Mondowiss Website, 24 Sep 2013 – Former U.S. officials joined an Iranian expatriate group in a rally outside the United Nations Tuesday to blast any diplomatic opening between the Obama administration and Iran.
Thousands of Iranian-American supporters of the Mojahedin-e-Khalq (the People’s Mojahedin of Iran) transformed Manhattan’s Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, right outside the UN building where the General Assembly was taking place, into a sea of MEK flags and pictures of MEK leaders Maryam and Massoud Rajavi.
Their ranks were bolstered by some Syrian-American supporters of the Syrian opposition and others who were bussed-in from around the country. Other participants included Americans from around the country–some of whom “didn’t have a clue what it was all about, “in the words of one attendee–who had their tickets, food and hotel paid for by the organizers of the rally.
One protester who joined the rally, 53-year-old Iranian-American Amir Rezaian, said that he wanted the U.S.to “stop the appeasement and let the Iranian people overthrow the government”.
While the Iranian expatriates, some of whom fled the country in the aftermath of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, chanted for the downfall of the Iranian regime, former U.S. officials spoke on stage.
The stars of the rally included former U.S. ambassador to the UN John Bolton; former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani; former Rhode Island Democratic Representative Patrick Kennedy; and former chairman of the Republican National Committee Michael Steele. They had one uniform message: stop Iraq from cracking down on MEK members and halt the Obama administration from carrying out talks with the new Iranian president, Hassan Rouhani.
The rally was held immediately after President Obama addressed the UN–where he hinted that negotiations over Iran’s nuclear energy program might be pursued by the U.S–and just hours before Rouhani spoke. The new Iranian president said that he was open to nuclear negotiations as long as Iran’s right to enrich uranium–which is protected under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty–was respected. But those words were likely to do little to persuade hardline former U.S. officials who attended the pro- MEK rally.
“He ought to be thrown out of the UN, “Rep. Kennedy said of Rouhani. “President Rouhani and his Mullahs… are waging a war not only against the Iranian people, but the Syrian people”.
Kennedy and other speakers decried the killings of 52 people in Camp Ashraf. On September 1, Iraqi security forces reportedly opened fire at the camp, where members of the Iranian group have been based since the 1980s, when Saddam Hussein supported them while they launched attacks against Iran . The majority of MEK members have moved to a different area in Iraq in anticipation of being resettled abroad.