International Heralt Tribune, October 23, 2008 – A prominent Iranian opposition group won an appeal Thursday against a European Union decision to freeze its funds.
Mujahedeen Khalq, People’s Mujahedeen, Iran, Court of First Instance
An Iranian opposition group won an appeal on Thursday against a European Union decision to freeze its funds.
The decision by the European Court of First Instance in Luxembourg followed a ruling in May by the British Court of Appeal that the British government had been wrong to include the group on its list of terrorist groups. The decision Thursday could increase pressure on the EU to relax its ban.
The EU first placed the group on a terror blacklist in 2002. But the court said Thursday that the evidence presented had been “manifestly insufficient to provide legal justification for continuing to freeze” the group’s funds.
Maryam Rajavi, the president-elect of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, the group’s political wing, said in a statement Thursday that the ruling “puts an end to the unjust label of terrorism.”
She accused some European governments of seeking to maintain the ban to nurture good relations with the leadership of Iran.
The group is regarded as potentially the most important force in the Iranian resistance. Legalization could enable the group to raise money and organize resistance to the ayatollahs in Iran.
According to the EU court, the Iranian group was founded in 1965 with the goal of replacing the government of the shah, and subsequently its successor government, with a democracy.
The court said that in the past the group had an armed branch operating in Iran, but noted that the group had renounced all military activity in 2001.