US official got bribes to urge removal of MKO from terror list

The US Treasury Department is investigating a former American politician for accepting money from the terrorist Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO).

Former Pennsylvania Governor Edward Rendell is among a group of former US officials who have accepted money to deliver speeches calling for the removal of the MKO from the State Department’s list of Foreign Terrorist Organizations.

Rendell said on Monday that last week the US Treasury Department has sent a subpoena to his office, seeking information on fees he had received for MKO-related speeches.

Rendell said he had given seven or eight speeches since July, estimating that he had been paid a total of USD150,000 or 160,000.

The Treasury’s investigation raises the possibility that the group of former officials who have accepted fees to speak on behalf of the MKO could come under scrutiny for any payments traced to the group.

The group includes former FBI Director Louis Freeh; two former CIA directors James Woolsey and Porter Goss; former attorney general Michael B. Mukasey; President George W. Bush’s first homeland security secretary Tom Ridge and President Obama’s first national security adviser Gen. James L. Jones as well as prominent Republicans, including Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, and Democrats like Howard Dean, a former governor of Vermont.

Spokesman for the Treasury Department John Sullivan refused to discuss any “potential investigation”, adding that American citizens and legal residents were “generally prohibited from engaging in transactions with or providing services” to the MKO or any other terrorist group.

“The Treasury Department takes sanctions enforcement seriously and routinely investigates potential violations of sanctions laws,” Sullivan said.

This is while even as Treasury Department is investigating the matter, the US State Department has asked Rendell and several other former American officials to act as informal envoys between Washington and the MKO, indicating a systematic cooperation between US officials and terrorist groups.

The MKO is listed as a terrorist organization by much of the international community and is responsible for numerous acts of terror and violence against Iranian civilians and government officials.

The United States designated the MKO a foreign terrorist organization in 1997.

The group has appealed to be taken off the list, claiming that it renounced terrorism in 2001. This as the MKO has been confirmed to be involved in or behind several terrorist attacks against Iranian citizens since then.