All right, y'all.
Welcome back to the show.
It's anti-war radio.
I'm Scott Horton and our next guest is Reza Marashi.
He is research director at the national Iranian American council.
Uh, he came to NIAC after four years in the office of Iranian affairs at the U S department of state.
Uh, very interesting.
He was an analyst at the Institute of National Strategic Studies.
As well.
All right.
Welcome back to the show.
Reza.
How are you?
I'm doing well.
Thanks for having me back.
Well, I'm very happy to have you here.
Uh, there's a very important news, uh, even though it sounds kind of like a esoteric subject.
I think it's really important to people.
And I like to highlight as much as I can.
Um, it's, uh, the story of the Mujahideen-e-Khalq, um, out of Iran, at least once upon a time, uh, Iran exile group nears U S rebirth.
Declares the wall street journal.
Um, we got a little bit of time.
Why don't you start off by, uh, catching the people up to speed on what exactly is the MEK, uh, you know, brief kind of a summary thumbnail sort of history and the, uh, controversy as it exists up to this point.
Sure.
I mean, the MEK started off in Iran in the 1960s, 1970s is really when they reached their peak, uh, as this weird Marxist Islamic, uh, combination movement that opposed the Shah of Iran and helped support the broad coalition of groups and factions, uh, that did end up overthrowing him.
And shortly after the revolution took place, the various political factions in Iran started to fight against one another and the current, uh, faction that's ruling the country of Iran, uh, uh, kicked the out and many other factions and killed a lot of MEK members.
So on and so forth.
Uh, fast forward a couple of years, the MEK was given a safe Haven in Iraq.
They sided with Saddam Hussein during the Iran Iraq war from 1980 to 1988.
And, uh, they were given a military base there that is still currently inhabited by MEK members.
In fact, if one looks back in 2003, the Bush administration used Saddam Hussein's support for the MEK, a designated terrorist organization here in the United States as one of the justifications for, uh, for going to war.
Yeah, that's hilarious.
I saw that on your Twitter feed this morning and went and clicked the link.
And I was just telling the audience about it a segment or two ago there that here it is on the list of, and in fact, this whole list is pretty much, uh, explained a way of all, but in any case, uh, here on the list of, uh, reasons to believe that Saddam Hussein is a international terrorist is he supports the MEK and that's why we got to invade him.
Political memory in this country can be remarkably short.
Sometimes even mine, apparently.
I mean, I knew that Colin Powell trotted out Zarqawi who was not really an ally of Osama bin Laden and who was a wanted man under Saddam Hussein and was protected in Kurdish safe haven land.
And, um, how, uh, George Bush had refused to allow the military to go in there and kill him and his Ansar al-Islam group before the war, because Colin Powell needed that talking point for his UN speech.
So my memory ain't that bad, but I had forgotten that they cited the MEK.
What a joke, but not that they're not terrorists.
They are, but just that they're perfectly willing to use them now.
And this is after this is on the heels really of just the other day.
Uh, well, relatively speaking, a couple of weeks ago, the white house, apparently, correct me if I'm wrong, uh, leaked to NBC news to go ahead and run a story about this is who's doing the assassinations in Iran for Israel.
Is the MEK terror cult.
Yeah, you're absolutely right.
And there's a lot of them.
That's why there's a lot of moving pieces with this story.
So, uh, so putting the pieces of this puzzle together can be a bit tricky at times, but I think the important thing to focus on here is, uh, is twofold.
On the one hand, this organization, I can say unequivocally beyond a shadow of a doubt is a terrorist organization deserves to be on this list during the Bush administration, which had an openly stated policy of regime change towards I helped participate in the review of their designation.
So I can say beyond a shadow of doubt that the justification is there, the legal justification is there.
Uh, so that's one two and more towards what's currently going on right now about them potentially being delisted.
I think the, the, the wall street journal article was maybe a bit too forward leaning in that, you know, certainly it could happen and it's no, most definitely a cause for concern, but we still have a ways to go.
This is a multi-tiered process.
And the first tier being a permanent closure of their military base called camp Ashraf that that's currently in Iraq.
Beyond that though, the United States has to separate the MEK leadership from rank and file.
They have to separate true believers in the MEK from those that are being held in, in camp Ashraf in Iraq against their will, uh, Rand, which is a highly reputable research organization here in the United States, uh, says that their estimates are about 70% of, uh, the MEK members in camp Ashraf are being held there against their will.
The United States has to find countries to take these people in people who have been designated terrorists.
And they also have to most importantly verify that the willingness and the capabilities of the MEK to engage in violence and terrorism has ended.
And, uh, that has to be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt.
So numerous additional steps, uh, there's still a ways to go.
So we can't say yet that delisting is a done deal or imminent, but there's definitely a cause for concern when these kinds of stories leak.
Well, now does it look to you?
I mean, you used to work for her for a time there.
Does it look to you like Hillary Clinton wants to do this or almost all the pressure politically is on her to do this?
Or is she just kind of nodding and smiling at them and saying, Oh yes, I'm doing everything I can for you, but really she doesn't.
Or what do you think about that?
I think Hillary Clinton has been put between a rock and a hard place.
And that's one of the reasons why the treasury department, uh, has been, hasn't taken it lightly on the Ed Rendell's of the world and others who have been taking money from the MEK.
You know, the treasury department issued subpoenas a couple of months ago.
I think it was in March, if I'm not mistaken, uh, for these people that were taking money from the MEK, uh, upwards of 10 to 12 of these individuals.
And, you know, through congressional pressure and, and former high level us government officials that were out shilling for this designated terrorist organization that puts political pressure on the Obama administration more generally, and the secretary of state who is the final arbiter more specifically to, uh, you know, render a different decision, a decision that goes against the facts.
Now, that being said, So there, in other words, by comp by hiring these front men, uh, and compromising such powerful people, uh, they've basically put the screws on, uh, the state department to more or less legalize their group to, to delist them so that what these men have done for them is no longer criminal.
I think that they go the long way towards explaining what we've been saying so far.
That no doubt about it.
There's a long way towards going and explaining what we've seen so far, but there's a, there is, there's a flip side to this coin and that secretary Clinton has been telling lawmakers that a decision on the MEK's terrorist designation is pending in part to see if the group relocates from its military base in Camp Ashraf inside of Iraq.
Uh, while that's a positive first step, no terrorist organization should be allowed to have a military base.
Uh, making that statement is also tantamount to an admission that the decision has nothing to do with whether or not the MEK is terrorist organization.
And that couldn't be further from the truth because simply put, it's unacceptable to delist a designated foreign terrorist organization and agree for them agreeing to relocate.
So long as the MEK's organizational structure remains in place, it illegally remains the terrorist organization, regardless of where its base is located.
And the last point I would make on this is that the precedent set by such a mistake would be an unmitigated disaster for the United States.
I mean, does America really want to open the door for other terrorist organizations to spend millions of dollars lobbying to get off the terrorist list?
Right.
I mean, yeah, that actually really could be a problem, but now help me understand this because I mean, there is no country anywhere in the world who's willing to accept them as a group, right?
So they're being basically what they're doing.
And this is what you were saying about, well, you know, the, the wall street journal sort of overstating it here.
There's a lot of things that have to be taken care of first.
First, you have to transfer the people who are still at Camp Oshroff to Camp Liberty, and then they're basically setting those people loose one at a time in different directions in different places, right?
Or are they just finding a different place inside Iraq?
I guess I read somewhere.
They're going to try to maybe find them a base up in Kurdistan where they can stay, but that's really the question of the delisting, right, is whether if they're a terrorist group, then they're, as long as they stay together, they're, they're exiled, but then, uh, or they can only just leave one at a time and their group is destroyed, or if they get delisted, then they can maybe go to Europe or something, but stay together.
That's basically it, right?
I mean, you're asking a really important question.
And right up against the break too.
Hold it right there.
We'll be right back.
It's Reza Mirashi from NIAC.org.
Hey, I'm Scott.
How's things?
Welcome back to the show.
It's anti-war radio talking with Reza Mirashi about the N.E.K.
Communist terrorist cult.
And now, uh, the, and the wall street journal piece, Iran exile group nears U.S. rebirth, a little bit of an overstatement as we talked about.
And then I'm sorry, Reza, cause I asked you a big, long, complicated question and then the hard break came on us.
And, uh, so now I kind of got to start all over again.
Basically my question was about the correlation and the causation between the delisting of the group and whether that means that they can leave Iraq together or whether they have to leave separately and maybe be reunited with their kidnapped children and whatever else kind of thing and set free.
That's a really important question because at the end of the day, above all else, you know, two things stand out.
One is the need to prevent terrorism, but also the need to ensure the human rights of those who are being held in Camp Ashraf against their will.
And I think that there are steps that can be taken, uh, to ensure that the latter occurs to ensure that the situation regarding Camp Ashraf can resolve be released fully once and for all.
The first step is that the camp needs to be dismantled under the supervision of the UN, the International Red Cross and the US military.
We're slowly starting to see this process take place.
A camp that had about 3000 people in it now has about half that number.
So it's headed in the right direction.
But with the terrorist cult, as you noted earlier, anything can happen.
So we need to be diligent on this.
Point number two is that the leaders of this terrorist should be distinguished from the rank and file members and the leader should not be granted immunity for prosecution for any possible involvement in terrorist attacks or human rights abuses.
Uh, there are serious concerns that, uh, the MEC leaders are using the current negotiations with the U S and the international community to ensure their own security while exploiting their members as bargaining chips.
Uh, you know, talking about the threat of mass suicide as a negotiating tactic, uh, things like that.
So we need to be careful here.
Third, I would say that law enforcement and psychological support services should be given to, uh, assist these camp residents who wish to leave the organization.
And again, grand says that about 70% of them are being held against the whole held in the camp against their will.
This is not going to be easy because the MEC, like most cults has made its members emotionally, psychologically, and financially dependent on the organization and fearful of retribution.
If they leave, uh, finally, I would say that, uh, you know, in addition to the resettlement in third countries, the reunification of families, if they meet the requirement of the United nations to renounce violence.
And this is an important point because many of the MBK members have not renounced violence yet.
Uh, the MBK as a whole, not just its political wing, not just its front groups, the MBK as a whole must renounce violence in an official proclamation that's published in both English and in Persian and completely disarm before, and a D listing can even be considered, uh, American forces need to be able to search the camp.
They need to be able to search vehicles that are moving in and out.
They need full unfettered access to anything related to this terrorist organization before a D listing can take place to properly ensure not only that, uh, it's a terrorist capabilities have been dismantled, but also to ensure that the human rights of, uh, of the individuals being held in the camp are respected and upheld to the highest degree.
Well, now where do you anticipate they'll end up here or what do you think is going to happen?
I think right now we are taking a few steps in the right direction in terms of trying to get the camp closed, trying to, uh, get MBK members out of a terrorist base and into a former us military base that doesn't have any of the existing infrastructure, none of their computers, none of their weapons, anything like that.
I think that's a bit of a rude awakening for, for the terrorist cult.
But I also think that, uh, you know, They're about halfway done with that, right?
Moving them from Ashraf to Camp Liberty.
That's right.
We're about halfway done with that.
Uh, but it's taken months to get halfway done.
So I think, you know, in terms of, you know, what happens next, I think we have a minimum of at least a couple of more months, uh, before everybody's out of camp Ashraf and it can be verifiably closed and shut down.
And then we have to start thinking about, well, what do we do with the people that we just moved out?
How do we separate rank and file from leadership?
Uh, how do we figure out who's a true believer and who's being held there against their will?
How do we find countries to take these people in?
How do we determine that the willingness and the capabilities of this group to engage in violence and terrorism has stopped?
There's, there's numerous additional steps that need to be carried out.
Even after this first long process, the important step of closing the terrorist base takes place.
So there's a ways to go.
Uh, secretary Clinton does have within her purview to delist this group.
If she deemed them not a threat to us national security, but being able to do that arbitrarily is a stretch.
So I do think there's a process here, but we need to make sure that we're doing this process the right way.
And when stories like the wall street journal piece come out, uh, I can see why it would conjure up a bit of fear because very few people support delisting this group.
Really.
You have members of the group itself.
Uh, some folks in Israel and the Netanyahu government who support using the MEK as a tool and some American neoconservatives who think the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
Hmm.
Well, you know, Ray McGovern, the former CIA analyst pointed out on this show.
Um, I guess I keep bringing it up mostly just so I remember, cause somehow I had forgotten or maybe even never really made the connection in the first place.
But during October of 2009, right at the most crucial time for whether or not we would be able to do the uranium fuel swap deal, John Dullah started killing a bunch of Iranian army officers.
And that tipped the balance in domestic Iranian politics against the deal in such a way, especially as to make the failure all their fault instead of anybody on our sides, but, uh, looks like now that was the Israeli Mossad, uh, perhaps posing as the CIA.
Maybe the CIA was in on it.
I'm pretty dubious that anyway.
Um, and, uh, but anyway, that really was a problem.
And so this is the kind of thing I've been, you know, fearing a little bit in the back of my head here, as we have a few weeks between the decision to have some talks and the actual having of the talks that somebody is going to start assassinating scientists and somebody means either John Dullah or the Mujahideen called working for the Israelis to sabotage.
Uh, these efforts it's in Haaretz, I think today or yesterday that, um, the Israeli government officially fears the success of talks.
That's the headline.
Israel fears nuclear deal between Iran.
Uh, do you think that that's a possibility that the MEK could be used to sabotage these talks?
Or I wonder whether even the leak to the wall street journal in this story is an attempt to kind of gum up the works a little bit by just bringing the MEK back into this, I mean, I think you're raising some important points here.
It's certainly not outside the realm of possibility.
That being said, we also don't know for, but what we do know is that, uh, there are numerous countries, uh, that the United States is close allies with Israel, Saudi Arabia, the countries of the Gulf cooperative council, uh, other countries in the Middle East, some in Europe as well.
And we also have domestic political constituencies here in the United States.
So numerous actors worldwide that have a vested interest in, in preventing the relationship between Iran and the United States from improving, uh, and actually seeing it deteriorating further.
And that's when you start to see these kinds of actions take place that you were describing before.
So what do you mean by that?
You, you think, uh, you're our European allies and other, not just Israel, but other Gulf States would rather keep America and Iran in a state of permanent antagonism rather than work that are differences out.
Absolutely.
Um, you know, everybody has their own vested self-interest that they prioritize for the interest of their allies or especially their adversaries.
Um, you know, Israel, for example, has had a Paul longstanding policy really since its creation in 1948, that no country in the Middle East should be allowed to achieve scientific military or technological parity with it.
Uh, they consider that to be a threat.
And now that Iran is reaching that threshold where it's becoming a country that, you know, can indigenously enrich uranium to high levels, um, could build a nuclear weapon on short notice if it made the political decision to do so, which, uh, American intelligence has told us that they have not, uh, that they, they see that as a threat to their hegemony in the region.
Therefore they have an vested interest in making sure that maybe the relationship doesn't improve to the degree that some other people might like it too.
Well, now I can see why maybe the Saudis would prefer that we prefer them to the Iranians in case, you know, we have a renewed, warm relationship with Iran, how they wouldn't like that or whatever, but what European powers do you think would prefer that things stay as they are?
I think the French were definitely one country, at least prior to, uh, to the election of, uh, of the new government in France, Sarkozy was, uh, the French equivalent of, of a neoconservative who, who saw a vested interest in, in, in preventing Iran from moving forward as a new program who saw, uh, it being in the interest of France to prevent the two countries from coming closer together.
You have to remember that until these incredibly draconian sanctions that are being put on the Iranian regime, uh, France had a close economic relationship and France actually pursued a strategic relationship with the Iranians in the late 1990s and early 2000 Sarkozy came in the office and moved all of that back.
Uh, so both French government, both right-leaning and left-leaning were essentially trying to fill a gap and take advantage of a country with massive energy resources that America didn't operate in.
And, and that the same can be said for the Russians, the Chinese and other European countries as well.
Right.
So we're with all our belligerence.
In other words, we're excluding ourselves from good business and they like it that way and they don't want us to ruin that and go back to the bad old days of the seventies when the Americans were getting along with the Persians.
Well, there's certainly something to be said for that at the same time, though, it can't all be about business.
I mean, one of the biggest problems that the United States is facing in the Middle East today, whether it's in Iran, Israel, Palestine, or anywhere else, is that we haven't properly found the balance.
We haven't calibrated our interests and our values too many times.
We're sacrificing one for the other.
And that imbalance opens us up to accusations of hypocrisy.
So on the one hand, we rightly criticize the Iranian government's human rights abuses.
On the flip side, you barely hear a peep about Bahrain and Saudi Arabia and places like that.
And as long as that, uh, that prioritization of interests over values continues to move forward in the Middle East in the way that it has over the last couple of decades, when it comes to U.S. policy there, it is a weakness that we have.
Uh, so it can't be all about business.
There has to be a balance between these various facets and then these various interests that we have in the region.
Well, I think if it was all about business, we would do business with them.
Unfortunately, it's all about politics and it's all about what Netanyahu wants.
That's another factor that plays into it.
There's no doubt.
It's not all about what Netanyahu wants, but I always like to remind people that Dick Cheney committed what later became the ultimate sin was to go to a foreign country and criticize America.
But he went to Australia and gave a speech a couple of times, I think, uh, or a couple of speeches while he was there criticizing Bill Clinton for sanctions against Iran and saying, as the CEO of Halliburton, you know, the Iranians are people too.
We can do business with them.
We ought to lift these sanctions and have normal relations with them.
The Iranian revolution was a long time ago, et cetera, et cetera.
And that was his point of view back before he had an army and an air force and a Navy at his command.
That's true.
And I knew when I was in Iran in 2005, Halliburton was operating there quite openly, so he was doing business.
Oh yeah.
So he got his exemption after all.
I mean, when you have a European subsidiary, at least back then, when you had a European subsidiary, it was very easy to skirt the sanctions.
Yeah.
Now, you know, Greg palace said that, Hey man, uh, I don't know if you heard or not, but British petroleum just opened a bazillion dollar refinery and giant industrial machine inside Iran.
And if you think they're subsidiary, the Royal air force is going to go over there and bomb it.
You're wrong.
They paid for it with their own money this time.
You know, there's a host of reasons why war with Iran is a bad idea.
And one of those reasons is because other countries not named the United States have a vested interest in not having war happen because it will adversely affect their economic interests.
Nevermind their economic stability as numerous countries in Europe are facing massive economic decline.
Right.
Yep.
Pieces in everybody's best interest.
Got that right.
All right.
I've already kept you over time.
I'm, I'm doing that more and more getting sloppier and sloppier, but I'm having a great time and getting great interviews.
And especially this one.
Thanks very much for your time.
Thank you very much.
Always a pleasure.
Everybody that's resume Rashi.
He is the research director at the national Iranian American council.
That's niacouncil.org.
I got it wrong earlier.
Sorry about that.niacouncil.org.
