Website Detailing Iranian Disinformation Campaigns Targeting Government Officials, NGOs, and the Media Published Today

PARIS, May 24, 2013 /PRNewswire/ --

A new website - MOISdisinformation.com - was published today to provide details on the vast network of attack websites, publications, and use of covert agents by Iran's Intelligence Ministry to discredit the NCRI and People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK).

"The Iranian mullahs are expending huge resources to undermine the NCRI and PMOI because they fear them politically," the announcement said. "The resistance organizations support real democracy and freedom, which are anathema to the mullahs."

The main targets of MOIS disinformation are government officials, NGOs, and the media in Europe and America.  

The new website has information about the MOIS, its longstanding campaigns to discredit the resistance organizations, attack websites, publications, disinformation agents, and fellow travelers.

Attack Websites

MOISdisinformation.com lists key attack websites operated by the Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS). The sites are easy to identify because they present extreme, one-sided, negative information about the NCRI and PMOI/MEK. There is no effort to provide balance or transparency. Issues are fabricated and lies continually repeated to mislead readers.

The attack websites offer the same arguments and promote the same books and videos to demonize the NCRI and PMOI. In most cases, the registration of the websites is deliberately hidden. Some sites provide false registration information in violation of the law. There are no addresses or telephone numbers to contact website sponsors. No executives are listed or board members or names of staff.  

Disinformation Agents

The MOIS recruits former resistance members through coercion and bribery and then uses them to distribute disinformation about the PMOI and NCRI. If former members refuse to cooperate, their family members in Iran are threatened with jail and other punishment.

"MOIS undercover agents have been effective in falsely portraying the NCRI and PMOI," said the announcement and "Their disinformation has been used in numerous reports and articles."

The MOIS agents set up meetings and give false testimony. Their names are often attached as authors of books and pamphlets produced and distributed by the MOIS that attack the Mojahedin.  

Fellow Travelers

The Netherlands 'General Intelligence and Security Service (Algemene Inlichtingen- en Veiligheidsdienst, AIVD) has reported Teheran's efforts to undermine the opposition People's Mojahedin Organisation of Iran in the Netherlands continued unabated in 2012.

It also exposed that in a campaign coordinated and financed by the Iranian intelligence services, the media and a number of politicians and other public servants were approached with a view to portraying the MEK in a highly negative light.

Clare Lopez, a former CIA officer and policy expert on Iran, said available evidence "suggests that the Iran Lobby in America is coordinated in Iran at various governmental levels and within establishment circles both governmental and industrial."

One of the groups in the Iran Lobby is the National Iranian-American Council (NIAC), headed by Trita Parsi, an Iranian raised in Sweden.  

Inside the NIAC website is a hidden link to MekTerror.com, a black propaganda site attacking the NCRI and PMOI, not unlike the MOIS websites.  

"MEKterror.com might as well be a MOIS website since it presents the same arguments and materials to discredit the resistance organizations," said the announcement. "Like the MOIS attack websites, there is no effort to provide balance or transparency. All the information is negative."

The NIAC distributes press releases, many of which are attacks on the NCRI and PMOI. The NIAC's third highest priority when sending letters to congressional representative is to "Tell U.S. Government to say No to Mojahedin."

Given the NIAC's resources directed against the NCRI and PMOI, it would appear that discrediting the resistance organizations that support freedom and democracy in Iran is a top priority - not unlike the MOIS.

The question arises, why is the NIAC doing the bidding of the MOIS?

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SOURCE MOISdisinformation.com