France expressed support over transferring members of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization outside Iraq, underlining its readiness to take part in coordination with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
Iranian Fars news agency quoted French Foreign Ministry Spokesman Philippe Lalliot as saying that his country supports the UN plan to move the MKO to a third country.
Head of an Iraqi human rights group had said that Iraq seeks to try in absentia the members of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO, also known as the MEK, NCR and PMOI) in Iraq.
He said the people of Tuz Khurmato, who are victims of the MKO and the trial is going to be held in their city, expressed happiness and satisfaction over the issue.
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Six people were killed and more than 50 were wounded on Saturday when several dozen mortar shells fell on a refugee camp for members of an Iranian opposition group, according to an Iraqi police official.
The camp, on the site of a former American military base near the Baghdad airport known as Camp Liberty, is home to about 3,400 Iranian exiles who are members of Mujahedeen Khalq, or M.E.K., a militant organization. It was removed from the State Department’s terrorist list in September after years of intensive lobbying from prominent American politicians and former military officers, who viewed the group as a legitimate democratic alternative to the Iranian government.
In an e-mail sent to news media outlets in Iraq, the military wing of Hezbollah in Iraq, a militant organization believed to have connections to the main Lebanese group and to Iran, claimed responsibility for the attack and warned that others would follow.
Although Hezbollah in Iraq was active during the American military presence there, attacks by the group died down after the Americans left, and its leaders said they would lay down arms and join the political process. But in an ominous sign that a recent spate of deadly sectarian conflicts in Iraq might escalate, the group announced at a recent news conference that it was establishing a militia to fight Sunni groups that had been attacking Shiites. Camp Liberty is meant to be a temporary residence for the Iranian refugees while the United Nations works to find host countries for them. In a statement issued from Geneva, the United Nations high commissioner for refugees, António Guterres, called the attack “a despicable act of violence” and said the residents of the camp were asylum seekers entitled to international protection.
In a statement, the M.E.K. accused the Iranian government and Iraqi forces of being behind the attack, and said the Iraqi government had recently removed the blast walls surrounding the camp, leaving the refugees unsafe. The group said that more than 100 had been injured in the shelling and that its demands to return to its previous location in Iraq, Camp Ashraf, had been ignored.
“The residents and their representatives have warned about a massacre by the Iranian regime and the Iraqi forces,” the statement said, “and demanded several times from the secretary general of the United Nations and U.S. officials to return to Camp Ashraf, where concrete buildings and shelters are available.”
Ali al-Moussawi, an Iraqi government spokesman, denied that Baghdad was involved, saying the accusation from the M.E.K. “is not the first time when they blame us for everything.”
The United Nations demanded that the Iraqi government open an investigation, saying in a statement that Martin Kobler, the United Nations special representative for Iraq, “called on the Iraqi authorities to immediately ensure medical care for the wounded.”
The M.E.K. had long resisted leaving Camp Ashraf, on land that had been set aside by Saddam Hussein, the toppled Iraqi dictator, and did so only because the United States made it a condition of dropping the group’s terrorist designation. An American official said in August that the M.E.K. had been using Camp Ashraf for paramilitary training.
The group carried out bombings in Iran in the 1970s against the shah’s government and later against the Islamic government, causing the death of several Americans, but by most accounts it has not engaged in terrorism in recent years. But Iraq’s current government, a close ally of Iran, views the M.E.K. as a terrorist group and wants it out of the country.
By YASIR GHAZI
Reportedly, the military wing of Hezbollah in Iraq, a militant organization active during the American military presence, has claimed responsibility for the mortar attacks on Camp Liberty that left a count casualty of nearly 60 on both sides, the Iraqi guards and the residing MKO members. In a statement, as it was expected, MKO accused the Iranian and Iraqi regimes to be not only the responsible but behind the attacks. But the chief responsible for the attacks and the inflicted casualties is MKO itself with Massoud Rajavi at the head.
Regardless of all these accusations and who the real directors of the attacks might be, MKO is the side that best benefits from the bloodshed. In fact, the leaders are not at all looking for the responsible to accuse; whoever they are, they have served MKO in the best way to deserve its thanks. It makes no difference for Rajavi who is sacrificed from which side; the emphasis is on the applied brutality to claim victims. And for MKO, the more victims the better.
The suffering, enslaved insiders of MKO have always been the front-line victims and their families, pressing effortlessly to rescue them, have repeatedly declared that Iraq is not a safe place for their children and relatives to stay. From the within the insiders are, physically and psychologically, under relentless pressure of a totalitarian cult, and from without, there are an ever-increasing likelihood of violent reaction from Iraqi people looking for any opportunity to strike at MKO in revenge for its flagrant collaboration with Saddam against the Iraqi people.
The Committee for the Defense of Iraqi victims of the terrorist MKO has reportedly filed more than 280 complaints against the group in German, Spanish and Turkish courts of law. The chairman of the committee Nafee Issa has asserted that lawyers have filed complaints on behalf of Iraqi victims particularly by farmers living in Diyala province whose crop lands have been occupied by the group to be walled and to establish the cult bastion called Ashraf. In fact, it was a legal demand by the Iraqi government and the local people, to whom the lands belong, to close the camp and return the lands to their real owners. Naturally, MKO as the occupier was reluctant to return what it had seized mostly because its erected utopia was known to be both its ideological and military bastion.
The group, however, was forced to leave Camp Ashraf and the residents were transferred to Camp Liberty near Baghdad. The group is well aware of the fact that relocation from Ashraf is equal to permanent expulsion from Iraq sooner or later. From the very day the first group of members arrived at Liberty, the leaders began a widespread campaign to stop the process of relocation. Now they are nagging, urging and plotting to be returned to Ashraf. And the recent mortar attack has provided the golden opportunity the leaders were looking for. In a statement after the incident, MKO accused the Iranian government and Iraqi forces of being behind the attack, and blasted the Iraqi government for its recent decision of removing the blast walls surrounding the Camp Liberty and, of course, repeated the necessity of being returned to Ashraf:
“The residents and their representatives have warned about a massacre by the Iranian regime and the Iraqi forces, and demanded several times from the secretary general of the United Nations and U.S. officials to return to Camp Ashraf, where concrete buildings and shelters are available.”
What is done cannot be undone but any similar operation for any claimed legal and just reason is either in the behest of MKO or an act on behalf of MKO. The safety of the residents, despite being known as the members of a despised terrorist cult, has to be guaranteed until they are resettled to third countries.
The High Commissioner for Refugees, António Guterres expresses his shock about this morning’s mortar attack on Camp Liberty in Iraq that reportedly killed six and wounded dozens.
"I strongly condemn this attack," Mr. Guterres said, noting that the residents of Camp Liberty are asylum seekers undergoing the refugee status determination process and thus entitled to international protection. "This is a despicable act of violence."
"I call on the Iraqi Government to do everything it can to guarantee security to the residents," he said. "The perpetrators must be found and brought to justice without delay," he said.
The High Commissioner also calls on all countries to help find urgent solutions for the Camp Liberty residents.
Mr. Guterres expresses his deep condolences to the families of the victims.
Head of an Iraqi human rights group says Iraq seeks to try in absentia the members of the terrorist Mujahedin-e Khalq organization (MKO, a.k.a. MEK and PMOI) in Iraq.
“The silence of the Iraqi government, international organizations, and the mass media regarding the martyrs and victims of Munafeqin (hypocrites, a term used in Iran and Iraq for the members of MKO) grouplet made us request the hearing in the absence of the Munafeqin,” head of the Association of Justice to Defend Iraqi Victims of MKO, Dr. Nafe al-Isa, told Habilian Association in an interview on Thursday.
He said the people of Tuz Khurmato, who are victims of the MKO and the trial is going to be held in their city, expressed happiness and satisfaction over the issue.
He added that the trial will be held as coordinated with the judicial system, and the witnesses will be heard in the first session.
Dr. Nafe al-Isa also called on Iranian media to cover the sessions, the first of which will be held on February 18, 2013.
Ban Ki-moon demands investigation by Iraqi authorities into deadly attack on dissident base that left at least six dead.
Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, has condemned a deadly attack on an Iranian dissident camp in the Iraqi capital and demanded an investigation by authorities.
"(Ban) strongly condemns the mortar attack today on Camp Liberty, the temporary transit facility near Baghdad for former residents of Camp Ashraf," his press office said in a statement after the attack on Saturday.
The US state department labelled the assault a "vicious and senseless terrorist attack," and called on Iraq to probe the attack and enhance security at the camp.
According to the Associated Press, at least six people were killed and dozens of others were injured when missiles struck the area occupied by the Mujahadeen e-Khalq (MEK) group near Baghdad.
A spokesman for the European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, also joined in the condemnation of the attack.
"We express our condolences to the families of the victims. We are concerned that it could add tension to the present situation in the camp," the EU spokesman said.
A spokesman for the interior ministry, however, said only one person had been killed and that reports of more deaths were "exaggerated".
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack on the transit camp, a former American military base known as Camp Liberty, adjacent to Baghdad’s international airport.
The camp was the base that now-executed dictator Saddam Hussein allowed the group MEK to establish in Diyala province in the 1980s, during Iraq’s eight-year war with Iran.
Martin Kobler, the top UN official in Iraq, told Al Jazeera that he was "shocked" by the attack.
"These people have to be protected," he said, calling on Iraqi authorities to "promptly conduct an investigation".
‘Terrorist group’
The camp is home to more than 1,000 residents from the MEK who were moved last year, on Iraq’s insistence, from their historic paramilitary camp of the 1980s – Camp Ashraf.
The MEK was founded in the 1960s to oppose the Shah of Iran, and after the 1979 Islamic revolution that overthrew him it took up arms against Iran’s rulers.
It says it has now laid down its arms and is working to overthrow the government in Tehran through peaceful means.
It is no longer welcome in Iraq under the Shia-led government that came to power after US-led forces invaded and toppled Saddam in 2003.
Al Jazeera’s Jane Arraf, reporting from Baghdad, said Iraq sees the MEK as a "terrorist group".
"They [MEK] say they’re in danger from the Iranians and the Iraqi government," she said.
The UN intends to process them for refugee status in other countries but no country has so far welcomed them.
Britain struck the group off its terror list in June 2008, followed by the European Union in 2009 and the US in September 2012.
The US state department holds the group responsible, however, for the deaths of Iranians as well as US soldiers and civilians from the 1970s into 2001.
The MEK has no support in Iran, and no connection to domestic opposition groups.
Following the campaign launched by the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO /MEK) on the alleged “inhumane condition” of Camp Liberty, the group leaders and supporters propagate “the necessity of returning residents to Ashraf”. Alejo Vida Quadras, the top MKO supporter in European Parliament suggested the new propaganda under the pretext of "lack of progress in relocation to third countries".
To our surprise, the group leaders do not call on their western supporters to aid facilitate their members’ relocation in European countries instead of returning to Camp Ashraf although a large number of Liberty residents have citizenship in various western countries. Earlier this month, speaking in their so-called international conference in Paris, Maryam Rajavi, the self-assigned president of the National Council of Resistance required the US government to relocate Liberty residents in Camp Ashraf. “Now the US must actively intervene as that the residents can return to Ashraf. Otherwise it would be responsible for what may henceforth happen in Liberty Prison” Rajavi addressed the conference. Fed by the large scale disinformation campaign of the MKO its supporters in Western states label Liberty as "Prison". They resort to the old pretext which has been flooding of storm and sewage at the camp. However, UN Mission in charge of the Camp believes that it complies with normal humanitarian standards as well as necessary infrastructure for residence of the group members. (View our previous post on Camp Liberty: Camp Liberty resembles a prison?)
On January21, 2013, in a debate in UK parliament House of Lords, a few number of Lords expressed their concerns over the situation of Liberty residents. Baroness Warsi, a conservative member of UK House of Lords convinced her coulleagues that heavy rainfall that flooded parts of Camp Liberty as well as many parts of Baghdad "did not affect residents’ accommodation blocks".
To respond her misinformed colleagues about the claims of ex-UNAMI chief Taher Boumedra and the alleged inefficiency of Martin Kobler over Camp Liberty issues, she noted:”Our own officials visited in July last year and the international community does not, at this stage, find any credible evidence to support the matters that have been raised by Mr. Tahar Boumedra.” Boumedra’s claims are still used as evidence by the MKO propaganda.
Lord Avebury who is one of the most loyal supporters of the MKO in UK parliament he pointed to allegations of “ill-treatment such as denial of access to urgently needed medical treatment”. In response Baroness Warsi mentioned that the situation of Liberty residents is “in many ways much better than that of residents in Baghdad.” She referred to the 24-hour electricity available in the Camp while Iraqi nationals enjoy power only three hours a day in some areas of Baghdad. She also noticed that enough water and medical facilities are available in the camp.
Baroness Warsi warned her peers in UK parliament that they “must be incredibly careful” about the MKO regarding its history and record.
The new tactic, the MKO has used to maintain the hegemony over its cult-like group seems to be an alternative to the previous agenda which was running petitions and lobbying efforts to make the UN grant the status of a refugee camp to camp Liberty. The failed tactic led the group to run the new one: return to Ashraf where they claim to own its properties.
In their most recent misinformation event in Paris, the “speakers condemned forcible eviction of Ashraf residents and their transfer to Liberty prison…”, according to NCRI website . They called for “the return of Ashraf residents to the modern town they built in 26 years.” Lord Dholakia’s asked about refugee status of Liberty while he confessed that he WAS misinformed by the MKO saying,”the information the Minister has is not the information that we receive from residents of those camps". Ordinary residents of liberty have no access to the outside world let alone contacting a UK Parliamentarian.
During the debate the conservative Baroness assured her colleagues that Liberty” is not a refugee camp as such: it is a place where individuals are being assessed as to the countries to which they could be relocated.”(View the debate here)
According to reports, almost all former members of the MKO who fled the group camps in Iraq could manage to resettle whether in Iran or in European countries. It sounds that leaving Iraq is not so difficult that the Rajavis could not relocate their members yet. Probably it’s not the matter of ability it’s the matter of will.
By Mazda Parsi
Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Non-affiliated)
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what recent information they have concerning flooding by sewage and storm water at Camp Liberty, and whether they have made representations to the United Nations and the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq about conditions at the camp.
Baroness Warsi (Conservative)
My Lords, we are aware that parts of Camp Liberty were flooded during a recent period of heavy rainfall, as were many parts of the Baghdad area. Fortunately, this did not affect residents’ accommodation blocks. We continue to monitor the situation at Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty through the embassy in Baghdad and to raise issues with the Government of Iraq and the United Nations.
Lord Maginnis of Drumglass (Non-affiliated)
My Lords, is it not time that the Government made a judgment, based on first-hand evidence such as that produced by the ex-UNAMI chief Tahar Boumedra, and ignored the manipulation and dissembling by Martin Kobler on behalf of the Secretary-General of the United Nations? If the United Kingdom is to maintain its integrity and influence in the Middle East, we should be pressing for the dismissal of Herr Kobler and, indeed, be asking ourselves, with our allies, whether the present Secretary-General of the United Nations has not outlived his usefulness.
Baroness Warsi (Conservative)
Before I answer the noble Lord’s very important question, I am sure the rest of the House will want to join me in wishing him a very happy birthday.
The noble Lord raises an important point. The Secretary-General, whom I met with last week at the United Nations, is doing a very important job, with the support of the international community, in some very difficult circumstances. The specific situation in relation to Camp Liberty is that the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Iraq, as part of the United Nations Assistance Mission, regularly reports about the situation in Camp Liberty and Camp Ashraf. Our own officials visited in July last year and the international community does not, at this stage, find any credible evidence to support the matters that have been raised by Mr Tahar Boumedra.
Lord Avebury (Liberal Democrat)
My Lords, considering that many of the complaints that are made by the residents of Camp Liberty and, indeed, Camp Ashraf, against the Iraqi authorities and UNAMI could be easily verified or refuted and that some have been confirmed not only by Mr Tahar Boumedra but by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, will the Government press for an inspector to be appointed by the UN Secretary-General to look into the serious allegations of ill treatment, such as denial of access to urgently needed medical treatment, which has lead to the deaths of two inmates of Camp Liberty? Since we have been aware for some time that 52 residents of Camp Liberty were formerly refugees in the United Kingdom, will my noble friend press for their immediate transfer to the UK?
Baroness Warsi (Conservative)
As my noble friend is aware, the situation in Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty is in many ways much better than that of residents in Baghdad. For example, electricity is available for 24 hours a day, as opposed to the three hours for which it is available in some parts of Baghdad. About 200 litres of water are available to residents there, when about 90 litres are available in some parts of Baghdad. My noble friend raises the very important issue of the recent death of a resident there. We share those concerns about the death of Behrooz Rahimian and have made inquiries specifically in relation to the medical assistance that he received. We are aware that there is a doctor and medical facilities on site 24 hours a day; there is also the opportunity to receive medical assistance from doctors in Baghdad. We understand that Mr Rahimian was afforded medical assistance in relation to his illness.
Lord Foulkes of Cumnock (Labour)
My Lords, will the Minister confirm that the new Parliament in Baghdad will be built to a British design, that UK parliamentarians, including the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope, are out there helping to develop democracy and that the development of a democratic Government in Iraq to deal with the kind of issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Maginnis, is the number one priority and will be supported fully by the British Government?
Baroness Warsi (Conservative)
I agree with much of what the noble Lord said. He will also be aware that this situation goes back many years. The group that lives in Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty is an organisation that originally left Iran after the Iranian revolution. Mujaheddin e Khalq, the group that is predominantly part of Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty, has its own history and record, and we must be incredibly careful about which members of that group we readmit to the United Kingdom.
Lord Dholakia (Liberal Democrat)
My Lords, does my noble friend agree that one of the problems we have is that the United Nations has not granted Camp Liberty the status of a refugee camp? It that were granted, would it not be possible to have adequate medical facilities and for water, sewerage et cetera to be resolved? At the same time, the status of Camp Ashraf could be looked at because the property of individuals is systematically being looted there, and the information the Minister has is not the information that we receive from residents of those camps.
Baroness Warsi (Conservative)
I can assure my noble friend that about 3,000 residents of Camp Ashraf have moved to Camp Liberty. It is not a refugee camp as such; it is a place where individuals are being assessed as to the countries to which they could be relocated. Four have already come to the United Kingdom, a fifth who was offered that has decided not to come and about 52 others are being considered for coming to the United Kingdom. In relation to property at Camp Ashraf, I can assure my noble friend that about 100 residents of this group remain in Camp Ashraf specifically to sell off their property.
An Iraqi official says the terrorist Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) had turned its Camp Ashraf into a base for training al-Qaeda operatives who carried out terrorist attacks against the Iraqi nation.
Head of the Security Committee of Diyala Province Meysam al-Tamimi noted that the MKO had transformed Camp Ashraf, situated about 120 kilometers (74 miles) west of the border with Iran, into a training camp for al-Qaeda members when they were in charge.
He said a large amount of money and weapons was also funneled through Camp Ashraf to al-Qaeda and Salafist extremist groups to help them target Iraqis in acts of terror.
The MKO fled to Iraq in 1986, where it enjoyed the support of Iraq’s executed dictator Saddam Hussein, and set up its camp near the Iranian border.
The group is also known to have cooperated with Saddam Hussein in suppressing the 1991 uprisings in southern Iraq and carrying out the massacre of Iraqi Kurds.
The MKO has carried out numerous acts of violence against Iranian civilians and government officials.
David Anderson (Blaydon, Labour(
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what recent reports he has received on the condition of residents of Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty; and what representations he has made to the Iraqi Government on that matter.
Alistair Burt (Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Afghanistan/South Asia, counter terrorism/proliferation, North America, Middle East and North Africa), Foreign and Commonwealth Office; North East Bedfordshire, Conservative):
The UN visit Camp Liberty, where the majority of former residents of Camp Ashraf now live, several times a week, and report that facilities at the camp meet international humanitarian standards. For example, residents have access to electricity 24 hours a day and over 200 litres of water per person per day. This compares well to the situation for many Iraqis. I raised the situation at Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty with the Iraqi Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Minister for Human Rights in July 2012. We continue to monitor the situation at Camps Ashraf and Liberty through our embassy in Baghdad, and to raise issues with the UN and the Government of Iraq where appropriate.