Iran: MEK-phobia in Tehran Reaches New Levels
Written by
Mohammad Sadat Khansari
Mashreq News, which is affiliated with the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) Intelligence Organization and has a special section and various tags dedicated to news and reports about the People’s Mojahedin Organization (PMOI/MEK), wrote a comprehensive report on December 21 that run with the title “Maryam Rajavi will become Tehran’s President.”
Listing several events and conferences by the Iranian Resistance in the United States, the piece is dominantly opting for an alarmist tone, warning the state and its aids abroad that if the increasing influence of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) and the PMOI is not countered, it will have grave consequences.
Trying to disparage the Iranian Resistance’s delisting campaign as an indication of the Obama administration’s support of the MEK, Mashreq News wrote: “The Rajavi sect is the only opposition group against the Islamic Republic that possesses an organization. During recent events, this issue has been announced in a more public way by famous officials in the American hierarchy in a meeting in Washington DC on Sunday, December 18. Mike Pompeo, the Secretary of State of the Trump administration and the former head of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), was the speaker at this gathering. This speech was covered by media organizations affiliated with the terrorist organization of the People’s Mojahedin Khalq.”
Referring to the trip of former US Vice President Mike Pence to Ashraf 3 in Albania and meeting with NCRI President-elect Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, the MOIS-IO publication added: “In his statements, the highest-ranking American official in 2016-2020 stroke a deadly blow at the monarchists and supporters of Reza Diba [Pahlavi] and said: ‘The Tehran regime wants to deceive the world into believing that the demonstrators in Iran want to return to Shah’s dictatorship. But I want to assure you that we will not be fooled by their lies. So let me ask all of you, right here, for the whole world to hear: Do the people of Iran want to replace one dictatorship with another [the Shah]?”
Mashreq News also recalled supportive statements from US House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Chair Robert Menendez, former US National Security Advisors General James Jones and John Bolton, and US Senator Joseph Lieberman and warned that unlike other Iranian celebrities or prominent figures, the NCRI and MEK are the real threat. At the end of the article, it even went as far as to lie about an alleged meeting in October 2019 where the MEK swore allegiance with other Iranian groups as well as American and Saudi officials to plan for a future in Iran.