Rajavi has stated that her political activism began when she was twenty-two, after her sister Narges was killed by SAVAK.[9] Her other sister, Massumeh, was also executed (while pregnant) in 1982 by Ruhollah Khomeini’s regime.[10] Then she became a member of the People's Mojahedin of Iran (PMOI/MEK), and began her political career.[11]
Rajavi served as an organizer of the anti-Shah student movement in the 1970s. In 1979, she became an official of the social section of the PMOI/MEK, where she served until 1981. Rajavi was a parliamentary candidate in 1980.[8]
In 1982, Rajavi was transferred to Auvers-sur-Oise, Île-de-France where the political headquarters of the Mojahedin was located.[8] In 1985, she married Massoud Rajavi in Paris, and became co-leader of the PMOI.[12] She also served as the Secretary General between 1989 and 1993.[13][11][5]
On 22 October 1993, the NCRI elected Rajavi to be "Iran’s interim President" if the NCRI were to assume power in Iran.[11]
In October 2011, Theresa May banned Rajavi from coming to Britain in a trip where she was to "explain how women are mistreated in Iran". The high court then sued Theresa May, with Lord Carlile of Berriew (the Government's former independent reviewer of counter-terrorism laws) saying that May's decision "could be viewed as appeasing the Mullahs".[14][15] In 2014, the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom dismissed an appeal from Lord Carlile of Berriew QC and others and upheld it to maintain the ban, which had originally been implemented in 1997. Members of the UK House of Lords argued that the Home Secretary was "violating Article 10 (freedom of expression) of the European Convention of Human Rights (the Convention)", saying that "Home Secretary’s reasons were legally irrelevant, because they depended on the potential reaction of a foreign state which did not share the values embodied in the Convention."[16][17] Rajavi is not excluded from any other European country and engages regularly with parliamentarians in the European Parliament.[18]
In 1992, the EP Council supported Maryam Rajavi's advocacy for "the international community act specially in favor of women’s rights" following condemnation of human rights violations by the Iranian government.[21]
Rajavi presented her plan at the Council of Europe in 2006, which supports complete gender equality in political and social rights and, specifically, a commitment to equal participation of women in political leadership. Her 10-point plan for the future of Iran stipulates that any form of discrimination against women would be abolished and that women would enjoy the right to choose their clothing freely. It also includes the ending of cruel and degrading punishments.[22]
In April 2021, Maryam Rajavi endorsed resolution HR 118, which expresses “support for Iranian people’s desire for a democratic republic” and “condemns ‘violations of human rights and state-sponsored terrorism’ by Tehran”.[23]
In July 2021, Rajavi organized a rally in Berlin to protest the election of Ebrahim Raisi as President of Iran. Rajavi called Raisi the "henchman" of the massacre of 30,000 political prisoners in 1988. She was joined in the protest by former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who expressed his support for Rajavi and the National Council of Resistance of Iran.[24][25]
In a statement that condemned the ISIS attacks against Iran's parliament and the tomb of the Islamic Republic's founder, Rajavi stated: "ISIS's conduct clearly benefits the Iranian regime's Supreme Leader Khamenei, who wholeheartedly welcomes it as an opportunity to overcome his regime's regional and international impasse and isolation. The founder and the number one state sponsor of terror is thus trying to switch the place of murderer and the victim and portray the central banker of terrorism as a victim."[26]
A 10-point manifesto published by Rajavi sets out a programme to transform Iran. She states her commitment to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and to other similar international organizations. She calls for the abolition of the death penalty, the creation of a modern legal system and the independence of judges. Rajavi would end Tehran's funding of Hamas, Hezbollah and other militant groups and is committed to peaceful coexistence, relations with all countries and respect for the Charter of the United Nations.[27] The manifesto also contains the statement that "We recognize private property, private investment and the market economy."[28] In June 2020, a majority of members of the USA's House of Representatives backed a "bipartisan resolution" supporting Rajavi and the NCRI's "call for a secular, democratic Iran" while "condemning Iranian state-sponsored terrorism." The resolution, backed by 221 lawmakers (including Louie Gohmert and Sheila Jackson Lee), gave support to Rajavi's 10-point plan for Iran's future (which include "a universal right to vote, market economy, and a non-nuclear Iran") while calling on the prevention of "malign activities of the Iranian regime’s diplomatic missions."[29][30]
Albania is where most of MEK members are based.[31] In 2024 Rajavi said in a statement that Ebrahim Raisi's death "represents a monumental and irreparable strategic blow to the mullahs' supreme leader Ali Khamenei and the entire regime, notorious for its executions and massacres".[32]
2018 Rally incident
In 2018, Vienna-based Iranian diplomat Asadollah Asadi was tried and sentenced to 20 years in prison in a high-profile case for masterminding a terrorism plot against a rally led by Maryam Rajavi. The rally was also attended by civilians and high-profile Westerners scheduled to speak (including Rudy Giuliani, Stephen Harper, and Bill Richardson).[33][34]
Legal issues
France
On 17 June 2003, Rajavi was arrested by Paris Police Prefecture alongside some 150 MEK members.[35][36] She and 23 other people were investigated over suspicion of links to terrorism.[37] All charges were later dropped.[38][37][39]
Iraq
In July 2010, the Iraqi High Tribunal issued an arrest warrant for 39 MEK members, including Rajavi, "due to evidence that confirms they committed crimes against humanity" by "involvement with the former Iraqi security forces in suppressing the 1991 uprising against the former Iraqi regime and the killing of Iraqi citizens". The MEK have denied the charges, saying that they constitute a "politically motivated decision and it’s the last gift presented from the government of Nuri al-Maliki to the Iranian government".[40]
Trial in absentia
On 29 July 2023, Iran announced that they would try Rajavi and 103 other members of MEK in absentia.[41] The trial against both Rajavi and the 101 other MEK members commenced on 21 December 2023 at a Tehran court, and is ongoing as of April 2024.[42] According to U.S. federal legislative information, these involve "sham trials" of dissident Iranian Resistance veterans in order to have them extradited back to Iran or "justify terror plots against them".[43]
^Banisadr who was affiliated with the National Council of Resistance of Iran from 1981 to 1984, was considered as the "President of Iran" in the claimed government by the council.[2] The office was vacant after Banisadr.
^Since 2003 Massoud Rajavi has disappeared and leadership of the group has practically passed to his wife Maryam Rajavi.[4]
Citations
^Kenneth Katzman (2001). "Iran: The People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran". In Albert V. Benliot (ed.). Iran: Outlaw, Outcast, Or Normal Country?. Nova Publishers. p. 97. ISBN1560729546.
^ abcConnie Bruck (2006). "Exiles: How Iran's expatriates are gaming the nuclear threat". The New Yorker. Vol. 82, no. 1–11. F-R Publishing Corporation. pp. 54–55. This transition was epitomized by Rajavi's involvement, in 1985, with Maryam Azodanlu. Maryam was already married, to Mehdi Abrishamchi, one of Rajavi's close associates. Rajavi overcame that fact by making the romance a matter of revolutionary necessity. First, he said that he was making Maryam his co-leader-and that it would transform thinking about the role of women throughout the Muslim world. Then, about a month later, it was announced that Maryam was divorced from Abrishamchi and that the two co-leaders would marry, in order to further the "ideological revolution."
^ abcKatzman, Kenneth (2001). "Iran: The People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran". In Benliot, Albert V. (ed.). Iran: Outlaw, Outcast, Or Normal Country?. Nova. pp. 97–98. ISBN978-1-56072-954-9.
^Cohen, Ronen (2009), The Rise and Fall of the Mojahedin Khalq, 1987–1997: Their Survival After the Islamic Revolution and Resistance to the Islamic Republic of Iran, Sussex Academic Press, p. 12, ISBN978-1-84519-270-9
^"اسامی نامزدهای تهران که بیش از ۱۰ هزار رأی آوردهاند" [Names of Tehran candidates who gained more than 10,000 votes], Kayhan (in Persian), no. 10964, p. 3, 5 April 1980 [16 Farvardin 1359], 15m4471, archived from the original on 29 April 2019, retrieved 20 January 2020 – via The University of Manchester Library
^Cohen, Ronen. "The Triple Exclusion of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization - Their Activities for Human Rights in Iran as a Voice in the Wilderness". Middle Eastern Studies. 49 (6): 952. The EP's condemnations of Iran continued also in 1992 and focused mainly upon the violations of human rights, the executions , the persecutions of ethnic and religious minorities, the oppression of women and the persecution of government opponents inside and outside Iran, as well as the attempts to assassinate MKO and NCRI leaders ... During that year the EP put much emphasis on women's oppression in Iran. The EP supported Maryam Rajavi's messages that demanded the international community act specially in favor of women's rights
^Muhanad Mohammed (11 July 2010). Rania El Gamal; David Stamp (eds.). "Iraqi court seeks arrest of Iranian exiles". Reuters. Archived from the original on 2 February 2017. Retrieved 28 December 2016. Rajavi's wife Maryam, leader of the French-based National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), the PMOI's political wing, was also included in the warrant, Abdul Sahib added.
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