Disarmed by the Americans in the wake of the Iraq war, and with their offices in France raided by authorities, Iran's armed opposition People's Mujahideen defiantly say they are stronger now than before the war.
"Demonstrations in Iran show the mullah's regime is weakening and international pressure is growing, while we gained international recognition from the affair involving Maryam Rajavi and from our attitude during the war," Mohsen Nadi, a leader of the Mujahideen's political wing, told reporters.
Last month, French authorities raided a dozen or so locations of the Mujahideen in the northwest of Paris and initially detained some 165 people, among them the symbolic leader of the group Maryam Rajavi, Massoud's wife.
On Wednesday, a French court ordered Maryam to be released on bail, while eight other detained members were also due to be freed.
"Maryam is the symbol of the struggle against the misogynous regime in Tehran and a hope for all Iranian women," said Nadi, speaking at Camp Ashraf, the group's largest camp in Iraq, some 100km north of Baghdad.
The Mujahideen lent its backing to 10 days of demonstrations by students and reformers that kicked off in Tehran on June 10.The protests spread to other cities in Iran and saw many slogans shouted against Iran's clerical regime.
Iranian authorities cracked down on the demonstrations, arresting some 4,000 people, 2,000 of whom are still being held for trial, according to state prosecutor Abdul Nabi Namazi.
Nadi said the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) also played a key part in bringing international pressure to bear on Tehran, notably over its nuclear program, which Washington says is being used to develop weapons.
"We gave the Americans information on the plans of the Iranian government," he said.
At Camp Ashraf, more than 5,000 Mujahideen fighters could be seen training, as they have been doing for years, but without their weapons.
In 1986, the Mujahideen under the leadership of Massoud Rajavi took refuge in Iraq, from where they organized attacks inside Iran as part of their goal to overthrow the Islamic regime.
In May, the group, considered terrorists by the US State Department and the EU, struck a deal with US occupation authorities in Iraq to disarm and relocate its fighters to one camp.
The organization is still receiving new young recruits from Iran. Two musicians, Anushirvan Riahi, 18, and Mohammed Macek, 19, arrived here five months ago from the central city of Shiraz to join the struggle.
"To join the Mujahideen, we traveled for awhile on foot and went through Turkey," one of them said.
Nadi said the accord with US forces was the result of the neutral position taken by the group during the war. "We did not fire a single shot, even when we were attacked. We left 17 of our bases and fell back to this camp to avoid any incidents, and our attitude has been rewarded."
For him, allegations that the group is involved in "terrorist" activities and was planning attacks on Iranian targets in Europe are "ridiculous."
"Do you think we will overthrow the Iranian regime by staging attacks against Iranian embassies in Europe?" he asked.
The crackdown on the group, which has operated in France for the past two decades, was launched over allegations it was to make France its new international headquarters.
It sparked demonstrations across Europe with several people setting themselves on fire in protest at the French action.
In a statement last week, the NCRI accused Iran's intelligence ministry of sending agents to France to direct a misinformation campaign against the group.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion