The Problem of Iranian Resistance

...Given the number of Byzantine games already being played in the region, it is perhaps not surprising that there is a reluctance to be tempted into further complications...

...The coincidence is noteworthy because it occurred at a moment when the NCR seems to be gaining increasingly significant international support...

...Four members of the raiding party were said to have been killed...

...A similar assessment has also been made by the British Parliamentary Human Rights Group, which maintains that Iran remains a "state of terror...

...Their statements have urged an international boycott of the Teheran regime until the Iranian people are permitted to decide in free elections whether or not they want a democracy...

...It enjoys the enthusiastic backing of the bulk of the 4 million people who fled Iran after the 1979 revolution and found sanctuary largely in the United States, Western Europe, Turkey, and Pakistan...

...The NCR is naturally gratified by the hearty endorsements of so many prominent figures...

...That remains one of the most humiliating experiences in recent American history, compounded by the disastrously abortive effort to free them by force...

...And NLA Commander-in-Chief Massoud Rajavi (husband of the NCR's president-elect) was an active member of the People's Mujahedin Organization that was responsible for the hostage-taking at the time, something NCR officials prefer not to mention...

...There are indications, too, of his tolerating greater intellectual freedom...

...Y.), who has declared "Khatami is neither a moderate nor pro-Western in his ideology...

...To buttress his case, he points out that funds for the upkeep of the NLA—described by the New York Times last December as having "acquitted itself well, demonstrating an ability to confront and defeat some of Iran's best armored units" —are provided by contributions from the Iranian exile community and from supporters within the country...

...Europe is not alone in keeping the NCR officially at a distance...

...Saddam Hussein, the NSC believes, sees the resistance movement as a useful instrument in his ongoing vendetta against Iran...

...Although the NLA is the military wing of the Council, the two events were not coordinated...

...Still, justifications based on realpolitik aside (all that oil...

...Speakers at St...

...Mohammad Khatami's inauguration in August has raised hopes in Western capitals that the long years of Islamic fundamentalist tyranny in Iran may soon be over...

...The British government, already accused of permitting extremist organizations from countries like Algeria and Saudi Arabia to operate from these shores, has become very sensitive to such charges...

...Mohammad Mohaddessin, the NCR's Foreign Affairs Committee chairman, passionately rejects that contention...

...In addition, they were addressed by an impressive assortment of parliamentarians from Britain, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Luxembourg, and Jordan, each of whom offered unqualified praise for the Council's efforts...

...Meanwhile, President Khatami, the supposed Iranian Gorbachev, showed no sign of wanting to improve relations with the United States when he attended an anti-American demonstration early this month commemorating the 18th anniversary of the hostage-taking in Teheran, and condemned "expansionist United States politicians...

...All told, some 2,000 members of legislatures in 16 countries, including a majority in the U.S...

...It hopes to foment a popular uprising that would be assisted by NLA troops and tanks...

...Free and fair elections for a new Iranian parliament are promised no later than six months after the country is liberated...

...Apparently for the same reason only a handful of journalists were invited...

...Ermin's Hotel noted with regret that, despite efforts by the United States to isolate the Iranian government, the highly organized, highly active resistance movement is on the State Department's list of terrorist organizations...

...Founded in 1981 and headquartered in Paris, the NCR is the largest, wealthiest, most dynamic exile resistance movement in the world...

...That same day, the Iranian National Council of Resistance (NCR) hosted an international conference here on overthrowing Teheran's mullah-dominated regime...

...D.-Ohio), who was prevented by legislative business from attending as scheduled, sent a message of firm support...

...The NCR's view is shared by Congressman Gary Ackerman (D.-N...

...For example, he recently let the distinguished and formerly persecuted Iranian scholar, Professor Abdolkarim Soroush, attend a conference in Cyprus on political Islam and the West...

...The movement claims to run an underground network in Iran and to have 65 per cent of the population on its side...

...As for the Pahlavi monarchy, the NCR's position is that the Shah was dethroned by popular choice...

...It further notes that the fatwa against Salman Rushdie remains inplace, and that efforts by Teheran to destabilize the Middle East continue uninterrupted...

...European Union governments consider the Khatami factor sufficient reason to stay clear of efforts to subvert the Iranian regime...

...including representatives of ethnic and religious minorities such as the Kurds, Baluchis, Jews, and Zoroastrians...

...With offices in major Western cities, the Middle East and elsewhere, the NCR describes itself as "a broad coalition of democratic Iranian organizations, groups and personalities...

...Norman Gelb reports regularly for The New Leader on British affairs...

...Khatami, it says, is as much a villain as the most fundamentalist of mullahs...

...At the same time, however, the election last May of the moderate Mohammad Khatami as Iran's new President is subjecting it to pressures never before experienced...

...He says that the National Liberation Army has accepted the use of a patch of land close to the Iranian border from the Iraqi government because it has no alternative...

...The NLA, consisting of 3 0,000 highly trained troops—one third of whom are women—is garrisoned in Iraq, just across from the target of its incursions...

...The strong international approval of the Council was evident at its meeting here...

...All this has inspired speculation that Khatami may be slowly, carefully fashioning himself as an Iranian Mikhail S. Gorbachev, prepared to reform his country's oppressive system...

...Its stated objective is "to establish a pluralistic, democratic, multiparty and secular system in Iran...

...The reason may go back to the holding of 53 American diplomats hostage in Teheran for 444 days after the Shah was overthrown in 1979...

...House of Representatives andparliamentary majorities inBritain, Italy and Denmark, have lent their names to the cause...

...Yet questions remain about whether these sources could provide sufficient funding for a large, well-equipped army, complete with tanks, not to mention the organization's radio stations, satellite television service and other operations...

...Women as well as men would play prominent roles, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights would be upheld...

...Then there is the fact that, whatever the arguments of Congressmen sympathetic to the Iranian resistance movement, the National Security Council (NSC) in the White House feels the NCR is too closely tied to Iraq...

...Congressman James A. Traficant Jr...

...It insists that "domestic suppression, the export of terrorism and fundamentalism continue to form the main pillars of the clerical regime," and lists the names of dissidents executed for their beliefs since Khatami took over...

...Held at the comparatively modest St...

...Ermin's Hotel, located on a side street in the center of London, the affair was billed as an educational gathering rather than a political rally to avoid raising Whitehall's hackles...

...But the State Department and the National Security Council would have to consider the National Council of Resistance a far more credible, reliable and viable alternative to the Khatami's regime before offering its blessings...

...Attacks, frequently involving armored units, are made regularly...

...The NLA says it has been at least partly responsible for over 600 anti-government operations in Iranian cities, citing more than 100 that took place during the past summer...

...The Problem of Iranian Resistance By Norman Gelb London On October 29, the Associated Press reported from Teheran that government security forces had clashed with opposition guerrilla units of the Iranian National Liberation Army (NLA) attempting to infiltrate from Iraq...

...Shaken by Western reaction to Iran's new President, the NCR has dismissed these actions as "a peculiar propaganda campaign...

...A British Foreign Office spokesman says there have been "one or two signs" of progress under Khatami "and maybe we'll see more...

...Touted as someone who will cut the mullahs and their medieval obsessions down to size, he has shied away from the fearsome rhetoric employed by previous Iranian leaders, and he hints at wanting to improve relations with Western nations...

...Nevertheless, those in attendance heard NCR spokespersons define the group's immediate and long-term objectives...

...But a long shadow has been cast over its prospects for receiving the so-far-elusive official sanction of foreign governments...

...Accordingly, NCR President-elect Marayam Rajavi was refused permission to enter Britain to attend the organization's London conference because "she has links with terrorism...

...Instead, they are maintaining their "critical dialogue" with Teheran...