By VOA News
Iran is strongly criticizing Britain for
lifting restrictions
on an Iranian opposition group previously banned as a terrorist organization.
In Tehran Wednesday, a Foreign Ministry spokesman, Mohammad Ali Hosseini, said
Iran totally condemns the British action. The group involved, known as the
People's Mujahedeen of Iran, or the Mujahedin-e Khalq, is banned as a terrorist
group by the United States, the European Union, Iraq, Iran and others.
Following a British court ruling last month that ordered reversal of the
seven-year-old ban on the Iranian group, lawmakers in London lifted the
restrictions without a vote. The action will allow the Mujahedin-e Khalq group,
as it is called in Iran and the United States, to operate more openly and raise
funds in Britain, although its assets would be subject to seizure in other EU
member nations.
Iranian officials say they hope the European Union will not follow Britain's
example.
The Mujahedin-e Khalq, founded in the mid-1960s, originally was a militant
Islamic socialist group engaged in armed struggle against Iran's former
monarchy. The MEK, or PMOI, as it also is known, joined in the Islamic
revolution that deposed Iran's shah, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, in 1978, but later
broke with the theocratic government that emerged in Tehran.
MEK fighters moved to Iraq in the early 1980s and fought against Iran from there
for two decades, supported by Iraq's former Saddam Hussein regime. U.S.-led
coalition forces that invaded Iraq and deposed Saddam in 2003 also disrupted the
militants' safe havens near the Iranian border and disarmed many MEK fighters.
When the MEK was formally outlawed as a terrorist group by the United States and
others in 2001, the Iranian militants said they had renounced violence. They
make up the main bloc in the National Council of Resistance of Iran, which
describes itself as a parliament-in-exile dedicated to establishing a
democratic, secular coalition government in Iran.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP and AP.
Related News:
Iran to
UK: MKO ruling will isolate you
Iran says a decision by the British court to remove a ban on Mujahedin Khalq
Organization (MKO) would only isolate the UK government... "By adopting a policy
of supporting terrorist groups, it (Britain) is pursuing certain provisional
interests." -Press TV
Related Site:
Iran
Interlink: Iran Interlink has been established as a point of contact for
families and friends of members of the Iranian Mojahedin-e Khalq (aka MKO, MEK,
PMOI, NCR, NCRI, NLA, MISS) which is now based in Iraq. Among its aims is "to
inform as widely as possible about the real nature of the Iranian Mojahedin
Khalq cult and to act as a pressure group in this regard."
... Payvand News - 06/26/08 ... --
