Terrorists’ Safe Haven in Northern Europe

Sweden is one of the European countries that has become a safe haven for the terrorist Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK, a.k.a. MKO and PMOI). Supporting sabotage attempts, sheltering the murderers of the Iranian people, and involving in bitter hostilities toward Iranians are just some of the policies of the Swedish government against the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Sweden has been a hub of the MEK and other terrorist groups for the past few decades. The Swedish government has supported terrorists, such as Habib Osaived, leader of the terrorist ASMLA group.

After the Iraqi war on Iran, some MEK members settled in Sweden because of the free rein they were given in that country. The MEK saw the Swedish government at their side or at least did not feel any imminent threat from them, who, along with several other European countries, broke off diplomatic relations with Iran and closed its embassy after Imam Khomeini issued a fatwa calling for the execution of Salman Rushdie.

MEK’s anti-Iran destructive actions in Sweden began from the early days of their presence in the country. The MEK has planned some terrorist acts in Sweden and launched an attack against the Iranian embassy in that country in 2009. In April 1992, MEK members attacked the Iranian embassy in Stockholm, which influenced the bilateral relations between Iran and Sweden.

MEK members in Sweden are now committing acts of sabotage under the auspices of the Swedish government. Over the past decade, as MEK members have become actively involved in cyberspace, Swedish, French, and US experts have traveled to Albania to teach MEK how to work on social media and spread violent messages.

Sweden condoning MEK attacks on people and journalists

In June 1995, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif paid a visit to Stockholm, the capital of Sweden. A number of MEK members staged a rally in front of the hotel where he was staying and chanted through loudspeakers. They also attacked and insulted reporters accompanying the Foreign Ministry’s political delegation.

Interestingly, the reporters had been told by Swedish security forces that they had to “beware of MEK, monarchists, PJAK supporters and Swedish left-wing groups, and, if attacked, they should not clash with them.”

According to Iranian embassy staff in Sweden, some protesters in Sweden who are members of the MEK and monarchists do such in exchange for money, and others do such because they have applied for residency with the Swedish government.

The MEK and monarchists also attacked Iranians in Gothenburg who wanted to cast their vote for the 2021 presidential election, a video of which has gone viral on social media.

In a meeting with his Swedish counterpart a few months ago, Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said: “It is not acceptable that Iran-Sweden relations be targeted by terrorist MEK’s conspiracies.”

From taking Muslim children away from their families to burning Quran in Sweden

In addition to supporting the MEK and monarchists and giving them plenty of elbow room for violence, the Swedish government has also taken action against Islam and Muslims, such as taking Muslim children from their families and giving them to childless parents. The action was so hateful that social activists in Sweden launched a massive online campaign called “Stop kidnapping our children” on social media, condemning the Swedish authorities' measure in depriving Muslim parents of their children’s custody.

Desecration of the Holy Quran and Islamic principles have been repeated many times in Sweden. Earlier in April 2022, extremists burned copies of the Quran in the Swedish capital of Stockholm and Uppsala. The Swedish police did not attempt to prevent them.

Sweden supports the murderer of the people of Khuzestan

With the arrest of Habib Osaived, it became clear that Sweden had been a European center to direct anti-Iran terrorist acts. The ASMLA leader was based in Sweden and used the facilities of the Swedish government. In his court hearings, Osaived confessed to the Swedish and Saudi governments’ support for him as well as his cooperation with the MEK and the PJAK terrorist groups.

“Denmark and Sweden provided our living conditions although they knew that we were separatists and were carrying out anti-Islamic Republic of Iran activities,” he said.
Bombing Ahvaz, Dezful, and Abadan governorates, Khuzestan Management and Planning Organization, Ahvaz Housing and Urban Development Department, Ahvaz Environment Department, and oil infrastructure of Khuzestan province were among the ASMLA’s attacks in 2005 which led to the killing of about 300 Arab civilians, including men, women, children and adults.

The group also targeted a military parade on September 22, 2018, in collaboration with other terrorist groups, killing 25 people, including a child, and injuring 249 others.

Sweden sending nuclear spy

Ahmad Reza Jalali is another person who was based in Sweden and took actions against Iran under the control of Sweden and Israel. Although he was born in Tehran, he went to Sweden to study and receive a residence permit, and then returned to Iran. Jalali’s wife was an expert with the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran. In addition to information on the AEOI’s projects, he passed on the names and information about a number of AEOI and Ministry of Defense executives to Mossad.

Jalali also provided Mossad with information on nuclear sites, letters from senior executives of the AEOI, the Ministry of Defense, affiliated organizations and their plans, and maps of buildings. He confessed to infecting the systems. In that period, according to the employees of the Ministry of Defense, the computers of this organization had been infected by virus. He had used flash drives to infect several computers.

According to the Tehran Public and Revolutionary Prosecutor, Jalali has confessed to eight meetings with foreign intelligence agents and has received financial support in this regard.

The complicity of the Swedish judiciary and the MEK in the case of Hamid Nouri

In November 2019, Hamid Nouri left for Stockholm, Sweden, to resolve his stepdaughter’s family disputes, but was arrested upon arrival at the airport. He is a former employee of the judiciary and is alleged to have been one of the organizers of the MEK trials in 1988.

Two MEK members submitted a report to the Swedish authorities containing allegations and accusations against Nouri through a legal office in the United Kingdom, and at the same time, they took Nouri to Sweden under the pretext of resolving the family dispute. Without conducting a thorough investigation, the Swedish prosecutor requested a court order for Nouri's arrest, based on the assertions and memoirs of several MEK members.

Nouri had been held in solitary confinement during the 21-months period since he was arrested until the completion of the so-called investigation and indictment on July 27, 2021. In this case, the Swedish government did not act under its responsibility under the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. They did not inform the Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Stockholm about this detention and did not inform his family. During this period, Nouri’s family traveled to Sweden twice but Swedish authorities did not allow them to visit him.

Hamid Nouri suffers from poor eyesight and had repeatedly asked the prison authorities to register with an ophthalmologist and use glasses. His request was ignored.

According to Iran’s secretary of human rights headquarters, Nouri was also treated inhumanely and in a humiliating manner in prison. In addition to being repeatedly beaten and tortured by Swedish agents, he was stripped of his clothes before the female agents, which, despite his complaint, was not addressed.

These measures were taken although Sweden claims to protect human rights and has always voted in favor of human rights resolutions against Iran.

Ironically, in the seventh session of Hamid Nouri’s trial in Sweden, the former Iranian president’s text message in Nouri’s inbox, which was sent to all active Iranian mobile phone numbers to congratulate the Persian New Year was used as evidence by MEK lawyers against him.

 

Source: Tasnim

Translated by Habilian Association