WASHINGTON (Dispatches) -- A bipartisan group of U.S. lawmakers will address an online gathering of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (MKO), a terrorist group that has carried out numerous attacks against Iranian civilians and government officials since the Islamic Revolution in 1979.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, a Republican from California, and Senator Bob Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, are among those that organizers say will address the three-day event.
They will be joined by Democratic Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey and Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, as well as Republican Sens. Rick Scott of Florida, John Cornyn and Ted Cruz of Texas.
The summit, being organized by major anti-Iranian groups in the U.S. and Europe, touted itself as “the largest-ever online international event dedicated to liberating Iran.” Organizers said they hoped the annual event will help incite riots.
The MKO had been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States for 15 years before it was delisted in 2012, following an intense lobbying campaign by pressure groups in Washington.
Ever since, the cult responsible for the death of more than 12,000 Iranians, has been heavily propagandized as an “Iranian opposition group” by the West.
The European Union also removed the MKO from its list of terrorist organizations in 2009, seven years after blacklisting the outfit.
MKO throws lavish conferences every year in the French capital, with senior American, Western, and Saudi Arabian officials in attendance as guests of honor.
Past attendees have included former U.S. national security advisor John Bolton, Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, former Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper, and former Saudi Arabian spy chief Prince Turki al-Faisal.