As western powers and the Iranian regime plan for more talks in January, policymakers in Washington are left to deliberate on what exactly the White House's engagement strategy is supposed to accomplish. Both engagement and the non-comprehensive sanctions, of course, have thus far failed vis-Ã -vis the Iranian nuclear program. Time is running out fast and options are dwindling.
To avoid seeing the world's foremost state sponsor of terrorism equipped with the world's deadliest weapon, which could then be transferred to terrorists targeting the West, Washington and her allies need to act fast by rectifying past policy mistakes and standing with the Iranian people for democratic change.
To characterize the West's current level of engagement with Iran as "dialogue" would be a misnomer. The attempt could actually better be summed up as a "monologue," to borrow from the President-elect of Iran's parliament-in-exile, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, Maryam Rajavi.
This was made abundantly clear when US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton went out on a limb not once but three times during a conference in Bahrain last month to say a friendly hello to the Iranian regime's foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki. She was embarrassingly snubbed on all three occasions. Tellingly, Mottaki was himself sacked a couple weeks later apparently for not being radical enough!
After years of negotiations and sanctions, the latest report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) says that Tehran continues to enrich uranium in defiance of UN resolutions. Meanwhile, regime officials continue to emphasize that the talks in January will not involve their "right" to produce enriched uranium. What will they be about then?
Sanctions, moreover, are at best an external source of pressure that must be complemented by internal forces in order to result in fast and painful effects on the mullahs' calculus.
So, what should be done?
Instead of the failed policy of engagement, and to avoid military action, the US should focus on democratic forces that are already engaged in bringing about fundamental regime change in Iran. The first advantage of this approach is that it is underpinned by the consistency and forceful message of America's ideals and values, such as human rights and democracy. A democratic order in Iran is the best long-term and strategic answer.
The most important step in this direction would be for the US to remove the barriers it has placed on the path of the main opposition group Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK).
As countless officials and press reports have said, the MEK was placed on the terrorist list in 1997 by the State Department as a "goodwill gesture" to what was then perceived to be a "moderate" drift in Tehran's ruling circles. That notion turned out to be a complete myth, but the restrictions on the mullahs' arch nemesis have remained intact.
Dissidents in Iran are regularly jailed, tortured and even killed by the regime under the pretext of the "terrorist" label. Just this month, a 63-year-old political prisoner, Ali Saremi, was inhumanely executed at Evin prison for having visited his son in Camp Ashraf, Iraq, home to 3,400 members of the MEK, many of whom survived Tehran's repression before they sought refuge at this Camp.
In Iraq, the residents of Ashraf face the same sorts of threats by regime proxies there, who primarily rely on the terror label to justify their heinous deeds. This month, a cancer patient, Mehdi Fat'hi, died unnecessarily because Iraqi forces doing the Iranian regime's bidding denied him timely and necessary medical treatment.
The US should immediately end shackling the MEK in order to dispel the perception that it is an unwitting accomplice of the mullahs in committing such crimes.
Recently some officials from the George W. Bush administrations admitted that the government made a horrible mistake in continuing to blacklist the MEK. Frances Townsend, the former White House Advisor for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism, described it as a "bad judgment" during a speech in Paris earlier this month, and added, "I know we were wrong not to delist the MEK, because of Iran's reaction... The tyrannical regime in Iran believed that the failure to delist the MEK was a weakness not strength."
At a December 17 symposium in Washington, Former Secretary for Homeland Security Tom Ridge echoed the same sentiment regarding the FTO designation of the main Iranian opposition movement saying, "If the goal was to improve engagement and to solicit a different response from the Iranian government, that has not worked out very well."
Looking at the MEK's conduct, which deeply contradicts its branding as a terrorist organization, former US Attorney General, Michael Mukasey, has asked the State Department, "If the MEK has renounced violence, as it has; and in fact presents no threat to any US personnel or interest; and in fact has been of affirmative assistance to the United States, as it has; and is not regarded as a terrorist organization in the United Kingdom or the EU, then why was it placed on the list and why does it continue to remain on the list?"
The growing consensus on the need to delist the MEK is bipartisan. A resolution in the House of Representative, H.Res.1431, garnered 113 cosponsors, 70 of them democrats. Chair of the Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade, Brad Sherman (D-CA), said in a Congressional briefing earlier this year, "I have difficulty understanding what has the [MEK] done, anything remotely, in recent times, that causes the [MEK] to be on that list. I do know there is no entity more feared, more hated by the mullahs who run Iran than the [MEK], which is perhaps the finest compliment that could be paid to that organization."
In July, the US Federal Court of Appeals strongly suggested that the MEK's designation should be revoked because it relies on unreliable evidence and rumors and has violated the group's due process rights. This, along with overwhelming congressional backing for delisting, as well as acknowledgments by senior Bush Administration officials that they exercised bad judgment in keeping the MEK on the terrorist list gives Secretary Clinton the legal, moral and political rationale and responsibility to delist the MEK.
Delisting the largest Iranian opposition force will undoubtedly encourage dissent in Iran against the regime, allow the democratic opposition to more freely articulate its views in the US, take away one of the regime's pretexts to execute political prisoners and MEK supporters, while also helping the residents of Camp Ashraf in Iraq to obtain a more secure fate. Most importantly, delisting would allow the MEK to devote its political and social wherewithal as well as resources, mostly used to challenge its designation in past 13 years, towards promoting change in Iran.
MEK members in Camp Ashraf, moreover, need to be protected by the US and UN forces to avert another humanitarian catastrophe there.
As former Attorney General Mukasey put it, "Quite simply, the MEK is the only organization of Iranians, both inside Iran and outside Iran, that opposes the current regime and favors a government in Iran that is organized as a democratic, secular, non-nuclear republic." It deserves to have its rights respected.
The West will get the attention of the regime, even during talks, once the Iranian people have been given enough breathing room to step up dissent and make the prospect of democratic change in Iran more visible than before. That is how the United States can avoid another military conflict and turn a monologue into a dialogue. But more importantly, that is how the regime's host of threats will give way to a free and more peaceful Iran and Middle East.
I appreciate your truthful report of what is happening in Iran. I congradulate your well informed opinion,
In the comments I noted some regorgitation of the alrady discredited accusations against MKO. These guys behave like a near drowing situation that the swimer holds hand to anything no matter how useless or discredited it can be.
The regorgitaed accusations that I do not want to repeat here are thoroughly investigated by the America forces in charge of Ashraf City and have been rejected already.
It seems that the nearly drowning Iranian regime and its followers in Iran hane nothing else to say but hroung mud or feeding the coronies the same food already putrifed.
POMI's status in the world now is above the A.N regime. When Mojahedin release apress release or an Interview the work hears it although they might not want to at on it but when Ahmadinejas or supreme leader talks the world knows that they are lying or coverng their crime or is a justification for their crime.
Dear Sir, I thank you again for highlighting Ashraf's plight and hope that your open minded readers will take notice of it in helping them.
There is not a shred of evidence that anyone connected to "Israel," or any other country for that matter, has provided a penny to the PMOI.
PMOI has always taken pride in its political, financial and organizational independence.
To those who invoke PMOI's policies in the 1960s and the early 70s in opposition to the US unconditional support for the Shah's dictatorship, make no mistake. Everyone, including millions of Iranians who overthrow the US-backed Shah, were opposed to the US policies in those days.
The heinous and countless atrocities that the tyrants who rule Iran today have committed in no way whitewash the crimes perpetrated by the Shah and his henchmen.
But, the issue is not living in the past. We must look to the future, one where all Iranians, regardless of their political, religious and ethnic orientations, could participate in shaping a free, democratic and modern Iranian state. And every opposition group, including the PMOI, should have the opportunity to contribute to that endeavor. The unjustified listing denies it that chance. This is what the de-listing campaign is all about.
First, even after the heinous execution of Mr. Saremi, the regime refused to hand over his body to his family for burial; it secretly buried him in his birth place, Amirabad village, near the western city of Boroujerd. Despite a heavy presence of security forces, as soon as people found out, some 5,000 went to pay homage to Mr. Saremi on Saturday.
Second, 3,400 members of the MEK have been living in Camp Ashraf, Iraq, for the past seven years, unarmed and without the possibility of leaving the Camp.
Can anyone explain to me why has the regime been pressuring its Iraqi proxies for the past couple of years to launch attacks against the residents, place restrictions on Ashraf and even deny patients medical care?
After all, the mullahs claim to have an army of 5 million bassijis, a regular armed force and the Revolutionary Guards Corps, which number in the hundreds of thousands.
Why does the regime not let the MEK go into oblivion, instead of spending millions to demonize the group, or make it the number one item on its agenda in every diplomatic exchange?
1. The Iranian people have proved over and over that they are the majority and they did not support this regime for example in the 2-3 million people protest last year post stollen election by A.N.
2. The Issue is that MEK has a very formidable support and base in Iran to prove this we need one day of freedom of demonstration to see that if last year 2-3 million people rushed into the street while the demonstration was announced illegal. What happens if they could freely express their views. Alternatively, if MEK has no support base in Iran so what is the regimeand it suportes worry for?
3. Iran does not need Nuclear power plants because these are very expensive, difficult to manage, high risk and more imortantly Iran does not have the knowhow of running it. It is already putting lives at risk. I give you an example.
When the IAE inspectors took samples from their centrifuges they found highly enriched uranium there. As the authorities could not deny this they came up with a justification that the centrifuges were contaminated before buying them. This means that those who are running these projects do not follow the basics of safty. Every BSc student knows that when you buy a centrifuge or any other nuclear device you must test for contamintion to prevent workers exposure and interference.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18546-iran-showing-fastest-scientific-growth-of-any-country.html
Iranian regime has created a mafia like system riddle with corruption and mismanagemÂent controllinÂg its population through daily public executions ,imprisoneÂment and stoning couppled by closure of free press.
Such a dicatorial regime does not deserve to be member of the family of Nations and the sooner is changed the better.
It is here that the de-listing of MKO as one of the main organised and popular opposition groups can help Iranians change Iran for better with requiring any forein forces .
On the other hand we are writing for a wider audience in this case maily Americans and in this case the " regime ruling Iran might be better.
Thanks again for the note.
There is a big difference between someone who supports a dictatorshÂip like the mullahs' and those who are striving for freedom and democracy for their enchained homeland, namely Iran. When you open their books, you will see their goals and intentions at the same time. As far as the mullahs are concerned, one can say and see what they are representiÂng. Just open khomeini's book "Q'S & A'S" (RESALEH), if you don't get sick after the first pages then you would be able to read the minds of those who are enjoying the power in Iran. But I would say, you should be prepared, like, have a "BAG" on the your side, just in case you need it. Make sure, you read that Question about "touching a six-month-Âold baby and... After this make your own judgment about these Basijis who proudly annonce their heritage being connected to such a "clergy"!!Â!
So wanting to deal with such creatures, would make you think twice before you want to give your hand or even saying "HELLO" to them (Mrs. Clinton's attempts). These mullahs fit in no categories of human definitionÂs.
If it doesn't suit the opinion of the moderator, please delete (3).
Half a censured argument only confuses the readers.
In spite of these facts, a campaign has been waged in the western media to vilify Iran for wanting nuclear arms. Based on unsubstantiated rumours, unverifiable statements by exiles, defectors and intelligence agencies, coupled in some cases with outright fabrications, the US was able to convince the Security Council to implement several rounds of sanctions against Iran.
So far Iran is holding on to its right to enrich uranium. By the way this is a second reason why Iran is popular with the people of the Middle East: it withstands Western (and Israeli) pressure and military threats to defend what it considers its sovereign right.
Don’t get me wrong on Iran. I am no sympathiser of their system of government. I think a secular and liberal democratic political system would give the Iranians more freedom and stop the human right abuses, but is up to the Iranian people inside Iran to change that. It may take a long and hard political struggle by the Iranian advocates for reform to win a majority, but that is preferable over military intervention by foreign powers or armed interference by their proxies like the MEK.
Covert actions or war will make matters only worse for everybody involved, as is proved by the gruesome examples of Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Iran is a total police /regious state with minimal freedom for any opposibg thoughts. The iranian nuclear activities are not peaceful and are aime for military use. Iran is enriched with gas and oil reserves and does not require Nuclear plants to produce power. New gas powered power plants are cheaper ,safer and more manageable.
Iranian regime has created an open mafia like system riddle with corruption and mismanagement controlling its population through daily public executions ,imprisonement and stoning couppled by closure of free press.
Such a dicatorial regiime does not deserve to be member of the family of Nations and the sooner is changed the better.
It is here that the de-listing of MKO as one of the main organised and popular opposition groups can help Iranians change Iran for better with requiring any forein forces .
Iran may be a police state for those who oppose the gouvernment, and I do condemn that most thoroughly and support the activities of Human Right organisations to stop it. However for the overwhelming majority of the Iranians, its government still represents the (religious) values they hold most dear.
If you want to change that, you will have to convince the Iranian people to change their attitudes. Top down revolutions don’t work, they only lead to repression and civil war. I think a grab of power by the MEK would only lead to another series of massacres and a new Gulag archipelago, this time filled with tens of thousands mullah’s and their families. I can’t see that as an improvement.
As yet there exists no solid irrefutable evidence that Iran wants nuclear arms. And why would they ? It would only give Israel and the US an excuse to start a war against Iran. On top of that what benefit would it give Iran ? Look at the other countries with atom bombs. In spite of their nuclear arms North Korea is still the poorest country on earth; Pakistan is still slowly descending into civil war; and Israel is continually engaged in military conflicts with its neighbours. The possession of nuclear arms didn’t solve any of their problems.
As to the gas and oil reserves of Iran, some day in the future they will run out. So it better to save some for the future. Building oil and gas energy plants also require enormous investments and they still create a lot of pollution.
Corruption and mismanagement are endemic in most of the countries of Third World, and even in the West it is often a problem. That is no valid reason to topple a government. If we apply these high standards I think only the Scandinavian countries would be members of the UN.
The MEK has discredited itself long ago with the Iranian people by supporting Saddam Hussein’s bloody war against their country. I think their long-time exile has left them out of touch with developments inside Iran, and I doubt the have any substantial support within the country.
And their biggest mistake right now is, that they allow themselves to become a tool for the Neocons and the Israeli’s to destabilise Iran. Neither is really interested in the fate of the Iranian people. They just want Iran’s influence out of the way to impose their own plans for the Middle East.
It is not surprising that those who do not like the article can not come up with a solid reason for their rejection and resort to call the fans "dude'
As the Aussies say" good on you mate, Ali Safavi, you have done it again.
Good on MEK that has managed to stand on its supporters feet in spite of the listings.
I want to remind the urgency of the de-listing to help the main Iranian alternative to the regime to really focus its energy on a fundamental change in Iran.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12104007
The issue here is dealing with the facts which are:
1. I ranian regime has failed its national/ International community by its hanging,stoning,extrajudicial killing,national/international support for terrorism and in one word running the country Mafia style.
2. This dictatorial regime is non reformable as Mr. Khatami proved it well ,no one is keen to try the Fake policy of reform again wasting another eight years of false hope as Mr Khatami suggested to A.N last week which was rejected outright by supreme leader .
3. We need alternatives with capability and popolarity to take up the fight.
*. capability means having the means ,plans and knowhow that MEK /NCRI with its government in exile and plans of action qualifies well. Here, the de-listing will affect the Iranian's fight for freedom.
*.Popularity can be tested by being legally active inside and outse Iran,again the de-listing comes to help. MEK has proved its popularity in spite of the dictatorship over and over once in Iran in 1979-1981 then outside Iran in their June's Paris gatherings and last week in Paris in the International gathering of democracy for Iran with prominant American and European participants.
Now I want those who commented negatively or supported the Islamic/ahmadinejad regime here to wake up and prove their point without using Basij's culture or reasoning.
HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU.