Nateq-Nouri displayed in no uncertain terms the mullahs' fear of the imminent danger of being overthrown by the Mojahedin and the National Liberation Army of Iran.
Nateq-Nouri warned that "the conspiracies are not confined to Isfahan alone, but are unpatriotic actions and against our national security." He underscored the need for total suppression and said: "The intelligence system must get into the fray and take serious action. We must not be afraid of what foreigners are saying." He emphasized: "The enemy, America and the Monafeqin [Mojahedin] have invested heavily in our universities where westernized intellectuals are exploiting the open atmosphere to hatch conspiracies."
Referring to the incidents in Isfahan, the state-controlled daily, Abrar, wrote in its editorial yesterday: "Information and documents prove that the incidents in Najafabad and the atmosphere of terror and intimidation the notorious and terrorist Seyyed Mehdi Hashemi had created there, originate from outside the borders." The mullahs' crisis-ridden regime again acknowledges that the National Liberation Army of Iran and the Mojahedin are the source of all of its problems and difficulties.
On Saturday, in a meeting with the Guards Corps' Bassij forces, Hashemi Rafsanjani described them as a force which has "neutralized" conspiracies by "Western Arrogance and the Monafeqin [Mojahedin]... and provided a secure protective shield for society."
The 10,000-strong demonstration by southwest Tehran's residents on May 4, the protest by thousands of people in Kermanshah late last week, students' protests and workers' strikes in different cities across the nation, including Shiraz, Ahwaz, Qazvin, Dezful, Bandar Abbas, Oroumieh, Rasht, Karaj, Meshkin-shahr, and Anzali have caused great alarm among the mullahs about their future. In this respect, the Guards Corps and the Bassij have been given orders to shoot to crush popular protests and unrest.
Yesterday, the regime's Air Force staged an exercise, code-named Moharram, in the vicinity of Bushehr on the Persian Gulf, involving seven of its air bases, in order to prepare for air strikes against the bases of the Iranian Resistance in Iraqi territory. After holding similar exercises in September, code-named "Thunder," nine F-4 Phantoms and F-5 Tigers bombed two bases of the National Liberation Army of Iran in Iraq's "no-fly zone."
Engulfed in internal crisis and unable to confront the operations and activities of the Resistance nationwide, Khomeini's faltering heirs have found stepped-up repression at home and military and terrorist attacks, air and missile strikes against the Iranian Resistance in Iraq, as the only recourse to forestall their overthrow.
Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran
May 18, 1998
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