The Iranian embassy in London has declared that the British Ahwazi Friendship Society (BAFS) is an "illegal organisation" that is "dedicated to stirring up trouble between Iran and its neighbours."
The Iranian embassy was talking to the Sunday Telegraph following revelations by a former Iranian diplomat, Adel Assadinia, that the regime had trained secret networks of agents across the Gulf states to attack Western interests and incite civil unrest. BAFS's "crime" was to publicise the diplomat's claims and to put him in contact with the British media ( click here for Sunday Telegraph article ).
Assadinia served for two terms as Majlis member for Ahwaz in the 1980s and defected to Europe in 2003 after revealing corruption at the highest echelons of the Iranian regime. He told the Sunday Telegraph that the Iranian regime was comparable with the regime of Saddam Hussein before he was overthrown: "very fragile and brittle within,"
Assadinia has spoken out about Iran's spy network in the Gulf region, which includes teachers, doctors and nurses at Iranian-owned schools and hospitals. According to the former Iranian Consul General to Dubai, the spies have formed Shia sleeper cells ready to be "unleashed" at the first sign of any serious threat to Tehran. Countries with large Shia populations include Iraq, Yemen, Bahrain, Lebanon, Pakistan and India; India has the world's second largest Shia population after Iran.
The BAFS has received reports that the Red Crescent Hospital in Dubai is a centre for Iranian intelligence recruitment, with many doctors and nurses employed there also in the service of SEVAK.
The Sunday Telegraph quoted Assadinia has saying that "Were America or Israel to attack Iran, such cells would be instructed to foment long-dormant sectarian grievances and attack the extensive American and European business interests in wealthy states such as Dubai and Saudi Arabia. Such a scenario would bring chaos to the Gulf, one of the few areas of the Middle East that remains prosperous and has largely pro-Western governments."
Assadinia's claims come a day after Deputy Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Ali Reza Afshar warned that even a "small move" against Iran would lead to a "great explosion" throughout the Gulf region ( click here for report ).
Assadinia told the Sunday Telegraph: "The Iranian government believes that to survive it needs permanent bases throughout the Middle East. Anybody who contemplates threatening or invading Iran will have those cells unleashed against them."
The former consul general to Dubai claimed that Iran's Dubai consulate was used as a "conduit for illicit funding of Hezbollah." He added that Iranian foreign ministry agents would regularly pass through with "suitcases containing up to £11 million, using diplomatic baggage channels to bypass customs scrutiny."
Iran's Dubai consulate is a hub for Iranian intelligence operations, due to the presence of Iranian businesses in the emirate. He told the Sunday Telegraph that "other intelligence activities included running nightclubs and prostitution rings, where carousing officials and diplomats could be lured into 'honey trap' blackmail operations, and organising Iranian expatriates - there are an estimated 500,000 in the Gulf - to act as double agents."
The BAFS and the Henry Jackson Society (HJS) will be holding an event in the House of Commons where Assadinia and an Arab Shia cleric will speak out against Iran's terrorist activities in the region and in favour of secularism and reconciliation with Sunni Muslims in Iraq.
BAFS Chairman Daniel Brett said: "The Iranian regime outlaws each and every organisation that contradicts its dogma and reveals its true intentions.
"The fact is that BAFS is a legitimate non-governmental organisation that operates within the law. We continue to state our opposition to violence and any military attack on the peoples of Iran, but we believe that the world should know the truth about the nature of the Iranian government.
"Iran constantly accuses us of being terrorists for supporting human rights, but the regime itself is inflicting state terrorism on the peoples living under its rule and is expanding that terror abroad.
"Gulf states have a right to know what the Iranian regime is doing on their territory and the potential for Iranian-backed terrorist attacks in the region. Mr Assadinia has simply told the truth.
"BAFS is not the problem with Iran's relations with the Arab world. Iran's duplicity and subversive activities in Arab states is the problem, not the BAFS.
"The Iranian regime's attitude towards Arabs can be seen in the treatment of its own Ahwazi Arab population, which is 80-90 per cent Shia. Ahwazi Arab have been bombed out of their homes by the Iranian government and human rights activists have been executed following flawed trials condemned by UN experts. This is the extent of the Iran regime's 'solidarity' with Arab Shi'ites living under its rule.
"Iran has imperialist designs over the Middle East and the negative consequences for Arab states' stability and prosperity is viewed by Tehran as collateral damage. It is time that governments in the Gulf wise up and clamp down on the clandestine networks that are supported by the Iranian regime on their territory."
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keywords: ahvaz ahwaz ahwazi arabistan khuzestan khuzistan khuzestani arab arabistan iran iranian human rights security oil news ahmadinejad ethnic cleansing
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