The information was gathered and documented by
the social network maintained inside Iran by the People's MojahedinOrganization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). The network gathered the information over a
period of several months, relying on sources inside the Iranian regime and the
IRGC itself.
The People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran
(Also known as MEK, or Mujahedin-e-Khalq / Mujahedeen-e-Khalq), was founded on
September 6, 1965, by Mohammad Hanifnejad, Saeed Mohsen, and Ali-Asghar
Badizadgan. All engineers, they had earlier been members of the Freedom
Movement (also known as the Liberation Movement), created by Medhi Bazargan in
May 1961.1
The MEK’s quest culminated in a true
interpretation of Islam, which is inherently tolerant and democratic, and fully
compatible with the values of modern-day civilization. It took six years for
the MEK to formulate its view of Islam and develop a strategy to replace Iran’s
dictatorial monarchy with a democratic government.
MEK’s interpretation of Islam
The theocratic mullah regime in Iran believe
interpreting Islam is their exclusive domain. The MEK reject this view and the
cleric’s reactionary vision of Islam. The MEK’s comprehensive interpretation of
Islam proved to be more persuasive and appealing to the Iranian youth.
MEK’s founders and new members studied the various schools of thought, the Iranian history and those of other countries, enabling them to analyze other philosophies and ideologies with considerable knowledge and to present their own ideology, based on Islam, as the answer to Iran’s problems.
MEK’s founders and new members studied the various schools of thought, the Iranian history and those of other countries, enabling them to analyze other philosophies and ideologies with considerable knowledge and to present their own ideology, based on Islam, as the answer to Iran’s problems.
MEK’s leadership’s arrest during the 70s.
The Shah’s notorious secret police, SAVAK,
arrested all MEK leaders and most of its member’s in1971. On May 1972, the
founders of the MEK, Mohammad Hanifnejad , Saeed Mohsen and Ali Asghar
Badizadegan, along with two members of the MEK leadership, Mahmoud Askarizadeh
and Rasoul Meshkinfam, were put before death squads and were executed after
long months of imprisonment and torture. They were the true vanguards, who
stood against the dictatorial regime of Shah. However, they are also recognized
for their opposition to what is today known as Islamic fundamentalism.
The death sentence of Massoud Rajavi, a member
of MEK’s central committee, was commuted to life imprisonment as a result of an
international campaign by his Geneva based brother, Dr. Kazem Rajavi
(assassinated in April 1990 in Geneva by mullahs’ agents) and the personal
intervention of the French President Georges Pompidou and Francois Mitterrand.
He was the only survivor of the MEK original leadership.
Massoud Rajavi’s critical role in
characterizing religious extremism
From 1975 to 1979, while incarcerated in
different prisons, Massoud Rajavi led the MEK’s struggle while constantly under
torture for his leading position.
Massoud Rajavi stressed the need to continue
the struggle against the shah’s dictatorship. At the same time, he
characterized religious fanaticism as the primary internal threat to the
popular opposition, and warned against the emergence and growth of religious
fanaticism and autocracy. He also played a crucial role when some splinter used
the vacuum in the MEK leadership who were all executed or imprisoned at the
time, to claim a change of ideology and policy. Massoud Rajavi as the MEK
leader condemn these individual’s misuse of MEK’s name while continuing to
stress the struggle against dictatorship. His efforts while still in prison
forced these individuals to no longer operating under the name of MEK and
adopting a different name for their group. These positions remained the MEK’s
manifesto until the overthrow of the shah’s regime.
Release of Political Prisoners on the last
days of the Shah
A month before the 1979 revolution in Iran,
the Shah was forced to flee Iran, never to return. All democratic opposition
leaders had by then either been executed by the Shah’s SAVAK or imprisoned, and
could exert little influence on the trend of events. Khomeini and his network
of mullahs across the country, who had by and large been spared the wrath of
SAVAK, were the only force that remained unharmed and could take advantage of
the political vacuum. In France, Khomeini received maximum exposure to the
world media. With the aid of his clerical followers, he hijacked a revolution
that began with calls for democracy and freedom and diverted it towards his
fundamentalist goals. Through an exceptional combination of historical events,
Shiite clerics assumed power in Iran.
Khomeini’s gradual crackdown on MEK in fear of
their popular support
In internal discourses, Rajavi the remaining
leader of the MEK, argued that Khomeini represented the reactionary sector of
society and preached religious fascism. Later, in the early days after the 1979
revolution, the mullahs, specifically Rafsanjani, pointed to these statements
in inciting the hezbollahi club-wielders to attack the MEK.
Following the revolution, the MEK became
Iran’s largest organized political party. It had hundreds of thousands of
members who operated from MEK offices all over the country. MEK publication,
‘Mojahed’ was circulated in 500,000 copies.
Khomeini set up an Assembly of Experts
comprised of sixty of his closest mullahs and loyalists to ratify the principle
of velayat-e faqih (absolute supremacy of clerical rule) as a pillar of the
Constitution. The MEK launched a nationwide campaign in opposition to this
move, which enjoyed enormous popular support. Subsequently, the MEK refused to
approve the new constitution based on the concept of velayat-e faqih, while
stressing its observance of the law of the country to deny the mullahs any
excuse for further suppression of MEK supporters who were regularly targeted by
the regime’s official and unofficial thugs.
Khomeini sanctioned the occupation of the
United States embassy in 1979 in order to create an anti-American frenzy, which
facilitated the holding of a referendum to approve his Constitution, which the
MEK rejected.
MEK’s endeavors to participate in the
political process avoiding an unwanted conflict with government repressive
forces
The MEK actively participated in the political
process, fielding candidates for the parliamentary and presidential elections.
The MEK also entered avidly into the national debate on the structure of the
new Islamic regime, though was unsuccessful in seeking an elected constituent
assembly to draft a constitution.
The MEK similarly made an attempt at political
participation when [then] Massoud Rajavi ran for the presidency in January
1980. MEK’s leader was forced to withdraw when Khomeini ruled that only candidates
who had supported the constitution in the December referendum – which the MEK
had boycotted- were eligible. Rajavi’s withdrawal statement emphasized the
MEK’s efforts to conform to election regulations and reiterated the MEK’s
intention to advance its political aims within the new legal system”.
(Unclassified report on the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran(PMOI/ MEK)
by the Department of State to the United States House of Representatives,
December 1984.)
However, the MEK soon found itself in a direct
struggle against the forces of the regime’s Supreme leader. The MEK’s
differences with Khomeini dated back to the 1970s, and stem from its opposition
to what is known today as Islamic extremism. Angry at the position taken by the
MEK against his regime and worried about the MEK’s growing popularity, Khomeini
ordered a brutal crackdown against the MEK and its supporters. Between 1979 and
1981, some 70 MEK members and sympathizers were killed and several thousand
more were imprisoned by the Iranian regime.
June 20, 1981- Khomeini’s order to open fire
on peaceful demonstration of half-a-million supporters of MEK
The turning point came on 20th June 1981, when
the MEK called a demonstration to protest at the regime’s crackdown, and to
call for political freedom which half-a-million supporters participated at.
Khomeini ordered the Revolutionary Guards to open fire on the swelling crowd,
fearing that without absolute repression the democratic opposition (MEK) would
force him to engage in serious reforms – an anathema as far as he was
concerned; he ordered the mass and summary executions of those arrested.
Since then, MEK activists have been the prime
victims of human rights violations in Iran. Over 120,000 of its members and
supporters have been executed by the Iranian regime, 30,000 of which, were
executed in a few months in the summer of 1988, on a direct fatwa by Khomeini,
which stated any prisoners who remain loyal to the MEK must be executed.
Having been denied its fundamental rights and
having come under extensive attack at the time that millions of its members,
supporters and sympathizers had no protection against the brutal onslaught of
the Iranian regime, the MEK had no choice but to resist against the mullahs’
reign of terror.
“Towards the end of 1981, many of the members
of the MEK and supporters went into exile. Their principal refuge was in
France. But in 1986, after negotiations between the French and the Iranian
authorities, the French government effectively treated them as undesirable
aliens, and the leadership of the MEK with several thousand followers relocated
to Iraq.” (Judgment of the Proscribed Organizations Appeal Commission, November
30, 2007.)
The MEK today is the oldest and largest
anti-fundamentalist Muslim group in the Middle East. It has been active for
more than a half century, battling two dictatorships and a wide range of
issues. The MEK supports:
• Universal suffrage as the sole criterion for
legitimacy
• Pluralistic system of governance
• Respect for individual freedoms
• Ban on the death penalty
• Separation of religion and state
• Full gender equality
• Equal participation of women in political leadership. MEK is actually led by its central committee consist of 1000 women.
• Modern judicial system that emphasizes the principle of innocence, a right to a defense, and due process
• Free markets
• Relations with all countries in the world
• Commitment to a non-nuclear Iran
• Pluralistic system of governance
• Respect for individual freedoms
• Ban on the death penalty
• Separation of religion and state
• Full gender equality
• Equal participation of women in political leadership. MEK is actually led by its central committee consist of 1000 women.
• Modern judicial system that emphasizes the principle of innocence, a right to a defense, and due process
• Free markets
• Relations with all countries in the world
• Commitment to a non-nuclear Iran
The MEK remains a strong and cohesive
organization, with a broad reach both worldwide and deep within Iran. MEK is
the leading voice for democracy in Iran, supported by its interpretation of
Islam that discredits the fundamentalist mullahs’ regime.
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