TEHRAN – Iranian security forces on Tuesday arrested a ringleader of Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) in the central city of Isfahan, IRIB reported. 

The forces found video recordings that the MKO member wanted to send to anti-Iran satellite TV channels.

The arrested person had been identified by Iranian security forces before entering the country for the purpose of “creating chaos and confusion” during the funeral of Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who passed away on Sunday and was laid to rest in Tehran on Tuesday.

According to the local media, the MKO member had recorded a lot of videos for MKO-linked satellite channels.

The MKO was launched in 1965 in Iran as an Islamist-Marxist group to oppose the rule of former Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. 

It supported the 1979 Islamic Revolution at first, but then changed its attitude towards the revolution and resorted to bombings and assassinations. It then sided with the Saddam Hussein army in the war against Iran in the 1980s.

Backed by the Saddam regime, the MKO launched a military attack on Iran in 1987, one week after UN Resolution 598 brought the war between the Iraq-Iran to a halt.

Iran accuses the group of being responsible for 17,000 deaths.

MH/PA