforts have to date failed to stop the mullahs and evidence shows that they are carrying out secret work to further enrich uranium.

It is also too clear that Tehran does not need nuclear energy. Iran is the second-largest crude producer in the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) after Saudi Arabia. The country’s Deputy Oil Minister Ahmad Qalebani said that Iran’s oil reserves has reached 155 billion barrels following the recent discovery of new onshore oil and gas fields in southern and western Iran with reserves of 500,000 million oil barrels and five trillion cubic feet gas respectively.

Sounding worried about Iran’s nuclear activities, this is what the former deputy director of the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, Olli Heinonen, said in an interview with Spiegel on October 6th, explaining how he felt they were tricked and misled:

“It’s undeniable that Iran’s nuclear program is far more advanced than it was in 2003, when the discovery of the Natanz facility brought it to the IAEA’s attention. At the time, uranium enrichment tests were being carried out in secret on a small scale. But at the end of 2003, the Iranians admitted they were also planning to set up a heavy-water reactor in Arak to generate plutonium.

Today the facts are as follows: The conversion plant in Isfahan has produced 371 tons of uranium hexafluoride. Some 8,000 centrifuges in Natanz are being used to enrich this raw material. In February 2010, Iran began increasing enrichment to 20 percent. That’s a significant step closer to making an atomic bomb because it takes only a few months to turn that into weapons-grade material.”

 In september, the  head of the United Nations nuclear agency announced plans to publish new information backing up his belief that Iran may be working on a nuclear warhead—developments that leaves his organization “increasingly concerned.” 

There are two important questions that need to be answered:

One. Why does Tehran not accept to stop nuclear enrichment?

Two. Does Iran have an Achilles’ heel to force it stop its drive to become a nuclear power?          

To answer the above questions, we need to look inside Iran.

First: The mullahs are facing a very young population (more than 70% below 30 years of age), who are almost entirely against the regime. The protests in the Iranian streets two years ago, showed the threat facing Tehran. The demonstrations have to date been stopped by brutal crackdown and wide spread torture of those arrested in the prisons, but the wind of changes in the Arab world is certainly not blowing against the regime in Iran.

The mullahs utterly need a way out. Capability to produce nuclear weapons is being seen as a solution to create crisis and survive. Tehran is too weak and is surrounded by too many problems to be able to negotiate stopping nuclear enrichment, no matter how many carrots it is offered.

Second: Tehran has a very hurt able Achilles’ heel that it has to be attentive of. The weakness, which is well recognized by the mullahs themselves, is their main opposition group, the MEK.

Shackling the MEK is a must for the mullahs as they feel the threat facing them inside country and they experienced it two years ago on the streets of the capital. The opposition must be kept under maximum pressure no matter what and that is the reason why the mullahs lobbies in Europe and the US, have clear-cut outlines to work with. The MEK was put in the FTO list in 1997 when the Clinton administration, keen on placating Tehran’s regime through various “goodwill gestures,” designated the group as a terrorist organization. Since then, the MEK has won every legal challenge it filed, whether in the United States, the United Kingdom, France or the European Union. Eight European courts have reviewed thousands of pages of classified and unclassified materials and have concluded that the MEK is simply not involved in terrorism.

The correct policy towards the mullahs in Iran is to recognize their Achilles’ heel. Tehran’s threat is too real but it does not need to be stopped by a war. The impasse can be opened by unshackling the mullahs’ opposition and delisting the MEK before it is too late.

Kambiz Assai is a scholar of Iranian politics living in exile in Britain and a former political prisoner of the religious dictatorship in Iran. He writes about Iranian current events and human rights issues extensively and dreams of returning to a free and democratic Iran.

Tehran’s Slick Way of Demonizing its Opponents

INTELLECTUAL CONSERVATIVE

Barbara Slavin, who has been highly critical of the Iranian opposition organization MEK, has an awfully cozy relationship with the Iranian government.

Barbara Slavin is proud to have maintained a close relationship with Iranian officials. In fact, one reason she has a claim on being an Iran expert is her “access” to such officials. Anyone with remote familiarity with the ruling theocracy in Iran knows that the high-ranking officials in national security and foreign affairs have previously held positions in the intelligence services and the Revolutionary Guards Corps.

Barbara Slavin, as an “Iran expert,” knows well that the transition from the intelligence units and the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) to government positions intensified during Ahmadinejad’s tenure and many of the key governmental positions are now run by former IRGC commanders.

Slavin herself has underscored the Iranian regime’s expediency in recognizing and maintaining their interests. Given the above background, one wonders what interest the Iranian regime has in allowing Slavin to visit Iran, not once or twice, but seven times? It is imperative that if Slavin’s visits would not serve its interests, the Iranian regime would not allow a repeat.

So far as it pertains to developments in Iran and Western policy on Iran, Ms. Slavin was for a while nostalgic about the Khatami and Rafsanjani eras (the regime’s former presidents) as though there was some moderation at work and the opportunity has been missed.

More intriguing is Slavin’s claim that the West and in particular the US are to blame for not offering the Iranian regime more concessions, and had they offered more, the Iranian regime would be more reasonable and logical to deal with and would show better cooperation with the rest of the world and treating its people.

When drawing such a rosy picture of Iran (which is far from the reality), Slavin intentionally ignores the fact that Iran is a theocracy and that its supreme leader always has the last word. What about the IRGC domination of all key governmental positions as well as Iran’s economy? What about the medieval court rulings, e.g., stoning to death? And what about the regime’s persecution of its opposition as mohareb (God’s enemies)?

The truth is that Khatami had an essential role in playing the “bad cop, good cop” game with the West, in order to acquire certain concessions and, in particular, having the main Iranian opposition, the MEK, put on the list of terrorists. He neither could facilitate a change in Iran nor was he really interested in doing so, as his best interests were in securing the very regime.

A few years later, when Ahmadinejad was appointed (elected?), it became very clear that the Iranian regime had planned to confront the international community and that the so-called moderation was only a myth, but Slavin encouraged the U.S. to be more “realistic.” She also has been very active in protecting the Tehran regime by participating in the campaign to defend Iran from economic sanctions and diplomatic isolations. Indeed, Slavin not only promoted the Iranian regime as a strong regional power but taunted the U.S. for not recognizing and respecting its hegemony in the region. Less than a year later, internal uprisings in Iran shook the regime’s foundations to the verge of collapse.

Slavin’s super-friendly relationship with the Iranian regime is best reflected in her rants against the main Iranian opposition, which often echo the regime’s itself.

During Rafsanjani’s and Khatami’s era, when Slavin made most of her high-level visits to Iran, the Iranian Intelligence Ministry devised its 80–20 percent formula.

According to this scheme, the Iranian regime’s contacts were encouraged to rant about non-serious allegations against the Iranian government 80% of the time and spend 20% making very serious accusations against the principal Iranian opposition, The People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). The rationale was: tell the truth 80% of the time and lie 20%, thus avoiding detection and giving a false image of opposing both while keeping the best interests of the regime in mind.

When reviewing Slavin’s writings against the MEK (e.g., her September 28 Inter Press Service [IPS] piece), one can see many similarities between her claims and the Iranian regime’s official propaganda.

Slavin’s biggest criticism of the MEK is that it is a sect. She complemented her claim with the mullahs’ favorite rhetoric – that the MEK does not have a popular support in Iran.
 
The essence of this message is very simple: the Iranian people are not interested in an organized opposition, and they’d be happy with some reforms within the existing theocracy. That is precisely a key 20% claim that makes Slavin and those like her very profitable for the Iranian regime.
 
The sectarianism label first was leveled against the MEK by the Iranian regime. In a Le Figaro interview in December 2008, an Iranian diplomat revealed that the label was invented during Khatami era and was repeated in diplomatic circles to characterize the MEK as a dangerous sect, not a political party.
 
In fact, last June, multiple high-ranking Iranian regime intelligence officials reiterated in TV interviews that they invented and widely propagated the sectarianism characterization as a means of reducing the MEK’s impact on the society.
 
The fact is that the Iranian regime has used every resource and lobbying campaign at its disposal to throw dirt at its main opposition and has spent millions on “research” and “think tank” firms during the past 30 years to draw an evil image of the MEK. The sect label against the Iranian resistance is one result of such campaigns.
 
With respect to the popular base of the MEK in Iran, suffice it to say that it is the oldest and most popular political organization in contemporary Iran that has fought two dictatorships in more than 46 years. Some 120,000 of its members and supporters have been executed throughout Iran, attesting to its widespread base. After the 2009 uprising in Iran, 11 were condemned to death and all were accused of MEK connections. Those condemned to death were executed precisely because of their MEK affiliations. Many are currently imprisoned in Iran because of their MEK sympathies or family connections in Camp Ashraf.
 
The MEK’s social network in Iran is by far the biggest nongovernmental network through which the MEK has been able to reveal more than 80 of Tehran’s nuclear programs, confidential sites, and secret projects.
 
Outside Iran, MEK gatherings have attracted tens of thousands of Iranians in the diaspora. In a gathering in Paris last June, some 100,000 participated, an unprecedented event in modern history. MEK has offices in most European countries and has sympathizers throughout the world. Its supporters are among the best educated and intellectual of the Iranians abroad, who have an extensive communication network.

Those have a deep understanding of the term sect know that it does not fit the MEK and is used against it to justify repression, killings, and restrictions of Camp Ashraf residents.
 
The above said, let me ask Slavin a few questions about the popularity or lack thereof the MEK:

• On what poll or survey is your opinion based? Is it possible under the Iranian regime for the people to freely express their opinion about the opposition? Don’t the Iranian constitution and its supreme leader make it a crime (“mohareb”) punishable by death to have any connection or affiliation with the MEK? Have you conducted a free survey on the campuses during her seven trips to Iran? Or do you expecting your contacts in the Iranian regime to offer a fair assessment of the MEK and its popular support? The main issue in Iran has been and continues to be freedom of expression. That’s is precisely why the Iranian regime resorts to widespread imprisonment, torture, rape, executions, has established so many oppressive units, and spends millions of dollars because it cannot tolerate freedom of expression.

• If the MEK does not have a popular base in Iran, why do high level Iranian regime officials continually warn about the MEK’s threats and its impact on the youth? According to the Wall Street Journal of May 7, 2008, the Western diplomats dealing with Iran have stated that Iran’s number one demand during the meetings has been restricting the MEK.

• If the MEK does not have a popular base in Iran, why are mullahs so concerned about Camp Ashraf and constantly conspiring against it? Didn’t Slavin characterize the Iranian regime as logical? Is it logical to campaign so hysterically against camp Ashraf? How does she explain the contradictions here?

The personality cult charge leveled against Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, the Iranian resistance President-elect, has been one of the anchors of Tehran’s propaganda against the Iranian resistance, one that Slavin repeats.
 
Doesn’t Slavin recognize the right of resistance against the mullahs? If she you do agree that resistance against a tyranny is a right, then an organized resistance will have leader to represent it. Mrs. Rajavi represents the Iranian people’s hope for a regime change and symbolizes a democratic Iran, just as de Gaulle symbolized the French resistance against Nazism.
Another propaganda charge that Slavin levels against the Iranian resistance is that the Ashraf residents are kept in camp against their will. This is an absolute lie propagated by the Iranian regime and its agents in Iraq.
 
How could these individuals be forcefully kept under most horrible and inhuman conditions imposed on Camp Ashraf by Tehran’s Iraqi agents and under a 24/7 emotional torture via 300 loudspeakers deployed around the camp? The truth is that these individuals have made a decisive personal choice to live in a most democratic and modern environment that Ashraf has provided for them, despite all external risks.

All Camp Ashraf residents have been interviewed multiple times by various U.S. officials and government units and were given an opportunity, with U.S. and Iraqi officials present, to exit Ashraf; each and every individual in the camp chose to – indeed insisted – to stay.
 
At the official hearing of the U.S. Congress on July 7,2011, retired Army Colonel Wesley Martin, former base commander, Camp Ashraf for 2005 t0 2006, testified: “One perpetual rumor worthy of specific address concerns members of the MEK being held against their will. I was able to validate through specific occurrences anyone wishing to leave has that choice.”
 
Colonel (now General) David Philips wrote on May 27, 2005: “I am the commander of the 89th Military Police Brigade and in that role was responsible for the safety and security of Camp Ashraf from January-December 2004. Over the year long period I was apprized of numerous reports of torture, concealed weapons and people being held against their will by the leadership of the Mujahedin-e-khalq. I directed my subordinate units to investigate each allegation.  In many cases I personally led inspection teams on unannounced visits to the MEK/PMOI facilities where the alleged abuses were reported to occur. At no time over the 12 month period did we ever discover any credible evidence supporting the allegations raised” … I would not have sanctioned any acts on the part of the MeK/PMOI to hold people against their will. The MEK/PMOI in fact notified us on a routine basis of people who desired to leave the organization and then transported them to our gate … I’ve visited male and female units on a routine basis. Sometimes these visits were announced, but most frequently they were unannounced inspections … Not one time did they (my subordinate units) discover any improper conduct on the part of the MeK/PMOI.” At the end of his letter he stated: “I would like my own daughters to someday visit these units for the cultural exchange.”
 
Col. Julie Norman, the U.S. Commander responsible for protection of Ashraf in 2006, in a Memorandum For Record on August 24, 2006, wrote: “There exists no prison or any obligation to stay in Ashraf; everyone is free to leave PMOI anytime he/she wishes to.” She added: “Normally, PMOI members invite their families, friends, and colleagues who live in Iran or foreign countries to Ashraf for visits.”
 
The above three official statements by three US commanders in charge of Camp Ashraf during 2004–2006 are very telling and contradict that of Slavin.
 
While Camp Ashraf was accessible to outsiders, six Europeans parliamentarian delegations visited Ashraf and documented their observations and talks with the individual camp residents, and all of them contradict Slavin’s baseless claims.

Slavin further blames the MEK for a lack of access by the camp residents to the UNHCR. But the truth is the opposite. The Red Cross did visit the camp and interviewed hundreds of its residents. Lastly, while the camp has been under the Iraqi blockade during the past three years, it has been the camp officials who repeatedly have called for a visit by international organizations, news media, parliamentarian delegations, and camps residents’ families.

As an Iran “expert,” Slavin knows that her reporting on the Iranian resistance best fits the 80–20 formula.

Antonio Stango, a political scientist, lecturer in International Law and Human Rights, is the founder and the Secretary General of the Italian Helsinki Committee, member of the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights. In 2003 he served also as an expert for the EU / TACIS Project “The Legal Protection of Human Rights in the Russian Federation.”

It could be another Srebrenica if MeK is not delisted

StopFundamentalism.com

According to the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Khamenei, the Iranian people don’t want democracy of the Western kind.   They want Sharia law.  

I know who would agree with him:  the taxi driver who, a few weeks ago, drove me from the Iranian resistance demonstration outside the State Department in Washington D. C.   “Iran is a free country,” he said.   “The mullahs are good.   I’ve lived in Iran so I know.”   When was that, I asked.   “In the Shah’s time.”  

When the Shah died the Iranian people may have had reason to hope the mullahs would free them, but they were quickly disappointed, and there has been no improvement since.   To give just one example, there were at least 62 executions in Iran during September.   A free country?

One of the obstacles to making it really free is that the main opposition group, the People’s Mojahedin of Iran, also known as the Mojahedine-e-Khalq, is still on the US list of terrorist organisations, three years after it was removed from the UK list, two and a half years after it was removed from the EU one, and fourteen months after the Court of Appeal in the District of Columbia ruled that there was no justification for keeping it there.

This makes it harder to bring about regime change in Iran, which in turn makes the whole of the Middle East less likely to be stable in the near future.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has granted the status of asylum seekers to the 3,400 Iranian refugees now living in Camp Ashraf, in Iraq.   Now it is time for the Secretary General to take action.  

A UN monitoring force needs to be stationed at the camp, full time.   As long as these innocent people, of whom 36 were murdered and 345 wounded last April, are classified as terrorists, the High Commissioner has admitted that it is hard to find them homes in third party countries, where their safety can be guaranteed.  

The Iraqis, whose forces were responsible for the April attack, have used the terrorist label to justify it.   Meanwhile, at a rally outside the UN Headquarters in New York on 22 September, the former Secretary for Homeland Security, Tom Ridge, declared that the PMOI/MEK surrendered all weapons and pose no threat whatever to the security of the US or anyone else.  

The President-elect of the Iranian Resistance, Mrs Maryam Rajavi, is prevented as a “terrorist” from entering the United States, while President Ahmadinejad, a former torturer at Evin Prison, who claims never to hurt a fly but is happy to order six-year-old children to be hanged, speaks at the United Nations Headquarters.   As Mrs Rajavi told the New York rally by video link, “It is no place for a murderer.”

Camp Ashraf is due to be closed at the end of this year; it could be another Srebrenica if Mek is not delisted. Time is running out. 

Carolyn Beckingham, a British writer and translator of a book called “Eye to Eye of a Monster”, and a human rights activist 

Distinguishing between rumours and facts about the MEK

SCOOP INDEPENDENT NEWS

As the terrorist label of an Iranian opposition group, the Mujahedin-e-khalq (MEK), is up for review by the U.S. State Department, many Iran regime lobbyists in the United States have devoted themselves to prevent the delisting of this organisation. Why these pressure groups and lobbyists have so much against an Iranian opposition group that strives for a democratic Iran at first seems strange. But if we take a close look at the policy suggestions of these pressure groups, such as NIAC, for futile appeasement of the brutal religious dictatorship in Iran, then we begin to understand the special interests involved, further accentuated by direct and indirect Iranian regime funding of such groups and efforts to discredit the MEK.

Furthermore, the world media needs to be more critical in sourcing their news stories on the MEK and should avoid basing their reports on rumours and speculations when there are numerous sources of real information available about this opposition group. News media should present data, facts and structured arguments so that people can build their own opinion rather than being fed rumours. Regarding the MEK, there are numerous facts that need to be clarified which have been ignored or overseen during the past months’ debates.

 Why is the MEK on the terrorist list to begin with? Rumours say that the organisation was involved in the killings of U.S. citizens in Iran in the 1970s, which is why the U.S. State Department has put the MEK on its list of foreign terrorist organisations. However, the facts tell a different story. Mr Martin Indyk, Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs in the Clinton Administration has said “[It] was White House interest in opening up a dialogue with the Iranian government. Top Administration officials saw cracking down on the [MEK], which the Iranians had made clear they saw as a menace, as one way to do so.” With this plan in mind, the U.S. State Department, under Secretary Madeleine Albright, issued a statement in 1997 stating the MEK as a terrorist organisation “as a gesture of good will to Tehran”, a senior administration official has said. The labelling of the MEK as a terrorist organisation by the U.K. and the EU was also requested by the Iranian regime (as confessed by the former British Foreign Minister Jack Straw) and implemented accordingly.

The MEK decided to dispute this allegation in court and in 2008 won the battle and were removed from the list of foreign terrorist organisation in the U.K. and later also in the EU. All courts concluded that there was no evidence supporting that this opposition group was a terrorist organisation. In 2010, a similar legal procedure in the U.S. ended with a federal court in Washington D.C. demanded the U.S. State Department remove the organisation from their list of foreign terrorist organisations.

The rumours about this opposition group are too often made-up stories and fake allegations. These allegations are very similar to those spouted by the Iranian regime during the post-election uprisings in 2009, where the Iranian government blamed the U.S. and the west to have initiated the uprising, and where they blamed BBC for the death of Ms. Neda Agha-Soltan.

One of the most infamous allegations against the MEK is that they are a cult. But the clearest evidence against the MEK being a cult is that they have a very wide support from and actively seeks to engage with society. Their supporters include people from all levels of society and walks of life including prominent artists, academics, lawyers and politicians. Their yearly rally in mid-June hosts more than 100,000 people from all over the globe that come to show their support for this Iranian movement and for the Iranian people.

Numerous politicians, lawyers and prominent people from the international human rights community have spoken at MEK events. Unfortunately, the latest accusation is that these people have been paid to speak on the behalf of the MEK. It is tiring to see this being written and interpreted as something shameful, when it is completely normal and according to all protocols to have expenses covered when invited to speak at symposiums, conferences and meetings; it is something which countless former U.S. officials and politicians do every day. This does not mean that the person has been paid to say specific things; just that he or she has been asked to speak their opinion.

Besides the process of delisting the MEK, new developments for the group are that the United Nation’s High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has finally come to an agreement with the residents of Camp Ashraf, where many MEK members reside, which enables them to apply for refugee status. A statement by the UNHCR says that “there is no formal requirement for individuals to disassociate themselves from the PMOI/MEK in order to apply for refugee status.” As the UNHCR at last agreed to allow the residents to keep their political rights, the residents of Camp Ashraf did not hesitate in applying for refugee status. This is a great step towards the safety of the opposition group and its members in Camp Ashraf. However, the situation in the camp is still urgent and needs immediate action.

The 3,400 Iranian MEK members that reside in this camp in Iraq have previously been attacked by Iraqi forces in at least two raids under which several unarmed residents of the camp were injured and killed. During the latest attack, in April 2011, United Nations officials confirmed the killing of 36 residents and wounding of hundreds. But despite condemnations of the Iraqi raid by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the EU and various parliaments throughout the world, nothing has changed and the residents have been left in mortal danger and their supporters in fear of another attack.

While the UNHCR processes the 3,400 applications for refugee status the lives of the residents of this camp are still in danger and human rights abuses by Iraqi troops continue unabated. Prominent members of the international community suggest that the safety of the residents can be guaranteed if the UNHCR send a monitoring team to Ashraf in cooperation with UNAMI, as their presence would prevent future Iraqi raids and the killings of the residents. In fact, this is probably the only solution for the residents’ safety as guarantees from the Iraqis have proven empty.

The MEK has many supporters inside Iran, despite rumours stating otherwise, and the residents of Camp Ashraf have become a symbol of hope and freedom for many people. The largest sign is the massive effort and resources put down by the Iranian regime to destroy this movement, as they see it being a threat to the ruling mullahs. The Iranian regime has during the past 30 years fed anti-MEK propaganda to the people inside Iran such that it is punishable to use the organisations real name (MEK is called “Monafeghin” by the Iranian regime). Moreover, anybody who has visited Camp Ashraf or has MEK relatives is hunted down and can be imprisoned and even executed because of his or her ties to the organisation.

The rumours and misinformation about the MEK makes the situation for the residents in Camp Ashraf more vulnerable as the international community does not get to hear their side of the story and keep basing much of its reports on these fake allegations. This seems to be the aim of Iran and Iraq as the Iraqi forces are not allowing journalists to enter Camp Ashraf to speak to the residents and has set up electronic jamming devices to stop any communication with the camp. The delisting of the MEK is therefore critical since by keeping the MEK on the list of foreign terrorist organisations, the West is helping the Iranian regime justify the execution of MEK supporters inside Iran, the blockade of Camp Ashraf and future attacks on the 3400 unarmed MEK members in the camp. Above all, delisting is the only just outcome and the only one based on the evidence.

Iranian Political Prisoners: Don’t Mollify our Butchers!

INTELLECTUAL CONSERVATIVE

Iranian political prisoner Sadegh Sistani from the Iranian opposition organization MEK recently escaped. His report? “Hundreds waiting in the gallows while the UN-US welcomes their butcher.”
 
As the motorcade of the Iranian President, Ahmadinejad moved towards the UN General Assembly for a predicted venomous speech and a mockery of World conscience, Iranian state-controlled media announced a new toll of death sentences for a group of 54 activists.

The ruling Iranian regime is an oppressive one that mixes theocracy with autocracy and extreme expansionist ideology that continues to defy the international community. It has proven that it absolutely denies the people and even members of its elite any form of Freedom.
 
I took the opportunity to ask a prominent veteran Iranian political prisoner who escaped torture only last April about the situation of his fellow prisoners back in Iran.

Sadegh Sistani, escaped Iran after enduring years of imprisonment under the present regime.

“There are thousands of political prisoners packed in hundreds of prisons in Iran. Tens of families which include whole families at times affiliated to the MEK, are in deploring inhuman conditions. Women are volatile, and suffer the most. Sexual harassment and misuse have been routine for woman political prisoners. During the 1980 executions of hundreds of MEK affiliates, a Fatwa by Khomeini allowed rape of young girls in order to make sure their spirits would not go to heaven. (They believed that sinned girls would not be allowed to heaven).

Others had their blood drained before death according to a separate Fatwa. The present regime president, Ahmadinejad, was one of the tens of torturers in the notorious Evin prison at the time. He is now shaking hands with his official counterparts. It is the same hand who pulled the trigger that killed tens in executions according to living witnesses.”

Sadegh Sistani, continued explaining the present situation; “The brutality of this regime towards families of MEK in Iran has not limits. A young mother of three toddlers is still paying the price of the “terror tag.” Her name I will disclose for her protection. She was abducted from her house as her little ones were screaming out of fear. The mother was dragged away for no apparent reason and has been in prison since. Her interrogator, a notorious torturer of the 1980s ‘Salavati’ told her: “You are paying the price of your sister and brother (supporters of the MEK and executed earlier) *1. The interrogator had asked for her children’s presence so that they would “cry their hearts out” to give him relief!

Sistani said: “In a letter smuggled out, she has bravely disclosed her ordeal and appealed to ‘World Conscience’:

“This is a FREE country, and its President Ahmadinejad claims there is total FREEDOM, where Human Rights is respected and where people have no fear of persecution. Indeed, a country in which “Breathing and being ALIVE” is a CRIME.

A place in which, a mourning mother in black has no right to cry for the loss of her darlings. Indeed, it is a role model for Freedom and Democracy!

I know very well that by writing this letter, I am accepting the worst to come, but all I want to be to voice of the many innocent in these prisons, who are suffering the cost of appeasement with the mullahs.”

“There is always hope in the dark dungeons, where your voice is not heard, and all you have desired for seems remote. That hope builds on your perseverance and resolve to stand firm on all you ever lived for: Freedom.”
Mr. Sistani said: “As this mother of three, MEK supporter has written “HOPE’” is still there, but is this still a value for the US Administration and President Obama?”

The voice for change has been resonating in comments and speeches by US senior officials supporting the movement and its struggle to establish democracy in Iran.

Dr. Sarah Sewall from Harvard Kennedy School of Government elaborated the conflict of foreign policy interests and true American values during a symposium in Washington DC and said:

“What is interesting for me concerning the issue of Democracy and Human Rights in Iran is that often, for the United States we see a significant conflict in our foreign policy between the values that America has held dear and, indeed, was founded upon and the interests of the United States of America as it plots its foreign policy and manages the affairs of state. The extraordinary issue is values, and interests are joined in a common framework for approaching the questions of Iran and democracy and human rights. Such clash in the conduct of foreign policy; so often leading to inconsistency; reversals of fortune, charges of hypocrisy; has now actually an opportunity to be reconciled.”She referred to a “third way’” in the approach towards Iran.

Published in the New York Post, a recent appeal, by dozens of senior US officials to UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon to “Save Ashraf Now,” Human Rights has been the prior concern amidst all other pragmatic and long-term interests.

We in America may have very different views about the relative success and the cost-benefit trade-off of that kind of an approach, bearing in mind Iraq-Afghanistan experience and its unintended consequences. The “third Option” argued for the past years by the MEK is the inevitable remedy.

The “Third Option” was offered by the Opposition movement years ago as an anti-thesis to “War” or “appeasement” mostly propagated by counter and pro Iranian Lobbyists in Capitol Hill. It simply leaves the complex and expensive challenge of resolving the clerical extremism, to the Iranian resistance movement and the Iranian people.

Gen.Shelton in a symposium in Washington said: “The MEK is the most formidable opposition to the regime in Tehran. It has challenged the worlds leading state sponsor of terrorism for the past 32 years and provides hope for the current Iranian people. It provides a degree of hope that far exceeds anything else that we or our allies can offer short of direct intervention.”

So what more is left and why is there no change in the country while others in the region will follow the Gale of democratic change?

The Reuters reported, “’The opposition (green movement) is leaderless and lacks any strategy.. is following the Arab uprisings with a mixture of envies and regret for its own failure.” The spirited youths who marched the streets during the 2009 uprisings were betrayed by Moussavi as he cowed to the Supreme Leader. They are pinning hope on yet a more reliable handle to grab.

However, there is a barrier that has blocked their path.

The US Foreign List of Terrorist Organization has for long favored the Ayatollahs in Tehran by enchaining the only remaining organized and capable movement.

“The List is a direct handshake with our butchers in Iran. The Mullahs managed to massacre 120,000 of MEK supporters through a fatwa. The organization was the exact anti-thesis to the clerical fascists in Iran. They believed in a tolerant Islam that based “Democracy and Peace” as its corner stone for progress and social change. It promoted complete Gender Equality, which is the landmark for any progressive society. Women from the leadership Council in the movement and recently in a democratic election, a new Secretary General was polled by members.” Said Sistani.

Ironically, as much as the clerical regime is misogynous in nature, it is an organization with “Women Leadership” which is the fear of its life and is an existential threat.

As Sistani takes a deep breath, he insisted on fatal repercussions of the enlisting:

“Keeping the 45-year-old movement in the US list, has provided a good excuse for both the Mullahs and Maliki to kill, hang and massacre us anywhere and when possible. It has enchained our ability to be used to reveal and prevent ongoing vile Human Right violations by the mullahs. It has simply put the US on the side of our butchers.”

 

Delisting MEK is good for Iran, the US, and the civilised family of nations

In regards to the legal issue of removal of the MEK (the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran) off the US list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTO), numerous court rulings in the United Kingdom and the European Union well as the US Federal Court have laid down the legal grounds to delist the MEK. Let’s now consider the moral and political grounds for delisting MEK.

The pre-mediaeval tyranny ruling Iran not only is the No. One Clear and Present Danger to the Iranian nation and its neighbours, it’s the foremost state-sponsor of terrorism globally having used its bought or set-up terrorist outposts throughout the Middle East and beyond to murder thousands of American, British, French and other nations’ citizens and soldiers in terrorist outrages.

Tehran’s role in the 9/11 terrorist barbarity also came to light with the 2004Congressional Report. Furthermore, the Washington Times on July 28th reported that the Obama administration had accused the Iranian regime of entering into a “secret deal” with an Al Qaeda offshoot that provides money and recruits for attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The US Treasury has said exposing the secret agreement would disrupt terrorist operations by shedding light on the Iranian regime’s role as a “critical transit point” for money and extremists reaching Afghanistan and Pakistan. Many reports have also been published by top US military leaders in Iraq of the regime’s active backing of terrorists by all means possible. This dangerously murderous regime is now hastily speeding toward the atomic bomb regardless of the UN and the Security Council’s demands for transparency and non-evasive and non-deceitful co-operation.

Even though it was Iraq who invaded Iran, the founder of the theocratic fascism, the mullah Khomeini, instigated the war against its Western neighbour by its expansionist policies, and was the party which rejected all peace proposals. The regime’s “export of revolution” led to millions of dead and injured on both sides.

What is still not quite grasped, however, is the fact that the Iran tyrant rulers sent hundreds of thousands of innocent but brainwashed Iranians including tens of thousands of children to their death during his expansionist and aggressive operations into Iraq. In addition, this repugnant regime has most barbarically raped, tortured and murdered tens of thousands of democracy activists (mainly members and sympathizers of the MEK).

It’s clear that on legal as well as moral and political grounds, the civilised family of nations cannot afford the dire consequences of the continued and the reckless terrorist designation of the MEK as a first step in freeing the hands of the main organized opposition movement in Iran in its four-decade long struggle to bring democracy and peace to that tortured land and end Tehran’s diabolical nuclear ambitions.

EU names adviser to help resolve Camp Ashraf issue

REUTERS

BRUSSELS – The European Union has named a senior Belgian diplomat to work with the United Nations, Iraq and others to help resolve the plight of more than 3,000 opponents of the Iranian government living at a camp in Iraq.

Jean De Ruyt, a former Belgian ambassador to the EU, will act as an adviser to EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton on Camp Ashraf, a spokesman for Ashton said on Monday.

The camp, some 65 km (40 miles) from Baghdad, is the base of the People’s Mujahideen Organisation of Iran (PMOI), which mounted attacks on Iran before the U.S.-led removal of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein in 2003.

The future of its more than 3,000 residents became uncertain after the United States, which considers the PMOI a terrorist organisation, turned the camp over to the Iraqi government.

Baghdad plans to close it before the end of this year and Ashraf has been the scene of bloody clashes between residents and the Iraqi security forces.

The rights group Amnesty International says the residents are subject to harassment by the Iraqi government and denied access to basic medicine. More than 30 residents were killed in a clash with Iraqi security forces in April.

De Ruyt will liaise with EU states and organisations including the United Nations, Ashton’s spokesman said.

He said the European Union, which removed the PMOI from its terrorism list in 2009, wanted a high-level diplomatic approach.

“We need a peaceful and realistic solution and the security and safety of residents is the priority,” he said.

Washington has proposed moving Ashraf residents temporarily to a new location in Iraq but they have rejected this, saying it would lead to a massacre.

Struan Stevenson, head of the European Parliament delegation on Iraq, called De Ruyt’s appointment an “apparent breakthrough.”

“The unarmed, civilian residents of Camp Ashraf have suffered years of psychological torture and harassment at the hands of the Iraqi government, aided and abetted by their sponsors in Tehran,” he said in a statement.

“The appointment of Ambassador De Ruyt … has underlined the seriousness of this issue. I look forward to working with him to ensure that we can avoid a Srebrenica-style catastrophe occurring at Ashraf,” he said, referring to the 1996 massacre of Muslims by Bosnian Serb forces in the former Yugoslavia.

Stevenson said the United Nations was assessing the 3,400 residents for refugee status and the intention was to resettle them in EU states and third countries, but this process could not be completed by year-end. He called the Iraqi deadline to close the camp “ludicrous.”

http://uk.reuters.com/article/2011/09/26/uk-iraq-ashraf-eu-idUKTRE78P24820110926

EU joins bid to help end Iraqi Camp Ashraf standoff

AGENCE FRANCE PRESSE

EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton has appointed an advisor to mull over the fate of thousands of outlawed Iranians facing expulsion from a camp in Iraq, their home for 30 years.

Catherine Ashton, EU foreign policy chief

A spokesman for Ashton said Monday that Jean De Ruyt, Belgium’s former ambassador to the EU, will act in Brussels “as an advisor on the European Union’s response” to Camp Ashraf, located near the border with Iran and home to some 3,400 Iranian dissidents.

The camp, which has become a mounting international problem, has been in the spotlight since an April raid by Iraqi security left 34 dead and scores injured, triggering sharp condemnation. Iraq wants its closure by year’s end.

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

Maryam Rajavi, head of the dissidents, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, on Monday called for the new nominee to visit Ashraf and to demand Iraq drop its bid to close the camp by the end of 2011.

And in a statement, the head of a European parliament group on Iraq, MEP Struan Stevenson, said “Ambassador De Ruyt should visit Ashraf as soon as possible.”

Stevenson said the camp’s residents were being assessed individually by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees after applying for refugee status, which would allow them to resettle elsewhere.

“This major operation cannot be completed within the timescale set by Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki,” he added, referring to the December 31 deadline for closure.

 

What Ahmadinejad Didn’t Say

THE HUFFINGTON POST

Once again, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has used the United Nations podium to churn out his misinformation and half-truths. And once again, the American media accepted his invitation for a fancy luncheon afterwards, enabling a ruthless murderer to wage his not-so-charm offensive. Apparently, some media outlets just want Ahmadinejad to say something, anything, as long as they get their story.

Children at an anti-Ahmadinejad rally outside the UN headquarters stomp on a poster of the controversial Iranian president before he is scheduled to speak at the UN General Assembly, Thursday, Sept. 22, 2011, in the Manhattan borough of New York. A few hundred demonstrators turned out to hear former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge and former UN Ambassador John Bolton speak. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

Has no one learned anything from the free passes provided to Ahmadinejad’s allies, such as Moammar Qaddafi of Libya and Bashar Assad of Syria?

Ahmadinejad allocated almost the entirety of his speech to just about anything unrelated to the clerical rulers of Iran. He talked about flooding in Pakistan, famine in Somalia, how a large percentage of the world’s population earns so little, and how a small percentage of the world’s population has so much. Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it?

Next he took on an authoritative posture, portraying himself as an engineer who knows that the two planes that hit the Twin Towers could not have brought those buildings down. (Huh!) Of course, one might wonder when he practiced his sophisticated engineering skills, in that he has spent pretty much all of his adult life first as a chief thug, organizing hooligans to attack and beat up students in the early days after the revolution, then as a notorious torturer in Evin prison, and later as a commander of the terrorist Qods Force during the Iran-Iraq war.

But what is more important is what Ahmadinejad did not address. He addressed numerous problems around the world, held America responsible for much of the world’s misery, but did not talk about the Arab Spring; no mention of Libya, Syria, Egypt, Tunisia, Bahrain, or Yemen.

He attacked world powers for intervening in other countries’ affairs, but stayed off the topic of his Revolutionary Guards’ helping Bashar Assad to violently suppress the revolt in Syria; and avoided details of how his regime used violence, bribery, intimidation, and blackmail to put Iraq’s defeated Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki back in office and deny the winning candidate, Ayad Allawi, a substantive role in the political process in Iraq.

Nor did he mention his use of proxies in the Iraqi Government to kill dozens of Iranian dissidents and former political prisoners who had taken refuge across the border in Camp Ashraf, Iraq in 2009 and 2011. No wonder that while most of the delegations left the General Assembly Hall when Ahmadinejad started speaking, the Iraqi delegation remained, cheering him on.

Ahmadinejad expressed concern about three billion people in the world not earning enough to live, but failed to mention the fact that as many as 80 percent of the Iranian population live below the poverty line; the official figures put it at 55 percent. He attacked the West for making exorbitant profits, but said nothing about his own closest allies in Iran, the ruling clerics and their cronies, who are plundering billions of dollars, dominating the nation’s industry, and running or taking a cut from all business in the country.

And lastly, he said nothing about the rising rate of executions in Iran, this year’s numbers close to 490 so far, higher even than last year. Since he spoke at the last General Assembly session, his State Security Forces and the Iranian Judiciary have sentenced to death or already executed more Iranian dissidents whose only crime was peaceful participation in the anti-government demonstrations in Iran.

But let’s not be picky about the facts. Especially since again this year, prominent American media were invited to a fancy lunch after his ranting at the UN, for a taste of more of his rhetoric. The attendees are expected to throw him soft balls, and some went so far as to praise Ahmadinejad for being impressive, “well-prepared,” and speaking “confidently.”

But while Ahmadinejad spoke inside the UN, and hosted some journalists, the story outside was very different. He may be able to suppress the voices of dissent in Iran, escalate violence in Iraq, help Assad quash dissent in Syria, and defy international demands to desist enriching uranium, but in New York he was confronted by thousands of Iranian-Americans, who called him a murderer and insisted that he is not representative of the Iranian people.

That should have grabbed the headlines.

Alireza Jafarzadeh is author of ‘The Iran Threat’.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alireza-jafarzadeh/ahmadinejad-un-speech_b_978812.html

Protesters rally against Iranian leader outside UN

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Demonstrators rally outside the UN headquarters to protest against controversial Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad before he is scheduled to speak at the UN General Assembly, Thursday, Sept. 22, 2011, in the Manhattan borough of New York. Former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge and former UN Ambassador John Bolton were among the speakers at the event. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

NEW YORK, (AP) — Former United Nations ambassador John Bolton said Thursday that the Obama administration is doing “almost nothing” to protect Iranians from the violence of their own regime — as represented at the U.N. by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Minutes before Ahmadinejad addressed the annual U.N. General Assembly, about 1,000 Iranian-Americans staged a protest rally in nearby Dag Hammarskjold Plaza.

Children stomped on a poster of Ahmadinejad among banners that covered the pavement. “Down With the Islamic Republic of Iran,” read one.

Bolton, who served as ambassador during George W. Bush’s presidency, told The Associated Press that the United States had failed to stop Iran from torturing and killing its own people.

“We expect that our commitment to the people of Iran is going to be upheld,” he said. “Right now, the Obama administration is doing almost nothing.”

Former UN Ambassador John Bolton speaks to the crowds at an anti-Ahmadinejad rally outside the UN headquarters before the controversial Iranian president is scheduled to speak at the UN General Assembly, Thursday, Sept. 22, 2011, in the Manhattan borough of New York. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

He said this week’s release of two American hikers held for years by Iran was what he called “just Broadway theater.”

Some protesters were draped in the Iranian flag, while others hoisted yellow flags representing Iran’s political opposition led by Maryam Rajavi, head of the Paris-based National Council of Resistance of Iran.

Protesters say tens of thousands of the opposition group’s supporters in Iran have been executed by the regime.

Speaking live from Paris via satellite on a giant television screen, Rajavi told the crowd that Ahmadinejad does not represent the Iranian people.

She urged the U.N. and the U.S. to stand with the Iranian people and their organized opposition, including more than 3,000 U.N.-defined refugees in Camp Ashraf in Iraq, which was attacked twice, with 47 killed and about 1,000 wounded.

“There is no doubt today that the United States has clearly abandoned its international obligations toward Camp Ashraf,” Rajavi said.

Former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge speaks to the crowds at an anti-Ahmadinejad rally outside the UN headquarters before the controversial Iranian president is scheduled to speak at the UN General Assembly, Thursday, Sept. 22, 2011, in the Manhattan borough of New York. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

While addressing protesters, former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said he agreed with Bolton that the U.S. government’s policy toward Iran is inadequate — especially in how it treats the MEK, or People’s Mujahedin of Iran that is the main component of Rajavi’s resistance group.

The U.S. State Department lists it as a terrorist organization, while supporters say the group opposes Ahmadinejad.

As the nation’s first head of homeland security after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Ridge said he started every day with a list of potential threats against the United States.

“Never, not once, among hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of potential terrorist threats, did I ever see the MEK as a terrorist organization,” said Ridge, who also served under Bush. “It’s about time we took them off the list.”

That position was echoed by many of the protesters, including one group busy assembling cardboard rolls into a “cage” symbolizing the one that held former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak at his trial. Inside was a man wearing a mask resembling Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Demonstrators rally outside the U.N. headquarters to protest against controversial Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad before he is scheduled to speak at the U.N. General Assembly, Thursday, Sept. 22, 2011, in New York. Former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge and former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton were among the speakers at the event. Demonstrators hold pictures of Massoud Rajavi, president of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, and his wife Maryam Rajavi. (AP Photo/John Minchillo)

“We hope that Khameini will be in a cage like this soon, to be tried for crimes against humanity,” said Farid Ashkan, 55, an Iranian-born New York dentist.

At the entrance to the plaza, a same-sex “wedding” was staged mocking the alliance of Syria and Iran. A protester posing as ousted Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi presided over the ceremony, with yellow cake served to onlookers, representing the uranium used to make nuclear weapons.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/09/22/national/a102622D80.DTL#ixzz1YoUmDyMN