Washington, Sep 22 (ANI): The US State Department has decided to remove an exiled Iranian opposition group from its list of terrorist organizations, a move that might possibly infuriate Tehran and further complicate stalled talks over Iran's nuclear program, senior U.S. officials have said.
The Mujahedin-e Khalq, or MeK, was put on the list in 1997 because of its military alliance with Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein and an assassination campaign it launched against American officials in Tehran during the 1970s. The group has also been committed to overthrowing Iran's Islamist government and killed hundreds of Iranian government officials during the 1980s and '90s.
US officials claimed that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has authorized the removal of the MeK from the State Department's terrorism list, and notified Congress about her intent to take the action.
"It's not been an easy decision because of the MeK's history," the Wall Street Journal quoted a senior U.S. official briefed on the State Department's policy deliberations, as saying.
According to the paper, thousands of MeK fighters had been under U.S. protection at a military base in central Iraq after its leaders surrendered their arms and committed to renouncing violence following Hussein's 2003 overthrow and the American invasion.
The Iranian Government reportedly wants to prosecute senior MeK fighters based in Camp Ashraf and has criticized the U.S. government for protecting them, the paper said.
Though the MeK has been banned in the U.S., the organization's supporters mounted a high-profile lobbying campaign in Washington over the past two years, following which a federal judge had given Clinton until Oct. 1 to make a decision either to delist the MeK or renew its terrorism designation, the paper said. (ANI)
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