Iran, North Korea forging ballistic, nuclear ties: dissidents

[bananas]

Source: Reuters

An exiled Iranian opposition group said on Thursday a delegation of North Korean experts in nuclear warheads and ballistic missiles visited a military site near Tehran in April amid talks between world powers and Iran over its nuclear program.

The dissident National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) exposed Iran's uranium enrichment plant at Natanz and a heavy water facility at Arak in 2002. But analysts say it has a mixed track record and a clear political agenda. Iran says allegations of nuclear bomb research are baseless and forged by its enemies.

<snip>

Citing information from sources inside Iran, including within Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps, the Paris-based NCRI said the seven person North Korean Defence Ministry team were in Iran for the last week of April. It was the third time in 2015 that North Koreans had been to Iran and a nine person delegation was due to return in June, it said.

"The delegates included nuclear experts, nuclear warhead experts and experts in various elements of ballistic missiles including guidance systems," NCRI said.

<snip>

The U.N. Panel of Experts that monitors compliance with sanctions on North Korea has reported in the past that Pyongyang and Tehran were regularly exchanging ballistic missile technology in violation of U.N. sanctions.

<snip>

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/05/28/us-iran-northkorea-dissidents-idUSKBN0OD08F20150528

[Spitfire of ATJ]

1. Weren't there exiled Iraqi dissidents that told us about WMDs?

[Fred Sanders]

7. Bingo! The war hawks only know one song. Exiled dissidents of any kind are....unreliable, shall we say?

[happyslug]

9. Actually, the Iraq dissidents were NEVER Terrorists, these have been....

The Iraqi Dissidents who told the US about WMD, where members of the ruling elite who lost out in various infighting in Iraq and ended up in America for they had no base of support in Iraq. Thus they had NO information to give, except to be an Iraqi saying what the Bush Administration wanted to hear.

This group is an aging left wing group founded in the 1970s but lost out to Khomeini during the Iranian Revolution of 1979. They kept on doing Terrorist activity in Iran from bases in Iraq held by the Kurds till the US invasion of Iraq. They claim they gave up violence at that time period (2002) do to adopting peace as the solution but that is ignoring the fact that Iran had opposed the US Invasion of Iraq, and that opposition, and this groups SUPPORT of that invasion, cost them most if not all of their support in Iran.

Thus they have some contacts in Iran, but nothing big. In many ways they are like the IRA in Ireland (But NOT the Sinn Finn, the Political arm of the IRA is still strong and active and NOT involved in criminal activities).

The IRA was big in the 1970s, but went into a slow decline in the 1980s and what survives today is mostly old timers living off the remains of the criminal elements they took over in the 1970s to pay for the War fighting the British. Many of these old timers are being replaced by young hoods, hoods who may month the IRA slogans but want to control the money from the criminal aspects not fight for an independent Northern Ireland. Thus the IRA is both a Criminal and Guerrilla organization, but in the final process of converting to a pure Criminal organization (much like the Mafia in Sicily, another group started out as a resistance group but slowly converted over time into a pure Criminal Organization).

I have NOT heard of any criminal activity on part of this Iranian Group, they appear to just give up fighting and their source of revenue appears to be from other governments (Saddam was a major Source( along with Iranian refugees. Given the area they are in, not much profit in criminal activity that is NOT already being exploited by someone else in the area. Thus unlike the IRA, this group has become almost meaningless except as a place for people who oppose the present government to make statements of opposition. There are dying and with that long death what access their have to Internal Iranian information is also dying.

In short, some good information may come from them, better information then from the Iraq dissidents that said Saddam had WMDs. On the other hand, given the view of most people in Iran that these are tools of the US and Israel, they ability to produce good information will be limited.

[dembotoz]

2. second verse same as the first

[davidpdx]

3. It frankly wouldn't surprise me a bit if this was verifiable

Iran and Russia have a close relationship as does Russia and North Korea. North Korea still needs cash to maintain their own military while begging for food from the world.

[Lurks Often]

4. Believable and the UN has apparently come to the same conclusion

North Korea needs foreign currency and other things it can not produce itself and Iran has the money and would like the help in advancing it's own nuclear program.

[Zight]

5. "dissidents" claim a lot of things

Whether they are real is another story.

[starroute]

6. NCRI is just the usual disinfo agents at MEK

They're a cult with terrorist leanings and they've been at this sort of thing for years. I don't give them any credibility.

[Tempest]

8. Is the NCRI leader's name Curveball by chance? n/t