By Jubin Katiraie
The signing into law of the new sanctions on Russia, North Korea and Iran and the impact of this legislation is already being felt, even before the commencement of practical measures which are on the way.
The officials of Iranian regime, in particular, are already afraid of the consequences of the new sanctions. In addition to economic implications of the sanctions, what worries them the most is the actions against the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) as a terrorist organization. Designating and imposing sanctions on the IRGC was long overdue. Khamenei’s military arm serves as the guarantee to preserve the entirety of the mullahs’ regime and is the main entity responsible for domestic suppression, the export of terrorism and extremism, and obtaining weapons of mass destruction, such as nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles.
The new bill has added to the already shaky regime’s fears. Janati, the head of the Guardian Council, announced on Thursday that the main issue preoccupying the Supreme leader is his concern over regime change. The actions of the regime in recent years is proof that change from within will not be successful, as the regime is geared to its own preservation and not the best interests of its people, including their international rights and freedoms.
Regime change was the main topic of the July 1, 2017 annual gathering of Iranian resistance (The Mujahedin-e-Khalq or MEK) under the umbrella of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) in Paris. Many speakers talked about the regime change and their support for the NCRI, as a viable democratic alternative to the current regime.
“I’m happiest to be here because I can say, can probably say this with a good deal of authority, that the government of the United States supports you,” said Rudy Giuliani, former mayor of New York City, referring to MEK supporters in the gathering.
“We’re behind you, we agree with your values. The government of the United States understands the danger of Iran. The government of the United States will not allow Iran to become an empire in the Middle East,” added Giuliani.
“I have come to bring you a simple message. Iran must be free. The only practical goal is to support a movement that could free Iran, and that’s you,” said former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, when addressing MEK supporters in the gathering. “The presence of 3000 MEK in Albania is a decisive defeat for dictatorship in Tehran. The name of your president will stand the same as George Washington and Lafayette in the United States.”
The bipartisan effort in this legislation showed that the threat posed by the current Iranian regime has created a united front from the United States.
“The outcome of the president’s policy review should be to determine that the Ayatollah Khomeini’s 1979 revolution will not last until its 40th birthday,” said former U.S. ambassador to the UN John Bolton during the recent “Free Iran” gathering in early July.
It has been over thirty years since the Iranian people and their just resistance (MEK) began to seek a regime change. But the brutal internal suppression, along with international and the U.S. policy of appeasement towards Iran, have been the main obstacles to achieving this goal.
Now the time has come for a regime change, and Iranian regime understands this more than anyone else, Iranian lobbies and apologists are spreading fake news that regime change in Iran means another war in the Middle East. They argue that it will mean a repeat of the war in Iraq will be repeated in Iran and the U.S. will get stuck in another war.
Iran lobbies have started a widespread campaign against the MEK to demonize the group and attempt to weaken its international support system. Their goal from demonizing the MEK is to eliminate any alternative for regime change, forcing the West to search for a solution within the regime and to try to find “moderates” inside the regime.
Contrary to many countries, including Iraq, a democratic and organized opposition exists in Iran. The Mujahedin-e-Khalq (MEK) has been fighting with this regime for over thirty-eight years. Since June 20, 1981, the Iranian regime has executed over 120,000 political prisoners, mostly members and supporters of the MEK. In the summer of 1988 alone, over 30,000 political prisoners, a majority of them from the MEK, were massacred.
In addition to the massacre of MEK members and supporters, the Iranian regime created an atmosphere of fear and terror within the Iranian society. The terror atmosphere was such that whoever had any connection of any kind with the MEK would be arrested and tortured. Even using the name of MEK was prohibited. Any call or communication with MEK members in Ashraf and Liberty camps in Iraq by their family members was considered a crime. Many MEK family members were arrested and tortured just because they called to talk to their loved ones.
Despite all the carnage, pressures, suppression, and demonizing campaigns, the MEK continued its fight against the regime. After the transfer of MEK members to Albania, they focused on activities inside Iran. In the past nine months, the MEK supporters have staged a campaign regarding the 1988 massacre in Iran, revealing many atrocities of the regime. The campaign has been so wide spread and extensive that the supreme leader of the regime, Ali Khamenei, was forced to react by defending the massacre of MEK members and supporters in the prisons.
The new law which imposes new sanctions on the regime for violating human rights and pursuing ballistic missiles, as well as designating the IRGC as a terrorist entity, is an essential step in rectifying the damaging policy of appeasement. Other measures need to be pursued in conjunction with this bill, include the eviction of the IRGC and its affiliated militia, particularly from Syria and Iraq. Finally, the international community needs to recognize the right of the Iranian people to overthrow the clerical regime.
Some background on MEK:
A Long Conflict between the Clerical Regime and the MEK
The origins of the MEK date back to before the 1979 Iranian Revolution., the MEK helped to overthrow the dictatorship of Shah Reza Pahlavi, but it quickly became a bitter enemy of the emerging the religious fascism under the pretext of Islamic Republic. To this day, the MEK and NCRI describe Ruhollah Khomenei and his associates as having co-opted a popular revolution in order to empower themselves while imposing a fundamentalist view of Islam onto the people of Iran.
Under the Islamic Republic, the MEK was quickly marginalized and affiliation with it was criminalized. Much of the organization’s leadership went to neighboring Iraq and built an exile community called Camp Ashraf, from which the MEK organized activities aimed at ousting the clerical regime and bringing the Iranian Revolution back in line with its pro-democratic origins. But the persistence of these efforts also prompted the struggling regime to crack down with extreme violence on the MEK and other opponents of theocratic rule.
The crackdowns culminated in the massacre of political prisoners in the summer of 1988, as the Iran-Iraq War was coming to a close. Thousands of political prisoners were held in Iranian jails at that time, many of them having already served out their assigned prison sentences. And with the MEK already serving as the main voice of opposition to the regime at that time, its members and supporters naturally made up the vast majority of the population of such prisoners.
As the result of a fatwa handed down by Khomeini, the regime convened what came to be known as the Death Commission, assigning three judges the task of briefly interviewing prisoners to determine whether they retained any sympathy for the MEK or harbored any resentment toward the existing government. Those who were deemed to have shown any sign of continued opposition were sentenced to be hanged. After a period of about three months, an estimated 30,000 people had been put to death. Many other killings of MEK members preceded and followed that incident, so that today the Free Iran rally includes an annual memorial for approximately 120,000 martyrs from the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran.
The obvious motive behind the 1988 massacre and other such killings was the destruction of the MEK. And yet it has not only survived but thrived, gaining allies to form the NCRI and acquiring the widespread support that is put on display at each year’s Free Iran rally. In the previous events, the keynote speech was delivered by Maryam Rajavi, who has been known to receive several minutes of applause from the massive crowd as she takes the stage. Her speeches provide concrete examples of the vulnerability of the clerical regime and emphasize the ever-improving prospects for the MEK to lead the way in bringing about regime change.
The recipients of that message are diverse and they include more than just the assembled crowd of MEK members and supporters. The expectation is that the international dignitaries at each year’s event will carry the message of the MEK back to their own governments and help to encourage more policymakers to recognize the role of the Iranian Resistance in the potential creation of a free and democratic Iranian nation. It is also expected that the event will inspire millions of Iranians to plan for the eventual removal of the clerical regime. And indeed, the MEK broadcasts the event via its own satellite television network, to millions of Iranian households with illegal hookups.
MEK’s Domestic Activism and Intelligence Network
What’s more, the MEK retains a solid base of activists inside its Iranian homeland. In the run-up to this year’s Free Iran rally the role of those activists was particularly evident, since the event comes just a month and a half after the latest Iranian presidential elections, in which heavily stage-managed elections resulted in the supposedly moderate incumbent Hassan Rouhani securing reelection. His initial election in 2013 was embraced by some Western policymakers as a possible sign of progress inside the Islamic Republic, but aside from the 2015 nuclear agreement with six world powers, none of his progressive-sounding campaign promises have seen the light of day.
Rouhani’s poor record has provided additional fertile ground for the message of the MEK and Maryam Rajavi. The Iranian Resistance has long argued that change from within the regime is impossible, and this was strongly reiterated against the backdrop of the presidential elections, when MEK activists used graffiti, banners, and other communications to describe the sitting president as an “imposter.” Many of those same communications decried Rouhani’s leading challenger, Ebrahim Raisi, as a “murderer,” owing to his leading role in the massacre of MEK supporters in 1988.
That fact helped to underscore the domestic support for the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran, insofar as many people who participated in the election said they recognized Raisi as the worst the regime had to offer, and that they were eager to prevent him from taking office. But this is not to say that voters saw Rouhani in a positive light, especially where the MEK is concerned. Under the Rouhani administration, the Justice Minister is headed by Mostafa Pourmohammadi, who also served on the Death Commission and declared as recently as last year that he was proud of himself for having carried out what he described as God’s command of death for MEK supporters.
With this and other aspects of the Islamic Republic’s record, the MEK’s pre-election activism was mainly focused on encouraging Iranians to boycott the polls. The publicly displayed banners and posters urged a “vote for regime change,” and many of them included the likeness of Maryam Rajavi, suggesting that her return to Iran from France would signify a meaningful alternative to the hardline servants of the clerical regime who are currently the only option in any Iranian national election.
Naturally, this direct impact on Iranian politics is the ultimate goal of MEK activism. But it performs other recognizable roles from its position in exile, not just limited to the motivational and organization role of the Free Iran rally and other, smaller gatherings. In fact, the MEK rose to particular international prominence in 2005 when it released information that had been kept secret by the Iranian regime about its nuclear program. These revelations included the locations of two secret nuclear sites: an uranium enrichment facility at Natanz and a heavy water plant at Arak, capable of producing enriched plutonium.
As well as having a substantial impact on the status of international policy regarding the Iranian nuclear program, the revelations also highlighted the MEK’s popular support and strong network inside Iran. Although Maryam Rajavi and the rest of the leadership of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran reside outside of the country, MEK affiliates are scattered throughout Iranian society with some even holding positions within hardline government and military institutions, including the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Drawing upon the resources of that intelligence network, the MEK has continued to share crucial information with Western governments in recent years, some of it related to the nuclear program and some of it related to other matters including terrorist training, military development, and the misappropriation of financial resources. The MEK has variously pointed out that the Revolutionary Guard controls well over half of Iran’s gross domestic product, both directly and through a series of front companies and close affiliates in all manner of Iranian industries.
In February of this year, the Washington, D.C. office of the National Council of Resistance of Iran held press conferences to detail MEK intelligence regarding the expansion of terrorist training programs being carried out across Iran by the Revolutionary Guards. The growth of these programs reportedly followed upon direct orders from Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and coincided with increased recruitment of foreign nationals to fight on Tehran’s behalf in regional conflicts including the Syrian and Yemeni civil wars.
In the weeks following that press conference, the MEK’s parent organization also prepared documents and held other talks explaining the source of some of the Revolutionary Guards’ power and wealth. Notably, this series of revelations reflected upon trends in American policy toward the Islamic Republic of Iran. And other revelations continue to do so, even now.
MEK Intelligence Bolstering US Policy Shifts
Soon after taking office, and around the time the MEK identified a series of Revolutionary Guard training camps, US President Donald Trump directed the State Department to review the possibility of designating Iran’s hardline paramilitary as a foreign terrorist organization. Doing so would open the Revolutionary Guards up to dramatically increased sanctions – a strategy that the MEK prominently supports as a means of weakening the barriers to regime change within Iran.
The recent revelations of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran have gone a long way toward illustrating both the reasons for giving this designation to the Revolutionary Guards and the potential impact of doing so. Since then, the MEK has also used its intelligence gathering to highlight the ways in which further sanctioning the Guards could result in improved regional security, regardless of the specific impact on terrorist financing.
For example, in June the NCRI’s Washington, D.C. office held yet another press conference wherein it explained that MEK operatives had become aware of another order for escalation that had been given by Supreme Leader Khamenei, this one related to the Iranian ballistic missile program. This had also been a longstanding point of contention for the Trump administration and the rest of the US government, in light of several ballistic missile launches that have been carried out since the conclusion of nuclear negotiations, including an actual strike on eastern Syria.
That strike was widely viewed as a threatening gesture toward the US. And the MEK has helped to clarify the extent of the threat by identifying 42 separate missile sites scattered throughout Iran, including one that was working closely with the Iranian institution that had previously been tasked with weaponizing aspects of the Iranian nuclear program.
The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) led by Maryam Rajavi is thus going to great lengths to encourage the current trend in US policy, which is pointing to more assertiveness and possibly even to the ultimate goal of regime change. The MEK is also striving to move Europe in a similar direction, and the July 1 gathering is likely to show further progress toward that goal. This is because hundreds of American and European politicians and scholars have already declared support for the NCRI and MEK and the platform of Maryam Rajavi. The number grows every year, while the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran continues to collect intelligence that promises to clarify the need for regime change and the practicality of their strategy for achieving it.
