Sunday, December 11, 2005

Iran’s nuclear issue is heating up as United States and Britain try to persuade Russia and China to accept the authenticity of the evidence found in “The Laptop” given to the U.S. nuclear experts showing Iran’s detailed plans for building a nuclear bomb.

The Islamic Republic’s long time main opposition group Mujahedin-e-Khalq, a.k.a. People’s Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI), has been bringing the nuclear issue to the world’s attention.

In a press conference in Washington, in August 2002, the Mujahedin-e-Khalq revealed Iran’s secret nuclear plan for the first time shocking the western intelligence communities.

Three years since then, new evidence emerging each month has created more suspicions about what Iran claims to be a peaceful project for civilian use.

Driven by increasing pressure from the European allies who have backed down from talks, the Islamic republic has hyped up their global campaign to discredit the Mujahedin-e-Khalq. Some policy makers who offered to put the Iranian opposition in the list of terrorist organizations now repent from their past policy. The PMOI has been officially designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation by the United States and is proscribed by the European Union.

The National Council of Resistance to Iran quoted Lord Alton of Liverpool, a lawmaker from the British House of Lords, as saying on November 29 in a symposium in the House of Lords, “Having been involved with the activities of the Iranian Resistance over this 25 years, I have learned a great deal about that misinformation campaign and the attempts by the Iranian regime to discredit the PMOI.”

The new campaign has concerned Iranian dissidents abroad. An outspoken former national soccer champion, Mr. Hassan Naeb Agha, an active member of the opposition, claims to have been approached by family members under influence of Iran Ministry of Intelligence (MOIS) in a psychological warfare in an attempt to penetrate his personal life to stop his activities.