I‘m a woman escaped from MKO camp
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... Since I couldn’t get out alone, I planned a way to escape. At the sunset time, I put a back bag on the front seat of my jeep and I put a cap and a scarf on the pack bag to make the figure of a woman. Therefore I could pass the control station. I told them that my colleague is taking a nap on the front seat. So I could get out until I reached the street around the camp where I parked the car and walked out of the prison I had spent so many years of my life ...
Sahar Family Foundation, Baghdad, November 2008
http://www.saharngo.com/en-index.html
Translated by Nejat Association, Tehran, November 2008
http://www.nejatngo.org/en/post.aspx?id=2074
Memories of Mrs. Batoul Soltani - Part two
Link to Part one:
http://iran-interlink.org/?mod=view&id=5300
In his phone calls, Masud Rajavi tried to know why I was upset by making jokes and having fun. He wanted to know what my problem was. I didn’t tell him what my problem was. I was very sad. I had many questions on the organization. I felt that I have lost all my life, wasting my lifetime for looking for nothing. I even saw that the organization didn’t obey its own principles. For example, at that time, we claimed to be anti-Imperialism so much, but I saw how they spread red carpet for the Americans in Camp Ashraf welcoming them warmly. They named the cooperation with Americans as the struggle with the main enemy which is Islamic Republic, saying that
“It doesn’t matter to negotiate with the US to fight the main enemy.”
Sometimes, I asked them:
” why do you make the youth miserable by bringing them to the organization? Why haven’t we overthrown the regime yet after two decades? Or why are we struggling at all?”
However I was stuck in vain, this was not a factor to make me escape or leave the organization until the day I was working on the computer and I entered the private network of Mozhgan Parsaie. In fact I was supposed to fix their network. In one of their rooms, I entered Mozhgan Parsaie’s network where she had prepared a report which was supposed to be sent to Maryam Rajavi. I read the report and I saw what she had written about me. I got shocked extremely wondering what the reason of all respects they had for me was and what this report is. I felt they are so hypocrite and the word hypocrite really deserves them. They had back-bitted about me writing anything they could write about me although I was a member of Leadership Council. For instance they had written that I have moral problems or I have problems with children etc…. they had stated that my situation was so crucial. So I got very upset since they had wasted my life. I was looking for a way to carry out my decision and soon I was able to pack my bag and escape from the camp. We were seriously controlled.
We couldn’t walk around the camp alone. The low-ranking members were told:
“You may be arrested or kidnapped by the others who traffic the camp.”
The members do not trust anybody. They are always monitoring each other. I was in the Leadership Council, so I know that they falsely say that
“We do not allow the women to walk alone due to lack of security in the camp.“
In fact they want to cover the reality of their jobs.
The women were controlled in a particular way, so strictly, that Rajavi had soon sworn that
“We have no female defector”,
The control over the women members were more sever because he wanted to prove his claim.
Since I couldn’t get out alone, I planned a way to escape. At the sunset time, I put a back bag on the front seat of my jeep and I put a cap and a scarf on the pack bag to make the figure of a woman. Therefore I could pass the control station. I told them that my colleague is taking a nap on the front seat. So I could get out until I reached the street around the camp where I parked the car and walked out of the prison I had spent so many years of my life: Two decades of my life, from the moment I was recruited by the cult until the time I could run away by a complex plan. When I was escaping from the camp, I didn’t intend to go to TIPF (the American camp). I had some tools such as a wire cutter to cut the barbed wires and walk out of the camp. I knew that there are some hungry dogs wondering around the camp. I brought some food to give them in case of the risk of their attack. When I entered the deserts around the camp and I was walking towards the cast, I encountered the dogs. So I gave the food and water to them. They became my friends and escorted me.
But when I got to the barbed wires I found out that I had lost my wire cutter when I was trying to feed the dogs. So I changed my plan and decided to go to American camp. I came towards the American camp and tried to draw the soldiers’ attention to myself, but they couldn’t hear me because they were listening to music by their headsets. I tried to shout, using my English. I told them that
“I am a woman who escaped from MKO camp and I don’t want the organization learns about me.”
Finally I could get in the camp of American forces.
In the camp, MKO tried to contact me, in many ways. They sent me letters, messages,.. They even called me on the cell phones which were held secretly in the American camp. They wanted me to get back to Ashraf promising me to do anything I want such as going to Europe or giving financial aids. Then they launched a large attempt to attract me by my children. They knew that I was looking for my children. They particularly wanted to bring my daughter to camp Ashraf so as I would get back. They even had her supervisor, in Europe, call me so that they can control me out of Camp Ashraf and even abroad. But I never let them get close to me. They had taken my daughter as a hostage; she wasn’t allowed to call me. She was told a lot of nonsense about me. They had even told her to have an interview against me but she hadn’t accepted because she was busy with her studies and her personal life.
I stayed in TIPF for a period of time. Americans suggested working for them. I did their computer works about storage of their goods listing them in the computer and I was paid 2.5 dollars an hour.
Meanwhile I had some contacts with my family. I was sometimes afraid of my future life. I was afraid of making mistake. I didn’t know what was waiting for me. Sometimes I got disappointed. The organization was also trying hard to have me back with promises of money or a free life in Europe but I was sure that I would have no way out with MKO except that same isolated cult.
We had many difficulties in TIPF. The Americans didn’t help us; instead they aided the organization to become more stable, for example they recognized Mozjgan Parsaie but not the separated members of the cult. The organization used the opportunity and expanded its control and hegemony over the members more and more. The pressure of the meetings was increased.
In the meetings, about 300 people were shouting at an individual asking him or her:
” what is in your mind? Why do you want to leave the camp? Why do you think about your children or husband?”
When I just remember these memories, I get terrified. So I didn’t think about any of their suggestions. In my contacts with my family, they couldn’t help me so much they wanted to help me in their own way offering their emotions and sympathy.
Translation:Nejat Society
To be continued
------------
Part one:
http://iran-interlink.org/?mod=view&id=5300
To be a Mujahed
Interview with Mrs. Batoul Soltani
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Sahar Foundation, Baghdad, October 23, 2008
www.saharngo.com
Translated by Nejat association
http://www.nejatngo.org/en/post.aspx?id=2063
Interview with Mrs. Batoul Soltani
The following is an interview with “ Former member of the leadership Council of MKO; a woman who was released after two decades of being captive of the cult of Rajavi …during those years she lost her kids and her warm family center. The life of Mrs. Batoul Soltani is mostly like a tragic drama that seems like an incredible fate. She is now stepping in a way to rejoin her missing husband and kids.
SFF: Mrs.Soltani, Thank you for your time. We would like to offer you our sympathy due to the entire grieves you suffered for more than two decades. As we’d like to learn about your tragedy-like life, please explain how you were recruited by the organization?
Mrs.Batoul Soltani: Thank you. I am Batoul Soltani. I was born in 1965 in Isfahan where I graduated from high school. I was accepted for the university but I didn’t go there and instead I married a man who had just been released from the prison.
In 1986 we got married and then one of my husband’s friends, who had joined the organization, introduced him to MKO. He had told them that we are opposed to the Islamic Republic. So the MKO’s men came to Isfahan to look for us.
My husband told me about leaving Iran. I had some social problems so I was ready to leave Iran. I said:
”It is so good. We will leave Iran to look for our happiness and life.”
The same year when I was pregnant (about eight months after our marriage) we left Iran through Iran-Pakistan border by the help of a smuggler who worked for MKO.
We were on the way for a few days. I remember the difficulties I had on the way. When we arrived in Pakistan, I told my husband that I wanted to continue my studies and have a free life. We asked the UNHCR for the refugee card. Due to my physical status, pregnancy, they soon granted refugee to us. I gave birth to my first kid in Pakistan.
Later MKO came to my husband. He insisted on going to Iraq and I disagreed but my husband said:
”It is very good to live in Iraq. They have a very good situation there. We will have a comfortable life. If we don’t want to live there, we can go to a European country.”
But from the other side the MKO’s representative said:
” everyone cannot step in this way. It is so hard. “
But my husband said:
”No, it’s not like that. They say these words to everyone who wants to join MKO, but it is not actually as what he says. They have a very relaxing life. They want to know how loyal the members are and such things.”
He said these things to convince me to be satisfied and tolerate any difficulty.
Therefore, in 1987 we came to Iraq with our two-month old baby. They received us in the best hotels of Baghdad and settled us in a 5-starred hotel. After a period of residence in the hotel they told me that I can leave my kid to the nursery and work in their school. I remember that they took our passport and refugee card when we arrived at the airport and we couldn’t understand that they were blocking all the way back.
When I got their base, I left my baby to the nursery and started working as a teacher in their school. We were practically gotten involved in the organization’s relations.
The process continued until they told us that they wanted to send the children to Europe. This was a plan after the Gulf War. They used the opportunity and said:
”We are not able to keep children here any more and we must send them to Europe. “
They held indoctrination meetings and various factors convinced us to send the children to Europe. I talked with my husband. He said:
”we have no way out of Organization’s relations and no appropriate facilities and means to live our life in Iraq without MKO. We can not return Iran because we will be arrested and executed there. Besides we have no money and the organization keeps our documents.”
Actually he was gotten stuck within the Organization’s relations so he wanted to continue as before.
So he convinced me to let our children go for their own sake in the hope that they will be lucky and happy there and we will be loyal to each other here and soon we will also go abroad. Or we will go to Iran after victory. He seriously emphasized that the regime of Iran would overthrow in 6 or 7 months and we would go to Iran.
After that I remember that I was so sad and I missed my children. I cried under the blanket at nights because we shouldn’t show our emotions. If they found out that I had missed my children, they would punish me. They said:
” what’s wrong with you? You are a revolutionary avant-garde. You are here to liberate your country.”
So I tried to hide my feelings. Then the promotions began in the organization. They held special programs to allegedly liberate the women in revolutionary phases, heightening the scene of responsibility of the weakened women.
Thus everyday I was promoted in my ranks and duties. After the departure of my children, I received military trainings and soon, in 1993, I was the commandant of a unit.
In 1991, the mandatory divorces were ordered. They said:
”Anyone who wants to stay and continue the way must divorce from her husband. “
Therefore in an artificial atmosphere, anyone wanted to take off her ring and declared her divorce to show that she is superior and more liberated.
This was Masud and Maryam’s plan to separate the spouses. [..]
After the divorces, the control was heightened to keep the men and women away from each other. If even the members thought about their spouses or asked any question about them, they would be punished seriously.
Later the group forced the men to give their hegemony following giving their wives to the organization and under the revolutionary titles they handed their duties to the women gradually.
I remember that I was the commandant of a unit with 11 tanks, each one with 3 service-men. It was a big responsibility and I had no free time. I could relax only two hours a day. Then I received computer training for 4 years after I went to Britain with a false passport. At the time the systems of the computers in MKO was Appel and the group wanted to promote them to PC so I was chosen for some new trainings.
During the war I learned the site systems and designed websites. I only for a short time worked in the recruitment section to recruit new forces. In 2007, I was promoted to the Leadership Council.
I attended the meetings of the Leadership Council which were held once a week. We held several meetings when Masud and Maryam were in Iraq and later, as the layer of the leadership council we had the meetings everyday.
In 2006,I was the subject of the meetings for a long time. They asked me why I’m not relaxed. Why I’m depressed or thoughtful. They constantly put me under questions until I got several phone calls from Masud Rajavi.
Translation: Nejat Society
To be continued
-------------
Also read:
http://iran-interlink.org/?mod=view&id=5286
Hysterectomy, latest MKO cult strategy
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Press TV, Oct 21, 2008
http://www.presstv.ir/Detail.aspx?id=72764§ionid=351020101
Of the most inhuman practices carried out within the MKO terrorist organization is the misuse of modern science to make women infertile. Batoul Soltani, who was a Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) member for 20 years and was promoted to the rank of the leadership council of the terrorist organization, told Press TV that individuals in the Mojahedin-e Khalq cult should reach what the organization sees as a peak by cutting all their links with the outside world.
“The women members who have dedicated their family life, children and husbands to the cult leaders are totally separated from the outside world by the removal of their womb. In the organization, the hysterectomy surgery is considered as reaching the peak.”
The former authority of camp Ashraf in Iraq, noted that some of the women even didn't have an idea of the operation done on their body since they were told that the operations are done for curing their sickness. Soltani also mentioned the leaders of the cult concluded that the removal of sexual parts of the body is even physically necessary.
Mojahedin-e Khalq which has undergone a so called ideological revolution has paved the way for a number of cultic practices within the organization. To name them, they are compulsory divorces, victimizing children, separating children from their families, trying to eliminate biological differences between men and women by forcing female members to carry out hard work, and now resorting to hysterectomy.
-------- Also Read: Discussion of the Mojahedin-e Khalq/National Council of Resistance and its activities in the EU Parliament . . . . ... Ms Ebrahimi said she saw Mr Paulo Casaca when he visited Camp Ashraf. We were not allowed to approach him and speak to him, she explained to delegates. If they had somewhere to go, she told delegates, without doubt ninety-nine percent of the people in Camp Ashraf would leave the camp and the MKO... Reported from EU Parliament, Sep. 09, 2008 On Tuesday 9 September a meeting was held by the Delegation for Relations with Iran in the European Parliament. The meeting focused on ‘Discussion of the Mojahedin-e Khalq/National Council of Resistance and its activities in an exchange of views with: Ms Anne Singleton expert on the MKO Ms Angelika Beer, President of the Iran Delegation (Greens/EFA), began by describing the MKO and its activities up to the present time. Anne Singleton briefly described her own involvement with the MKO for over twenty years. Asserting that the MKO will not give up the use of violence to achieve its aims, Ms Singleton went on to explain why, in spite of that, she believes that the MKO has currently little to do with the Iranian political scene, but that precisely because it is a cult, its danger is that it interferes in parliamentary democracy in western countries in ways that may even involve criminal activity. Whilst agreeing that the MKO’s platform of ‘total regime change’ in Iran could be attractive to some politicians in the west, Ms Singleton challenged the delegates to consider whether the MKO would be able to achieve its stated aim – ‘will it do what it says on the tin’? Since its last major offensive against Iran in 1988, the MKO has achieved little to further its aims. She told delegates that they should also consider the possibility that, even if they believe the MKO has changed tactic and intends to pursue its aims only through political opposition, the MKO may not actually be ‘fit for purpose’ She urged them to consider the evidence of the three former residents of Camp Ashraf who have arrived in Europe from Iraq only in the past few weeks, and who would speak later in the meeting about conditions inside the MKO. Ms Singleton asserted that Iranian people – as those delegates who have visited Iran are aware – are not waiting to be rescued by the MKO and are capable of opposing their own government. Iranian women are not waiting to be taught about feminism by Maryam Rajavi who leads an organisation which – as Batul Ebrahimi will testify - badly abuses women members. Then Ms Singleton described the current situation of the MKO in Iraq. Control of Camp Ashraf, the MKO’s headquarters, has been transferred from the American military to the Iraqi military. Ms Singleton said that Iraqi government officials are angry at reports which suggest that the MKO would be ‘massacred’ if the Americans handed over Camp Ashraf. Instead, the people inside the camp are facing a humanitarian crisis because they are not allowed even basic freedoms such as the right to enjoy contact and visits from their families. A rumour has arisen that the Americans have removed around 300 of those captive in Camp Ashraf and left the others. Ms Singleton said that if this is the case then she would consider the remaining 3000 individuals in Camp Ashraf to be ex-members of the MKO. They should be brought to western countries as soon as possible. Finally, Ms Singleton presented delegates with one solution to the crisis at Camp Ashraf, remove the MKO from the European terrorist list and bring ALL 3,300 residents to Europe where those who are mentally, physically and emotionally sick would be able to receive help. Ms Singleton finished by reminding delegates that continuing support for the MKO would, of course, mean that the European Parliament accepted to have a cult operating in its midst and continuing to interfere in parliamentary democracy. However, if that is the decision to be made, then so be it. Ms Ebrahimi (speaking in Farsi) told delegates that she had gone to Camp Ashraf when she was sixteen years old and although she quickly realised she wanted to leave, she was captive there for another ten years. She described conditions for women in the camp. Not only does the MKO not allow women to marry, women are made to work in the scorching sun for hours at a time so their complexions are ruined and they become ugly. This is so they do not develop the vanity to think they could be attractive to a man, she told delegates. In order to remove hope from the women of ever having a family, they are being sent under surgery for spurious medical conditions to have their wombs removed [hysterectomy] and around ten percent of women in Camp Ashraf have now undergone this surgery. When they tried to impose it on her, Ms Ebrahimi ran away. She begged delegates to take doctors to Camp Ashraf to check the veracity of what she was telling them. The MKO told her that if she left the camp and went with the American soldiers, they would rape her. For this reason it took two years before she was able to have the courage to escape. Ms Ebrahimi said she saw Mr Paulo Casaca when he visited Camp Ashraf. We were not allowed to approach him and speak to him, she explained to delegates. If they had somewhere to go, she told delegates, without doubt ninety-nine percent of the people in Camp Ashraf would leave the camp and the MKO. Mr Hamid Siah Mansoori (speaking English) told delegates he had been in the MKO for over twenty five years. He described how he had gone to Iraq from Canada. He had a good education, and a good life in Canada and had his own business before leaving everything behind in the mid 1980s to go to Iraq. He then described the MKO’s attitude to family. He said no one is allowed to contact their family, except in a few cases where people were told to contact their family to get money from them. He said the MKO told his family he was dead. They came to look for him five years ago – at the beginning of the American occupation – but were told he was dead. Mr Hamid Siah Mansoori said he had arrived only a week ago, but had lost any contact details for his family. Nevertheless, his first priority now was to make contact with his parents and the rest of his family. Ms Beer asked delegates if they had questions. One delegate asked how the MKO continued to be financed which allowed them to continue to undertake such expensive campaigns in parliament and elsewhere. Another delegate asked for more detail about the role of the Americans in supporting Camp Ashraf when the US State Department so strongly describes them as a terrorist group. Anne Singleton answered these questions, pointing out that during the reign of Saddam Hussein the MKO had received almost unlimited finance from Saddam Hussein, as well as from Saudi Arabia and some western governments from behind the scene. Now, however, although it is clear that MKO finances are dwindling somewhat, it was unclear how the MKO could continue to spend so much money, and the only people to answer that are the MKO themselves. Ms Singleton pointed out a five year rift in policy toward the MKO between the US State Department – which has a very thorough knowledge of the MKO – and the US Defense Department under Donald Rumsfeld. Some in the US Administration wanted to use the MKO in confronting Iran and therefore Camp Ashraf has been protected by the US military in Iraq for five years. Ms Singleton conceded that this protection was beneficial in keeping the MKO out of danger in the midst of a war zone. But that the Americans had also flouted the UN Fourth Geneva protocol by not allowing MKO to meet their families and not enabling them to leave the situation. Ms Beer then introduced Mr Mohammad Sobhani who had previously addressed the Delegation. Following that meeting he had been the subject of unfounded accusations of having attacked MKO members in Paris. Instead, Mr Sobhani was the victim of a violent attack when some fifty MKO supporters ambushed a meeting at which Mr Sobhani was a speaker. Following this, Mr Hadi Shams Haeri briefly pleaded with delegates to help him have contact with his children whom he has not been allowed to see for eighteen years. He asked that Mr Paulo Casaca accompany him to Camp Ashraf and help him meet with them again. At the end of the meeting Ms Beer expressed her appreciation for the speakers and said it had been a valuable meeting. One which, given the ongoing situation at Camp Ashraf, might soon be repeated. After the meeting, several of the attendees stopped to talk to the visitors – in particular the three who had just arrived from Iraq - and asked them to keep them informed of developments. 
It appears that the ideological revolution of Mojahedin-e Khalq not only led the organization to transform into a notorious cult, but also brought about countless negative consequences, most of which have so far remained unknown to the outside world.
News about MKO's recent scandal has leaked out while Maryam Rajavi, wife of MKO leader Masoud Rajavi, seeks to introduce herself a radical feminist and the true defender of women rights.
Furthermore, she refers to the achievements of the ideological revolution of Mojahedin-e Khalq as a solution for the challenges concerning women rights.
The group is responsible for bombings, killings, and attacks against Iranian government officials and civilians over the past 25 years, including the assassination of the late president Mohammad-Ali Rajaei, prime minister Bahonar and judiciary chief Ayatollah Mohammad Beheshti.
The MKO is also known to have cooperated with Iraq's former dictator Saddam Hussein to suppress the Iraqi people.
http://iran-interlink.org/?mod=view&id=5097
MEPs intrigued by accounts of newly arrived escapees from Camp Ashraf 
Representative of the NCR (declined invitation)
Three Residents of Ashraf Refugee Camp who arrived from Iraq in the last couple of weeks: Ms. Ebrahimi, Mr. Hassan Piransar and Mr. Hamid Siah Mansoori.
Also present were former MKO members Karim Haggi, Mohammad Sobhani, Hadi Shams Haeri and Ali Ghashghavi, who accompanied the new arrivals to provide support to these vulnerable people. 
Ms Beer thanked Anne Singleton for her contribution and asked the three recently arrived, former Camp Ashraf residents to speak. 
