By: Sara Bertoncelj (Nova24tv)
The European Group of Socialists and Democrats (S&D) is demanding an explanation as to why the head of the EU presidency took part in an event organised by Iranian mujahedeen affiliated to the People’s Organisation of the Mujahedeen of Iran. “For almost 33 years, the world has forgotten the victims of the massacre. That must change,” said Prime Minister Janez Janša in his address at Saturday’s event organised by the Iranian Diaspora Free Iran World Summit. On the one hand, his performance garnered a lot of praise and admiration, but also a lot of criticism, saying that his move jeopardised, among other things, the EU’s continued efforts to revive the nuclear deal with Iran, a key EU foreign policy priority. But a much more weighty question in all this is why the Socialists are so ardently defending the Iranian regime – perhaps because they continue to try to cover up the laundering of Iranian money? Previous left wing governments have even renewed diplomatic ties with Iran, as some companies and transitional tycoons are doing business with the Iranian regime.
“When Janša defends human rights around the world. Complicated geopolitical issues require a filigree approach,” however, Janez Janša approached the diplomatic table with a mallet, Delo wrote, and Prime Minister Janša responded with a rather eloquent photo, adding: “You are defending this with your Iran-NLB-gate approach.” He reacted similarly to the accusations of SD MP Matjaž Nemec, who had the opinion that the thesis that the Prime Minister is hostile to the EU, its institutions and values is being confirmed – according to him, the sabotage of the Middle East peace process shows this. Janša reminded that the words came from the mouth of an SD party official which laundered a billion for the regime in the Iran-NLB-gate affair, which massacred people who were described by the Islamist religious and political authorities as opponents of the regime. All in all, of course, it was that our Prime Minister called for an independent investigation into the massacre of 30,000 political prisoners in Iran in 1988 at an event organised by the Iranian Diaspora on Saturday. He also pointed out the role of newly elected Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi in this massacre.
Imprisoned political dissidents were therefore murdered in massacres, and relatives were not told where they were buried, and they were also banned from public mourning. It was later learned that they had been hanged. In 2016, an audio recording of a 1988 meeting between Hossein Ali Montazeri, Ayatollah Khomeini’s right-hand man, and officials responsible for carrying out the massacres appeared in public. In the recording it is possible to hear Montazeri’s words that they had been preparing the massacres for years, and as a reason for their implementation, they used the armed attack of the militant opposition group People’s Mujahedeen, which has Shiite and Marxist foundations and whose supporters are supposed to be imprisoned political dissidents, they wrote on the siol.net portal. Years ago, Montazeri also spoke in more detail about the massacres in question, naming 60-year-old Ebrahim Raisi, the newly elected extremist Islamist president of Iran, as one of the people involved in the massacre. Raisi will take office in August and advocates, among other things, the Islamisation of public life. Raisi was the Deputy Attorney General at the time of the massacres. In addition to participating in the killings, the United States and several Western NGOs have accused him of other human rights violations during his long career in the judiciary.
The Iranian billion bribed Slovenian socialists
The attacks on the US embassy in Iraq, the US attacks on the infamous Iranian General Qasim Suleimani, and the retaliatory Iranian attack on the US base in Erbil, recalled the somewhat forgotten Iran-NLB-gate affair last year. The reaction of the Slovenian regime media was in favour of the Iranian regime – which happened this time as well. The whole case regarding the “ATM of the Transitional Left”, i.e. the NLB, began in December 2008, after the government of Borut Pahor took over. On December 12th of that year, an Iranian citizen with a British passport, Iraj Farrokhzadeh, opened an account with the NLB, through which he channelled a billion dollars in two years – at a time when Iran was subject to international sanctions. Farrokhzadeh has been on the Interpol list since 2006 and under the scrutiny of American intelligence, but he still stayed at the Slon Hotel without any problems, and then, with the business card of one of the executive directors of the NLB Group, he walked to the NLB branch and opened a bank account for the Farrokh company, which is registered in the British Virgin Islands. Farrokh had a bank account opened in Switzerland, but it was closed when it turned out that the bank was helping to finance a nuclear programme in Iran.
By the end of 2010, almost EUR 900 million had flowed through the NLB account, and in mid-December 2010 the Bank of Slovenia finally stopped the game due to suspicions of money laundering. Information about money laundering came to light only after seven years, although during Farrokh’s operations all the then highest representatives of the state were informed: President Danilo Türk, Prime Minister Borut Pahor, Interior Minister Katarina Kresal, Finance Minister Franc Križanič, Foreign Minister Samuel Žbogar, Police Director Janko Goršek and so on. If we shorten the whole story a bit – Farrokhzadeh was not an unknown uncle, but he was closely connected with the ruling tops in Slovenia. Not only did the transitional left benefit financially from these deals, but it also, at least indirectly, supported terrorism. It is clear that all those who knew about the money laundering but did not take action are responsible for the terrorist acts directed in one way or another by the Iranian regime. Therefore, their accusations that the head of the presidency of the Council of the EU participated in an event organised by the so-called National Resistance Council of Iran (NCRI), also known as the People’s Organisation of the Mujahedeen of Iran (PMOI) – this organisation was listed on the European list of terrorist organisations until 2009 – is downright ridiculous.
