On September 10, the clerical regime in Iran held the 17th session of its show trial targeting the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK), nearly 43 years after the mass executions, torture, and confiscation of property belonging to members and supporters of the opposition group.
According to Mizan News Agency, affiliated with the regime’s Judiciary, the trial took place in absentia. The so-called judge, introduced as Judge Dehghani, issued an order for the identification and seizure of the PMOI’s assets. This decision comes in response to the regime’s anger over the August 24 gathering near Paris, where prominent legal experts and former UN officials called for an investigation into Iran’s history of genocide and grave human rights violations.
In a fiery address to the UN Secretary-General, Judge Dehghani made a mocking reference to the international body, stating, “What the mentioned resolutions mandate, even for the UN Secretary-General, is that their observers and rapporteurs must stay away from groups accused of terrorist acts until courts have properly examined their crimes.”
He went on to warn the UN chief, saying, “I advise the UN Secretary-General: don’t let your tenure be remembered as the time when UN members became closest to those accused of international illegitimacy. Otherwise, the awakened conscience of nations, especially the Iranian people, will recall your period as a dark era.”
Sham Trial in #Iran Highlights Clerical Dictatorship’s Desperationhttps://t.co/6Hi31hfMQK
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) June 11, 2024
The session featured Amir Mollaee Balestani, who acted as the plaintiffs’ lawyer. He submitted a motion requesting that the court seize the PMOI’s assets to “compensate for the damages caused by their crimes.” Dehghani quickly responded, stating, “As the presiding judge, after consultation with the court advisors, I approve the requested criminal injunction and order the identification and seizure of assets related to the accused, by Article 107 of the Criminal Procedure Code. The defendants’ assets are to be frozen.”
Another speaker at the trial was Ali Sedaghat, presented as an expert on religious ideology, who repeated the regime’s usual defense of the 1988 massacre, an atrocity for which the regime has never been held accountable. He argued that “The amnesty committee was formed by Imam [former Supreme Leader Ruhollah Khomeini], but the death committees and the punishment of the PMOI members were orchestrated by Massoud and Maryam Rajavi. They deliberately caused some of the prisoners to stand firm in their positions and not be saved. Meanwhile, thousands of people were granted amnesty during the Imam’s [Khomeini] clemency hearings.”
Sedaghat claimed, “A witness in the last court session clearly stated that many of those who were freed immediately joined Camp Ashraf, and this shows the great mercy of the Islamic Republic, which even pardoned those who pretended to show remorse.”
Desperately attempting to spin new narratives about the @Mojahedineng during its staged trial, the clerical regime is essentially undermining its own decades-long #propaganda against the movement. This not only weakens Khomeini's defamation tactics but also inadvertently… pic.twitter.com/WkAzHs3ZGC
— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) May 12, 2024
Sedaghat then launched a broader attack on international bodies and Western governments, arguing that “anyone who cooperates with this terrorist group, the most violent in contemporary history, is complicit in their crimes.” He emphasized that “even human rights rapporteurs are guilty by association” for engaging with the PMOI and warned that those attending recent PMOI meetings could face legal consequences. “They need to understand,” he said, “that by attending the PMOI’s meetings, they are endorsing their terrorism and could face prosecution.”
He explicitly said, “Something must happen so that no one dares to endorse this terrorist group in their meetings.”
During the sham trial, a figure introduced as the prosecutor’s representative revealed the regime’s frustration with the PMOI’s influence within Iranian government institutions and its role in exposing Tehran’s covert nuclear program. He continued by alleging that in the 1990s and 2000s, the group shifted its focus to leaking details about Iran’s nuclear activities to Western countries, to remove themselves from international terrorist lists.
“In 2004,” the prosecutor stated, “the United States published a report, and the PMOI themselves admitted that the false nuclear information they provided to Western countries as part of their deceitful nature to escape the terrorist designation.”
While the clerical regime struggles to navigate a convergence of domestic and international challenges, it sees the Iranian Resistance as the primary obstacle to its efforts to intimidate and deceive the world into appeasement, complicity, and turning a blind eye to its atrocities. Aware that its propaganda and online intimidation have failed to silence the courageous human rights advocates who rightly call for holding the regime’s leaders accountable, the regime is now resorting to direct threats.
