BRIEF ON IRAN No. 566 Monday, January 6, 1997 Representative Office of The National Council of Resistance of Iran Washington, DC 20007 An Iranian Woman's Hanging Feared..., Voice of America, January 2 The Amnesty International says that it believes an imprisoned Iranian woman is about to be executed.... Sheida Khorramzadeh Esfahani is the wife of Abolqassem Majd-Abkahi who was sentenced to death in July along with two others while charged with economic mischief and spying for the United States.... ...And Two Are Hanged, Reuters, January 5 Iran has hanged two men for spying for Israel and the CIA and committing economic sabotage during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, newspapers reported on Sunday. They said the two Iranians were hanged at Tehran's Qasr prison on January 1.... Hedayatollah Zendehdel, a Jewish businessmen who converted to Islam, and businessman Abolqassem Majd-Abkahi, were sentenced to death in July.... Tehran's Export of Terrorism, Radio Israel, December 31 According to the Kuwaiti daily Al-Syiassa, the Islamic republic of Iran has dispatched 500 members of the Revolutionary Guards to Lebanon for training Hizbollah members.... The daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat wrote in its latest issue that the Iranian government has decided to increase its military and political influence in Lebanon to avoid any difficulty should there be a rift between Iran and Syria. The daily Al-Arabi, published in Cairo, reported that Egyptian security officials have disclosed several secret meetings between Egyptian terrorist networks and intelligence officials of Iran. Iran's Third Submarine Passes Through Suez Canal, Reuters, January 2 A Russian-made submarine passed through the Suez Canal on Thursday on its way to join Iranian naval forces in the Gulf, shipping sources told Reuters. The Kilo-class, diesel-powered submarine is the last of three submarines which Moscow has sold to Iran, the only Gulf state to deploy submarines in the oil-rich region.... Washington and Iran's neighbors have voiced strong concerns over Iran's rearmament program.... Overview Mullahs, Look! Women, Armed And Dangerous The New York Times, By Douglas Jehl, December 30 ...By the map, Camp Ashraf lies in Iraq, 60 miles north of Baghdad. But a more accurate description would be the military headquarters of Iran-in-exile, and a place unto itself. The sprawling camp is home to the leadership of the National Liberation Army, a formidable Iranian opposition force. It is also home to unfathomable devotion toward the 43-year-old woman her disciples say should be Iran's next leader. "We love Maryam Rajavi," men in camouflage dress chanted after braving a pool of fire in an exercise of their own. "And we promise to take her to Tehran." Built up on a barren salt plain beginning about a decade ago, the army, now some 30,000 strong, is by any measure the best-armed opposition force poised outside any country's borders. With raids deep into Iran in 1988, in the closing months of the eight-year Iran-Iraq war, it equipped itself with some $2 billion worth of weapons, including American-made armored personnel carriers and British-made Chieftain tanks.... But to hear its members tell it, the real strength of the National Liberation Army derives from faith in Mrs. Rajavi and her husband, Massoud, architects of a force so highly motivated and disciplined that it borders on the bizarre. Uniforms display neither rank nor insignia, in an effort to promote "camaraderie and fraternity in our struggle," said Kobra Tahmasbi, 39, a division commander. Mrs. Tahmasbi and most other top officers are women, whose standard-issue attire includes khaki head scarves and modestly cut tunics that would be acceptable even on a Tehran street but who exercise an authority unimaginable at home.... Only twice since its formation has the opposition army fought head-to-head against Iran, in the operations of 1988, when it once pushed more than 100 miles into Iran, and in 1991, when Iran's Revolutionary Guards invaded Iraq in an attempt to crush the resistance at the end of the Persian Gulf war. By most accounts, the National Liberation Army has acquitted itself well, demonstrating an ability to confront and defeat some of Iran's best armored units. It has also withstood years of indirect attacks, including an Iranian Scud missile attack in 1991, and shootings and car bombings even at its office in Baghdad as part of a worldwide Iranian assassination campaign. The force has been well- financed, mostly by contributions to the National Council of Resistance from inside Iran, its top officials say.... As soldiers and officers filed into a dining hall for lunch recently, a huge photograph of Mrs. Rajavi, smiling beatifically, stood perched on an easel at the head of the room. Around the room, television sets were showing videotapes of Mrs. Rajavi's triumphal return this month to Iraq after three years in Paris, the organization's political headquarters, and there were throaty cheers. "I have found my final answer in Maryam Rajavi," said Mohammed Taslimi, 46, a political prisoner under the Shah who is the camp's chief of logistics. "Maryam Rajavi is anathema to the Khomeini ideology, and that's why she is the cure."