Bulgarian Deputy Foreign Minister Urdan Popov Wednesday called the anti-Iran group, Mojahedin-e-Khalq Organization, a terrorist group despite European Union’s recent decision to strike the MKO off its terror list… The remark by popov whose country is an EU member came after a controversial decision by the 27- nation bloc’s foreign ministers in Brussels to drop the MKO from the blacklist. The MKO had been blacklisted as a terror organization by the EU since 2002.
Bulgaria’s fourth non-combat unit to guard the Ashraf refugee camp north of Baghdad leaves for Iraq on Monday. Deputy Defense Minister Sonya Yankulova, army staff and defense officials, families and friends of the troops will attend the official ceremony in the town of Vratsa, Northwestern Bulgaria.
Bulgarian sources had earlier reported that the mission of Bulgarian forces for protecting Camp Ashraf has been extended for another year. However, the Gestapo of Ashraf each time denies that Bulgarian forces are guarding MKO’s camp and try to convince others that they’re under the protection of US forces!
The contingent will be under the operational and tactical command of the U.S. forces. During implementation of the mission, Bulgaria will retain its criminal, civil and disciplinary jurisdiction in respect of all Bulgarian service persons. The Ashraf refugee camp, northeast of Baghdad, houses some 3,500 members of the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), an exiled Iranian opposition group interned in Iraq, who enjoy protected status under the Fourth Geneva Convention.
Bulgaria’s guarding unit will assume control over the Ashraf camp in Iraq on May 6, the Day of the Bulgarian Army, it appeared during a videoconference with Iraq Friday.
The head of the unit lieutenant-colonel Marin Marinov told during the videoconference …
Bulgaria’s non-combat unit, which will perform tasks in a military-humanitarian mission at Camp Ashraf in Iraq was deployed in the camp area on April 11, the Bulgarian Defense Ministry said.
Bulgaria’s parliament approved the government decision to send up to 155 troops to guard the Iraqi camp of Ashraf, about 70 km north of Baghdad. The unit should stay in Iraq for a year.
Bulgaria’s parliament has approved a government decision to send up to 155 troops to guard an Iraqi camp.
Earlier this month the Socialist-led government agreed to deploy a non-combat unit of 120 lightly armed soldiers plus support staff to guard a camp of mainly Iranian refugees in Ashraf, about 70 km north of Baghdad.
As the United States advances steadily toward a confrontation with Iran, the fate of an Iraqi-based Iranian opposition group appears to have been sealed. It has now been confirmed that Bulgarian troops will assume control of the formerly-armed Mojahedin-e-Khalq (MKO) organization’s Ashraf camp. This move likely constitutes the final stage of removing the MKO from Iraq, a process that began with the U.S. bombing of the organization’s bases in April 2003.
The Bulgarian government will make a decision of sending a non-combat unit to an Iraqi refugee camp in two weeks, Defense Minister Veselin Bliznakov revealed on Saturday.
Bliznakov told the local Darik radio that there is already a consensus on this issue within the three-party ruling coalition and the government is to decide on the deployment of the non-combat unit of 154 soldiers to Ashraf in the next two weeks.