Iranian opposition leader: Tehran is force behind extremism

[webfact]

Iranian opposition leader: Tehran is force behind extremism
DEB RIECHMANN, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — A top Iranian opposition leader told a U,S. House subcommittee Wednesday that Iranians have dubbed their government the "godfather" of the Islamic State militant group.

Maryam Rajavi, president-elect of the Paris-based National Council of Resistance of Iran, also said Tehran wants nuclear weapons to foster Islamic extremism.

"The ultimate solution to this problem is regime change," Rajavi said.

Testifying before a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee via videoconference from France, Rajavi discussed international negotiations underway to get Iran to curb its nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions crippling its economy.

She warned against giving Iran too many concessions, saying it would embolden its leaders to be more aggressive in meddling in other nations.

She said the U.S. and five other nations in talks with Iran must demand that it completely stop enriching uranium and shut down its nuclear sites, missile programs and other programs. While there is no final deal yet, emerging details of an agreement fall short of her demands.

"None of the sanctions should be lifted before an agreement has been signed that effectively and definitively denies the mullahs the bomb," Rajavi said. "Otherwise, the regime will spend billions of unfrozen assets to buy weapons, including advanced missiles from Russia."


-- (c) Associated Press 2015-04-30

[Dannyboy666]

Too many Concessions... Not Enough Trust. I guess we ll see when the War in the Middle East is over.

[simple1]

Why would the US give oxygen to this group? Have a read of the following...

https://www.thenation.com/blog/205521/cult-leader-will-tell-congress-fight-isis-regime-change-iran

[dexterm]

How can the Shia government of Iran currently fighting the Sunni Islamic State be their godfather at the same time? I think the woman is deliberately muddying the waters for a few gullible politicians.

Maybe she has a personal axe to grind in suggesting regime change....i.e. changed to her own party.

[timtscott]

Obviously has own political agenda and seeking US financial/military support. Like Maliki did before the US invasion of Iraq and that turned out really well.

Sent from my iPhone using Thaivisa Connect Thailand

[Neurath]

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

Why would the US give oxygen to this group? Have a read of the following...

https://www.thenation.com/blog/205521/cult-leader-will-tell-congress-fight-isis-regime-change-iran

Just another Chalabi, being used for the precisely the same sorts of pre 2003 reasons

[Steely Dan]

Why would the US give oxygen to this group? Have a read of the following...

https://www.thenation.com/blog/205521/cult-leader-will-tell-congress-fight-isis-regime-change-iran

Whatever her background and motives I think her comments on concessions to Iran on the nuclear deal are valid. Furthermore regime change in Iran, the world's largest sponsor of terrorism would be a good thing. Just take a look at their latest moved hijacking merchant ships to imagine what an Iran with nuclear weapons would behave like.

[simple1]

Why would the US give oxygen to this group? Have a read of the following...

https://www.thenation.com/blog/205521/cult-leader-will-tell-congress-fight-isis-regime-change-iran

Whatever her background and motives I think her comments on concessions to Iran on the nuclear deal are valid. Furthermore regime change in Iran, the world's largest sponsor of terrorism would be a good thing. Just take a look at their latest moved hijacking merchant ships to imagine what an Iran with nuclear weapons would behave like.

Sure regime change from a theological dictatorship would be beneficial, but by whom and would they dismantle the nuclear infrastructure. You know the old adage, that seems to be de rigueur in Islamic countries, 'the oppressed become the oppressor'.

Edited April 30, 2015 by simple1

[ABCer]

Ir-respectively of which way your thinking is leaning - those of you who start with a wrong presumption cannot be right.

If USA wanted peace in Middle East they wouldn't support the so called Arab Spring in all ME countries.

Speaking of Iran, if they wanted peace - they wouldn't sell their staunchest friend - Pahlavi.

Only a blind man cannot see that in every country whichever side the USA supports the end result is fight against USA.

I start thinking that is exactly what they want - perpetual war, destabilization and destruction.

Sorry to rain...

[Godders]

Only one country has ever used nuclear weapons. And it isn't Iran.

How many countries has the US attacked - unlawfully on numerous occasions - and how many millions of innocent civilians has it killed to "protect American interests"? By way of contrast, since deposing the brutal Shah inflicted upon them by the West, how many nations has Iran invaded?

How many innocent civilians of other nations have been killed by Iran, which lost an estimated four per cent of its population as a result of years of brutal US/UN sanctions which killed hundreds of thousands of children..

The US has hundreds of military bases in other countries. How many can Iran boast?

Which country has an official strategy, revealed by a retired top US defence chief, of overthrowing the leaderships of seven sovereign nations - including Syria and Iran - over five years?

Iran has every reason to wish to defend itself against the American aggression. But does anyone seriously imagine the Ayatollahs would risk annihilation by producing a nuclear bomb or doing anything to give the US and its bellicose deputy dawg, nuclear-armed Israel (why isn't the US/UN demanding they give up their nuclear weapons?), an excuse to wipe the Muslim nation off the map?

It is high time people both inside and outside the Land of the (increasingly less) Free began to see through the bogus and long-discredited War on Terror brainwashing exercise and woke up to the reality of which nation is truly the biggest danger to world peace. The historical record and recent events in North Africa and the Middle East speak for themselves.

Iran is not the harbinger of global doom, nor is ever likely to be. This distinction belongs to the suited and uniformed psychopaths running the US, the most warlike and destructive superpower in history.

The paranoid republic whose President has the freedom to declare war on any state at his discretion and take out "terrorist" suspects - including US citizens - across the world with drone strikes (which frequently also murder innocent civilians) spends more on its military than the majority of all the other nations put together.

It also employs force with an impunity granted not by the UN, whose strictures relating to aggression against sovereign states it feigns to support but constantly flouts, but by virtue of its overwhelming military superiority. At the same time, the US continues hypocritically to preach peace, restraint and democracy to the rest of us.

Right now, as recent events in the Ukraine show all too clearly, we are living on the edge of an abyss. With the dollar in imminent danger of losing its reserve currency status and civil unrest growing among millions of impoverished, mainly black and Hispanic American citizens, the prospect of the US dragging the West into a major conflict to resolve its ballooning economic and social problems is becoming all too real.

More of us need to stop ingesting the puerile propaganda pumped out by Fox News and wake up to the reality of how US hegemony is dragging us into a third world war.

[Chicog]

WASHINGTON (AP) — A top Iranian opposition leader told a U,S. House subcommittee Wednesday that Iranians have dubbed their government the "godfather" of the Islamic State militant group.

A "top Iranian opposition leader" lied.

[ezzra]

Only one country has ever used nuclear weapons. And it isn't Iran.

How many countries has the US attacked - unlawfully on numerous occasions - and how many millions of innocent civilians has it killed to "protect American interests"? By way of contrast, since deposing the brutal Shah inflicted upon them by the West, how many nations has Iran invaded?

How many innocent civilians of other nations have been killed by Iran, which lost an estimated four per cent of its population as a result of years of brutal US/UN sanctions which killed hundreds of thousands of children..

The US has hundreds of military bases in other countries. How many can Iran boast?

Which country has an official strategy, revealed by a retired top US defence chief, of overthrowing the leaderships of seven sovereign nations - including Syria and Iran - over five years?

Iran has every reason to wish to defend itself against the American aggression. But does anyone seriously imagine the Ayatollahs would risk annihilation by producing a nuclear bomb or doing anything to give the US and its bellicose deputy dawg, nuclear-armed Israel (why isn't the US/UN demanding they give up their nuclear weapons?), an excuse to wipe the Muslim nation off the map?

It is high time people both inside and outside the Land of the (increasingly less) Free began to see through the bogus and long-discredited War on Terror brainwashing exercise and woke up to the reality of which nation is truly the biggest danger to world peace. The historical record and recent events in North Africa and the Middle East speak for themselves.

Iran is not the harbinger of global doom, nor is ever likely to be. This distinction belongs to the suited and uniformed psychopaths running the US, the most warlike and destructive superpower in history.

The paranoid republic whose President has the freedom to declare war on any state at his discretion and take out "terrorist" suspects - including US citizens - across the world with drone strikes (which frequently also murder innocent civilians) spends more on its military than the majority of all the other nations put together.

It also employs force with an impunity granted not by the UN, whose strictures relating to aggression against sovereign states it feigns to support but constantly flouts, but by virtue of its overwhelming military superiority. At the same time, the US continues hypocritically to preach peace, restraint and democracy to the rest of us.

Right now, as recent events in the Ukraine show all too clearly, we are living on the edge of an abyss. With the dollar in imminent danger of losing its reserve currency status and civil unrest growing among millions of impoverished, mainly black and Hispanic American citizens, the prospect of the US dragging the West into a major conflict to resolve its ballooning economic and social problems is becoming all too real.

More of us need to stop ingesting the puerile propaganda pumped out by Fox News and wake up to the reality of how US hegemony is dragging us into a third world war.

Only one country has ever used nuclear weapons. And it isn't Iran.....

Really? is this is your argument? how can a country use or not use something they don't have?

and as for your ' how many other nations' point, is Iran Iraq war rings a bell? where by over a million

people, both solders and civilians have been killed?

I can go on an on, the point is that Iran is the arch godfather of terrorism everywhere around the world,

their agenda is to rule and install fear in every nation on earth, they are as far as south America,

Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay, just to name a few, their deadly tentacles are everywhere,

[Braddockrd]

Only one country has ever used nuclear weapons. And it isn't Iran.

How many countries has the US attacked - unlawfully on numerous occasions - and how many millions of innocent civilians has it killed to "protect American interests"? By way of contrast, since deposing the brutal Shah inflicted upon them by the West, how many nations has Iran invaded?

How many innocent civilians of other nations have been killed by Iran, which lost an estimated four per cent of its population as a result of years of brutal US/UN sanctions which killed hundreds of thousands of children..

The US has hundreds of military bases in other countries. How many can Iran boast?

Which country has an official strategy, revealed by a retired top US defence chief, of overthrowing the leaderships of seven sovereign nations - including Syria and Iran - over five years?

Iran has every reason to wish to defend itself against the American aggression. But does anyone seriously imagine the Ayatollahs would risk annihilation by producing a nuclear bomb or doing anything to give the US and its bellicose deputy dawg, nuclear-armed Israel (why isn't the US/UN demanding they give up their nuclear weapons?), an excuse to wipe the Muslim nation off the map?

It is high time people both inside and outside the Land of the (increasingly less) Free began to see through the bogus and long-discredited War on Terror brainwashing exercise and woke up to the reality of which nation is truly the biggest danger to world peace. The historical record and recent events in North Africa and the Middle East speak for themselves.

Iran is not the harbinger of global doom, nor is ever likely to be. This distinction belongs to the suited and uniformed psychopaths running the US, the most warlike and destructive superpower in history.

The paranoid republic whose President has the freedom to declare war on any state at his discretion and take out "terrorist" suspects - including US citizens - across the world with drone strikes (which frequently also murder innocent civilians) spends more on its military than the majority of all the other nations put together.

It also employs force with an impunity granted not by the UN, whose strictures relating to aggression against sovereign states it feigns to support but constantly flouts, but by virtue of its overwhelming military superiority. At the same time, the US continues hypocritically to preach peace, restraint and democracy to the rest of us.

Right now, as recent events in the Ukraine show all too clearly, we are living on the edge of an abyss. With the dollar in imminent danger of losing its reserve currency status and civil unrest growing among millions of impoverished, mainly black and Hispanic American citizens, the prospect of the US dragging the West into a major conflict to resolve its ballooning economic and social problems is becoming all too real.

More of us need to stop ingesting the puerile propaganda pumped out by Fox News and wake up to the reality of how US hegemony is dragging us into a third world war.

Only one country has ever used nuclear weapons. And it isn't Iran.....

Really? is this is your argument? how can a country use or not use something they don't have?

and as for your ' how many other nations' point, is Iran Iraq war rings a bell? where by over a million

people, both solders and civilians have been killed?

I can go on an on, the point is that Iran is the arch godfather of terrorism everywhere around the world,

their agenda is to rule and install fear in every nation on earth, they are as far as south America,

Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay, just to name a few, their deadly tentacles are everywhere,

You are wrong and Godders is right and if you cannot see that is because you are blind and brainwashed.

[FangFerang]

How can the Shia government of Iran currently fighting the Sunni Islamic State be their godfather at the same time? I think the woman is deliberately muddying the waters for a few gullible politicians.

Maybe she has a personal axe to grind in suggesting regime change....i.e. changed to her own party.

"Maryam Rajavi, president-elect of the Paris-based National Council of Resistance of Iran, also said Tehran wants nuclear weapons to foster Islamic extremism."

I agree 100% with dexterm. Well said and to the point. Shew wants a regime change. She wants the regime changed to...

her favorite regime.

[BKKBobby]

Theres lots of these political refugee/exile types from Iran that are lying and make up all sorts of bogus. They want regime change and they want to be a part of the new regime.

Just look at the opportunists that came into power in Iraq and Afghanistan after the US invasions.

Edited April 30, 2015 by BKKBobby

[BKKBobby]

How can the Shia government of Iran currently fighting the Sunni Islamic State be their godfather at the same time? I think the woman is deliberately muddying the waters for a few gullible politicians.

Maybe she has a personal axe to grind in suggesting regime change....i.e. changed to her own party.

"Maryam Rajavi, president-elect of the Paris-based National Council of Resistance of Iran, also said Tehran wants nuclear weapons to foster Islamic extremism."

I agree 100% with dexterm. Well said and to the point. Shew wants a regime change. She wants the regime changed to...

her favorite regime.

Maryam Rajavi is the leader of a terrorist group that also qualifies as being a sect in its structure. They commit acts of terrorism that kills civilians in Iran. They had a safehaven in Iraq but US labeled them as a terrorist group and they were kicked out of Iraq after the US invasion as far as I know.

[TooPoopedToPop]

Only one country has ever used nuclear weapons. And it isn't Iran.

How many countries has the US attacked - unlawfully on numerous occasions - and how many millions of innocent civilians has it killed to "protect American interests"? By way of contrast, since deposing the brutal Shah inflicted upon them by the West, how many nations has Iran invaded?

How many innocent civilians of other nations have been killed by Iran, which lost an estimated four per cent of its population as a result of years of brutal US/UN sanctions which killed hundreds of thousands of children..

The US has hundreds of military bases in other countries. How many can Iran boast?

Which country has an official strategy, revealed by a retired top US defence chief, of overthrowing the leaderships of seven sovereign nations - including Syria and Iran - over five years?

Iran has every reason to wish to defend itself against the American aggression. But does anyone seriously imagine the Ayatollahs would risk annihilation by producing a nuclear bomb or doing anything to give the US and its bellicose deputy dawg, nuclear-armed Israel (why isn't the US/UN demanding they give up their nuclear weapons?), an excuse to wipe the Muslim nation off the map?

It is high time people both inside and outside the Land of the (increasingly less) Free began to see through the bogus and long-discredited War on Terror brainwashing exercise and woke up to the reality of which nation is truly the biggest danger to world peace. The historical record and recent events in North Africa and the Middle East speak for themselves.

Iran is not the harbinger of global doom, nor is ever likely to be. This distinction belongs to the suited and uniformed psychopaths running the US, the most warlike and destructive superpower in history.

The paranoid republic whose President has the freedom to declare war on any state at his discretion and take out "terrorist" suspects - including US citizens - across the world with drone strikes (which frequently also murder innocent civilians) spends more on its military than the majority of all the other nations put together.

It also employs force with an impunity granted not by the UN, whose strictures relating to aggression against sovereign states it feigns to support but constantly flouts, but by virtue of its overwhelming military superiority. At the same time, the US continues hypocritically to preach peace, restraint and democracy to the rest of us.

Right now, as recent events in the Ukraine show all too clearly, we are living on the edge of an abyss. With the dollar in imminent danger of losing its reserve currency status and civil unrest growing among millions of impoverished, mainly black and Hispanic American citizens, the prospect of the US dragging the West into a major conflict to resolve its ballooning economic and social problems is becoming all too real.

More of us need to stop ingesting the puerile propaganda pumped out by Fox News and wake up to the reality of how US hegemony is dragging us into a third world war.

Thank you for an intelligent and literate summary.

[TooPoopedToPop]

Only one country has ever used nuclear weapons. And it isn't Iran.....

Really? is this is your argument? how can a country use or not use something they don't have?

and as for your ' how many other nations' point, is Iran Iraq war rings a bell? where by over a million

people, both solders and civilians have been killed?

I can go on an on, the point is that Iran is the arch godfather of terrorism everywhere around the world,

their agenda is to rule and install fear in every nation on earth, they are as far as south America,

Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay, just to name a few, their deadly tentacles are everywhere,

Paranoid hogwash.

[humqdpf]

Why would the US give oxygen to this group? Have a read of the following...

https://www.thenation.com/blog/205521/cult-leader-will-tell-congress-fight-isis-regime-change-iran

Whatever her background and motives I think her comments on concessions to Iran on the nuclear deal are valid. Furthermore regime change in Iran, the world's largest sponsor of terrorism would be a good thing. Just take a look at their latest moved hijacking merchant ships to imagine what an Iran with nuclear weapons would behave like.

The last time I looked up Hijacking it did not say detaining a ship by a sovereign state on suspicion of illegally entering sovereign waters. But perhaps I am indeed out of date.

Please be aware that when countries (esp USA, UK and others) get into the business of regime change, the long term result is often not what they bargained for. The last time Western powers got involved in regime change in Iran was in the 1950s when a dirty allegation was made against the then elected premier and the Shah was installed. The current regime is the result of a series of events that arose because of the disruption causes by Western meddling, mendacity and providing support for tyrants (like the Shah).

Regime change always looks good before the fact. Remember Iraq under Saddam Hussein? And by the way, just as the USA was best buddies with Saddam, so was this organisation when they were based in Iraq.

Nuclear weapons are already in the hands of some strange people - Pakistan, for instance. A much more unstable country than Iran. Leave well alone - the middle east is not in a good state at the moment - sometimes when you meddle, you get worse scenarios. Saddam was an evil dictator but under his watch there was no ISIS/ISIL.

[Chicog]

Seems the usual conclusions have been jumped to....

April 30, 2015 7:54 a.m. ET
DUBAI—A decade-old Iranian court case that resulted in a judgment against Denmark’s Maersk Line for $3.6 million appears to have led to the seizure of one of the firm’s cargo ships in the Persian Gulf, the shipping giant said Thursday.
Maersk Line, a unit of the shipping conglomerate A.P. Moller-Maersk Group, hasn’t received a full explanation for Tuesday’s seizure of the M/V Maersk Tigris and its 24 crew members by Iranian coast guard ships,, spokesman Michael Christian Storgaard said.
The company believes, however, the detention of the ship stems from a case filed by a private Iranian company against Maersk Line in an Iranian court in 2005, Mr. Storgaard said, adding that the firm was seeking to confirm the connection.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/ship-seizure-by-iran-linked-to-court-case-1430394886

Edited April 30, 2015 by Chicog