Mojahedin Khalq, MKO,
MEK, NCRI, Rajavi cult terrorism in Iran and Iraq
* * *
BBC Newsnight: Mujahideen-e-Khalq Terrorist MeK MKO
Part One
Part two
Part three
Mojahedin Khalq, MKO, MEK, NCRI, Rajavi cult
terrorism in Iran and Iraq
Press TV reports on Western
double-standards in the so-called 'war on terror' as
the UK is known to host the leaders and members of
several anti-Iran terrorist groups, such as MEK,
Pejak and Jundullah
* * *
Mojahedin
Khalq (Rajavi cult) on the run
Massoud Khodabandeh and Arash Sametipoor
join live from Geneva
Press TV, September 2010
Part one
Part two
------------------------
Third Report on Camp Ashraf
and Mojahedin-e Khalq in Iraq
Iran
Interlink is a campaigning and activist group. Its
aims are to expose the MEK as a destructive cult and
to promote and protect the human rights of its
victims who are mainly based in Camp Ashraf in the
Diyala province of Iraq. Further information can be
found at
www.iran-interlink.org .
Families at the camp –
acting as a humanitarian pressure group
Families as an
existential threat to the MEK
MEK denies medical
treatment to residents
Iraqi demonstrations
and police activity at the camp
Events of April 8 2011
Aftermath of the April
8 operation
Investigations
A unique dimension
Key difficulties
Finding a baseline
from which to move forward
Recommended steps for
progressing removal of the camp’s residents
Introduction
Iran-Interlink representative Anne Singleton
travelled to Iraq mid April at the invitation of the
Baghdad based human rights NGO Baladiyeh Foundation,
officials of the Government of Iraq and other NGOs
involved in the Camp Ashraf problem. The Baladiyeh
Foundation, headed by Mrs Ahlam al-Maliki, provides
humanitarian assistance to a wide range of deprived
sectors of Iraqi society arising directly from the
invasion and occupation of Iraq by allied forces in
2003. Baladiyeh Foundation is concerned by the
humanitarian crisis at Camp Ashraf caused by the
group’s leaders who are refusing to allow access to
human rights organisations to verify the wellbeing
of all of the camp’s residents.
Anne Singleton, a leading expert on the Mojahedin-e
Khalq (MEK) terrorist cult, was invited to speak at
al-Mostanserieh University in Baghdad on the
problems of removing the group from Iraq. She also
participated in a one hour live discussion on Al-Masar
television presented by Dr Qeis al-Atwani on the
topic ‘people want Monafeqin Khalq terrorists out of
Iraq’. (The term Monafeqin is a religious term
meaning hypocrites and is the preferred name among
Muslims for the Iranian Mojahedin-e Khalq cult.)
Anne visited Camp Ashraf shortly after the events of
April 8 and had the opportunity to speak with Iraqi
military representatives and observers stationed at
the camp perimeter. She toured the outside of the
camp to see where a third of the land has been
reclaimed.
Background
When Iraq’s current democratically elected
parliament opened on 14 June 2010 it was known that
the Iraqi government would continue to work toward
the removal of the MEK from Iraq. It was known that
the MEK would spill blood to resist this outcome. It
was therefore a game of wait and see until a bloody
confrontation erupted.
Although the election marked the beginning of a slow
death for the MEK organisation in Iraq, eight years
since it was captured and disarmed, the MEK in its
current situation in Camp Ashraf is a spent force.
The average age and both mental and physical health
of the residents as well as their social and
educational abilities indicate that it cannot
function as a mass opposition force. Some
individuals of course will be found who remain loyal
to the Rajavis and who will continue to work for
them in the future, but most of the residents are in
need of help rather than being able to help others.
By the time the Government of Iraq (GOI) took charge
of the camp in January 2009, the MEK had become used
to imposing its own will on the conditions related
to its survival and would not willingly relinquish
an iota of this control. The MEK had in effect
maintained, after the fall of Saddam Hussein, a de
facto illegal territorial exclave run by non-Iraqis;
a state within a state. Under the Iraqi constitution
it is impossible to allow such a foreign terrorist
group to remain in Iraq.
Since 2003 in particular there has been a history of
cynical political exploitation of the residents of
Camp Ashraf by multifarious elements. The people who
reside in Camp Ashraf are being treated as pawns by
every party which has an interest in the camp and
the Mojahedin-e Khalq brand. Clearly, in order to be
effective in resolving the future of Camp Ashraf in
a peaceful and humanitarian way, it will be
necessary to put aside the interests of these
political players and to look beyond the military
and security aspect and to deal with the residents
of the camp as individuals. More than that, they
must be dealt with as the victims of a destructive
cult.
The imperative which now drives resolution of this
issue is the legitimate demand of the Government of
Iraq that the MEK leave the country before the end
of 2011. How this is to be achieved is the essential
difficulty. Putting aside the MEK’s victim
propaganda it is clear that in fact the MEK is the
problem, not the government of Iraq per se. So, the
first question is how can all the parties concerned
work together to remove the MEK from Iraq as the
Iraqi government and indeed the Iraqi constitution
requires?
As a helpful starting point, Western governments and
agencies could certainly support the Government of
Iraq position and provide positive practical
interventions rather than indulging in political
sniping from the sidelines.
The Rule of Law
One important aspect of the UNAMI mandate is that
assistance was to be given to the new Iraqi
government to bring the whole country under the Rule
of Law. In this respect, the situation at Camp
Ashraf should certainly have been a priority since
the MEK leaders are known worldwide not to obey any
law except their own. The minimum requirement that
UNAMI should have demanded of the MEK from the start
of its mandate in Iraq was that the group obey Iraqi
law.
To reinforce its position the GOI recently began to
release some of its intelligence information,
gathered over the previous seven years, on MEK
involvement in insurgency activity. Evidence was
made available that Al Qaeda in Iraq had met with
MEK leaders and helped fund the MEK in exchange for
logistical support for Al Qaeda activities in Iraq.
Evidence was also made available concerning MEK
attempts to influence the outcome of the elections
of March 2010.
Families at the camp –
acting as a humanitarian pressure group
The two violent clashes which took place between
Iraqi security forces and MEK loyalists in July 2009
and April 2011, in which several MEK were killed,
were assured widespread attention in the West by
intensive MEK lobbying. But since 2009 the most
significant development at the camp has been the
establishment of the permanent presence of families
of Camp Ashraf residents as a humanitarian pressure
group. In February 2010 a large group of families
had travelled from Iran to find their relatives. The
MEK not only denied them contact with their loved
ones but attacked them as ‘agents of the Iranian
Intelligence Ministry sent to spy on them and
destroy the camp’. The families ignored these
insults and continued to make their requests. The
MEK grouped at the gates of the camp to swear and
throw stones at them. In disbelief, the families
travelled to Baghdad where they met Iraqi officials
responsible for Camp Ashraf and solicited their
help. This was the first time that Iraqi officials
had been directly approached by families for help.
At this point some of the families went home as they
had not planned to stay for so long and their other
commitments or health issues forced them to return.
But other families decided that they would stay and
would not leave until the situation had been
resolved for them to meet their relatives. They
began to ask around what could be done. They
questioned who was really in charge of Camp Ashraf
and why so little was being done to reach those
inside. A few Iraqi human rights organisations and
personalities agreed to help the families along with
Sahar Family Foundation in Iraq. They called
themselves the Committee to Support the Families at
Camp Ashraf.
The families returned to Camp Ashraf and persuaded
the Iraqi army to provide basic accommodation
(containers) and allow them to set up a permanent
picket.
The families began by approaching the camp gate and
shouting messages for their loved ones. The MEK
leaders responded by staging angry demonstrations
with members shouting insults and swearing at the
families. Rajavi thought they would give up and go
away after only a short time.
Instead, the MEK inside the camp began to respond to
the families, making surreptitious signals and
encouraging them to go on with their messages. The
MEK leaders then emptied the front of the camp where
they were using several buildings, taking residents
further inside the camp to a distance where the
voices of the families could not be heard and they
could not see one another. The families began using
hand-held loud-speakers. This tit for tat behaviour
escalated as the MEK began counter measures –
banging bin-lids and metal cooking pots to drown out
the families’ voices. The MEK mounted audio
equipment on the back of a vehicle and stationed it
in front of the families. They loudly broadcast
anthems and songs in an attempt to drown out the
families’ voices.
The families in turn brought their own loudspeakers
and broadcast the sound of laughter of a two year
old child – something the MEK had not heard for many
years. The response of the MEK who were still in
sight was astounding, they smiled and nodded and
again made surreptitious signals to encourage the
continuation of the families’ actions.
Both the families and the MEK brought larger
loud-speakers. The standoff escalated. By the end of
the autumn, the families had spread their protests
to all the other gates of Camp Ashraf on the
perimeter and established their loud-speakers and
banners and pickets all around the camp. The MEK was
forced to retreat into the centre of the camp. In
desperation the MEK installed American-made noise
parasite equipment to block the sound, broadcasting
audio interference at the families. The MEK were
unaware at that time that reporters were present and
the exposure of this illegal action which has a
detrimental health effect forced them to quickly
remove the equipment. (It has since been
reinstated.) But the evidence of American support
for the MEK was clear for all to see as reporters
questioned how the MEK had taken receipt of such
equipment beyond the camp checkpoints and indeed who
had supplied it.
Throughout 2010 and up to the current time the
families of residents in Camp Ashraf have played a
crucial role in determining the future of the camp.
Their presence has forced the MEK leadership to
adopt more and more defensive positions, to retreat
further and further into the depths of the camp.
Rajavi introduced a special force to systematically
patrol the perimeter fence and use catapults and
slingshots to aim metal missiles to deter anyone
from approaching the fence.
It is interesting therefore to examine why this
should be so and why these families present such a
problem for the cult.
Families as an
existential threat to the MEK
The fundamental question is ‘what is the rationale
which explains Rajavi’s refusal to allow the
residents of Camp Ashraf to have contact with their
families?’ This is not a recent phenomenon. It has
been a cult rule for thirty years that all contacts
with families, including family relations inside the
cult, are strictly controlled by the cult. Only in
cases where there has been potential for financial
gain, further recruitment of family members and/or
cooperation in MEK activities is anyone allowed to
make contact with their family wherever they are in
the world. These contacts are ordered and rehearsed
and monitored to ensure that they keep to the
purpose and do not slip into any personal, emotional
level.
Any family which does not have any use for the cult
is an enemy of the cult. The cult member is
indoctrinated to believe that their families are
agents of the Iranian regime and their aim is to
prevent the member from pursuing their sacred and
ideological aim of struggle against the clerical
dictatorship ruling Iran. In this way, Rajavi
inculcates an artificial phobic reaction of fear and
loathing in cult members against their own families.
This means that any encounter with a family member
will trigger an automatic reaction in the cult
member to reject and hurt their family.
But this effect is only partially effective and
relies on both the constant reinforcement of the
phobic fear as well as preventing any actual meeting
with or phone contact or even written contact with
the families. (This is why the cult members are
instructed to reject further family contact through
the Red Cross Tracing Service. The Red Cross ensure
that they deliver the first contact directly to the
family member and do not allow the MEK leaders to
deliver the contact on their behalf because they
know they would not reach the recipient. However,
the MEK instructs such recipients to inform the Red
Cross to pass the message to their family not to
contact them again.)
The reason why Rajavi tries so hard to prevent these
contacts is that it is known that in cult members
generally (except perhaps in the case of persons
born into cults) the deep seated emotional ties to
the person’s original family can, given a very small
opportunity, override the messages of the cult
leader. In the case of the MEK cult in which members
are not allowed to form families inside the cult,
they live in a very black and white emotional
landscape; either love Rajavi or you are his enemy.
But there exists in each member the suppressed
memory of former emotional relationships. These
will, of course, be triggered by contact (by letter,
telephone or in person) with a family member. Even
contact with other people’s families can trigger
this emotional memory. A small and fleeting contact
can override the indoctrination and plunge the cult
member into a spiral of confusion and doubt about
their exclusive relation to the leader.
As a result of this contact many cult members simply
‘snap out of it’ and are then able to begin the long
and painful process of recovering from cult
indoctrination. The problem for members of the
Rajavi cult who are resident in Camp Ashraf is that
they cannot physically leave. Otherwise they would
be what is known in cult jargon as a ‘walk out’; put
simply a person who walks away from the cult. The
residents who have managed to escape the confines of
Camp Ashraf are in effect ‘walk outs’. The
conditions of their escapes are significant. Their
escapes have been fraught with danger and
difficulty. Firstly they know there is no TIPF to
take refuge in. They will be on their own and they
are aware that Camp Ashraf is far away from any
place to get help and they have no money or ID and
are instantly identifiable as Iranian and from the
MEK. In addition, the MEK leaders have convinced
them that the Iraqis will kill them if they leave
and hand themselves over. (The people inside Camp
Ashraf have had no uncensored news of the outside
world for over two decades. They have no idea of the
real situation pertaining in Iraq.) But by taking
the steps to leave the physical confines of the camp
they have also left the cult. It usually does not
take long once freed from the psychological pressure
imposed by the cult leaders until they regain their
critical thinking and their emotional responses.
Such escapees from Rajavi’s cult report that the
vast majority of residents in Camp Ashraf would like
to leave but have no way of getting out. They are
not willing members of Rajavi’s MEK nor are they
indoctrinated members of his cult. They are
hostages.
It is the presence of the families and these ‘walk
outs’ which Rajavi fears more than anything else
because it signals the inevitable dissolution of his
organisation. The families of the residents inside
Camp Ashraf are the true existential threat to the
MEK.
With this in mind it is clear that the permanent
presence of the families at the camp gates will play
a major role in the efforts to ensure that external
agencies are able to enter the camp and make serious
efforts to relocate and rehabilitate the people
inside.
MEK denies medical
treatment to residents
One of the issues over which the MEK invented a
false human rights crisis for Western consumption
after the Iraqis took over the camp was access to
medical treatment.
As more and more members succumbed to serious and
life-threatening illnesses the MEK leader was faced
with a problem. If he allowed the member to be
transferred to a suitable Iraqi hospital for
specialist treatment the member would be outside the
jurisdiction of the cult. Rajavi knows that members
who are not subjected to ongoing indoctrination,
especially at a moment in their lives when they are
more vulnerable to ‘changing their minds’, will
after even a short time begin to question and doubt
the path of their lives and that as this critical
thinking returns this will more than likely allow
them to slip away from the cult and regain their
lives.
For this reason the MEK insisted that any sick
person must be accompanied by at least one other
loyal cult member. These minders were to be sent as
a kind of mobile indoctrinator.
As well as the security concerns of allowing MEK
outside the camp, the Iraqis knew full well why the
MEK wanted to send these minders and refused. They
argued that there are many Farsi speaking Iraqi
medical staff working in Iraq’s hospitals who would
be available for translation in a medical
environment. The MEK of course lobbied Western
parliaments on the grounds that the Iraqis were
refusing them medical treatment when in fact this
was not the case. The MEK were trying to dictate
unreasonable terms. In this way they denied many
Camp Ashraf residents from accessing treatment.
Several have died as a result who could have been
saved.
In March 2010, MEK leaders had denied a delegation
from the Iraqi Ministry of Human Rights access to
the inhabitants of the camp. Surprisingly, given the
unusually inflated degree of interest in Camp Ashraf
among members of the European Parliament, other
national European parliaments, and human rights
bodies like Amnesty International, this denial did
give rise to protest or parliamentary questions;
concerns were not raised over what may be going on
inside the camp.
Over the autumn of 2010 the Iraqis were aware that
three people had died as a result of not receiving
early medical attention because the MEK refused them
access to proper medical care. One more person was
murdered by hanging (the MEK explained this as a
suicide in protest at the families coming to visit
them). After further enquiries, the campaign group
Iran-Interlink was made privy to information that
the cult leader was now prepared to kill or force
the terminally sick people to commit suicide in
order to put the blame on the Iraqi authorities.
Iraqi demonstrations
and police activity at the camp
Throughout 2010-11 peaceful demonstrations by Iraqis
demanding the MEK’s removal from Iraq and in support
of the demand of the families to see their relatives
took place on a frequent basis. The MEK response was
invariably to initiate violent resistance – hurling
rocks and other missiles at demonstrators - and to
attempt to incite a violent response in the external
groups whoever they may be. But while Iraqi media
gave widespread coverage to these events, Western
media did not find it interesting or newsworthy that
local Iraqi citizens despise the MEK, nor that their
peaceful demonstrations outside the camp were met
with violence by the MEK. It is unsurprising then
that Western politicians could be fooled into
believing that the situation at the camp was a
simple case of the Iraqi authorities violating the
human rights of the residents.
In the autumn of 2010 Iraqi police received
information about criminal activities taking place
inside Camp Ashraf. When the police arrived at the
camp to investigate, the MEK leaders refused to
allow them access and started fighting with them
using batons and knives to prevent the security
officers from discharging their functions. At the
same time some MEK loyalists were seen to be
deliberately injuring themselves only later to
accuse the Iraqi police of using heavy handed
tactics.
Events of April 8 2011
Since January 2009 the GOI had attempted, in vain,
to bring the residents of Camp Ashraf in line with
Iraqi and international law. One of the issues which
arose during this period was that of land ownership.
Camp Ashraf had been built on land illegally
confiscated by Saddam Hussein from local tribes and
farmers on which he built his own military base
Khalis garrison. He later gifted the camp to Massoud
Rajavi, who renamed it Camp Ashraf, to use as a base
for his fighters. In addition, over the years the
MEK also unlawfully expanded its camp to occupy
farmland to the north of the camp.
Since 2005 the Iraqi Judiciary had worked hard to
adjudicate on such land disputes all over the
country and in the case of the land occupied by Camp
Ashraf, at least some of the original owners were
able to provide documentary proof that they were the
rightful owners. This made it imperative on the GOI
to return this land to them.
The GOI tasked the military to take action to
reclaim a 20 km square portion of this land (the
total land mass of Camp Ashraf was 51 km sq.). The
area to be taken lay to the north of the camp from
where a road identified as Road 100 (the main
boulevard of the camp) runs east to west.
There were conflicting reports as to what happened
next. Iran-Interlink enquired of various official
and non-official sources, including non governmental
observers at the camp who witnessed the activities.
On April 3, the Fifth Division in Diyala replaced
the Ninth Division which had been protecting Camp
Ashraf. At the same time the MEK leaders were
informed and served with legal notices to say that
the Iraqi military would shortly be reclaiming the
swathe of land situated to the north of Road 100 in
order to restore it to its rightful owners. Although
the MEK appeared to agree to this at the time, they
immediately began a public relations campaign in the
West to claim that the Iraqi military had invaded
Camp Ashraf. "The forces of Iraq's Fifth Division
invaded Camp Ashraf with columns of armoured
vehicles, occupying areas inside the camp, since
midnight on Saturday," claimed an MEK public
relations statement.
Brigadier Tarek Azzawi, chief of military operations
at the camp explained to an AFP reporter, "It's a
replacement of forces, not a new deployment."
"The Fifth Division in Diyala has replaced the Ninth
Division that protects Ashraf, and we have not
advanced even one metre," he said. "There were no
clashes," he added.
An MEK spokesman reported that 40 to 50 uniformed US
troops arrived at Camp Ashraf on April 2 and
departed on the afternoon of April 7.
Speaking several weeks after the events, a US
military spokesman, Colonel Barry Johnson said in an
interview with the Miami Herald that the American
soldiers had been sent to Camp Ashraf to “assist a
new Iraqi army unit that was rotating into the area
to replace another unit. When they left April 7,
"there were no major concerns about the capability
of the new Iraqi Army unit to assume the mission,”
he said”. The Colonel told the newspaper, “The US
units were not aware of any impending Iraqi
operation at the camp.”
On April 8, having served legal notice, Iraqi
military personnel arrived at the camp with
bulldozers and other heavy vehicles in order to
break through the barbed wire perimeter fence which
had been reinforced by the MEK. They would then
break through the three metre high earth banks -
which the MEK had erected to prevent escapes and to
prevent anyone seeing into the camp. The MEK of
course had been forewarned of this operation and as
such had been given the opportunity to move whatever
they had from the area into the remaining section of
the camp – a further thirty square kilometres.
As the Iraqis approached the camp perimeter and
began to dismantle it, two MEK came forward and set
themselves on fire in front of the Iraqi soldiers.
Inside the camp, a crowd had been assembled whose
task was to shout slogans and make as much noise as
possible, taunting the Iraqis with insults and
threats.
From behind the earthworks MEK specially trained and
organised forces erupted and began to throw metal
missiles and to catapult smaller ones at the
soldiers as they began their task of breaking down
the fence. Other offensive weaponry wielded by the
unarmed MEK involved included clubs and knives.
Molotov cocktails were used to set fire to the Iraqi
military buildings and vehicles at the compound
nearby. The MEK were wearing different coloured
protective headgear and were coordinated to operate
in various locations using an assortment of weapons.
According to a former member who had recently
escaped the camp, this type of offensive
‘resistance’ activity had been planned and practiced
by the MEK for years in advance.
The MEK activity was intended to prevent the
military from doing their work. However, the
military had been ordered to complete this task and
did not have orders to retreat from the scene. One
commander explained that they had given legal notice
of their intention several days previously which as
far as they were concerned had been accepted and
they had not therefore anticipated this reaction. An
order was given to shoot at the legs of the
protestors in order to regain control of the scene.
Several individuals were shot during this activity.
Some of the soldiers drove military diggers at the
crowd to try to disperse them. Several MEK were
crushed under these vehicles. During this incident
tens of Iraqi soldiers were also injured, some
seriously and had to be evacuated from the scene.
At the end of the operation, the Iraqi military had
taken the land and driven the MEK back into the
remainder of the camp. Over the next two days, they
established a new fence along the perimeter just
north of Road 100. The MEK moved residents out of
the buildings close to the new perimeter fence and
re-housed them out of sight and earshot of
activities outside the camp.
Aftermath of the April
8 operation
As usual because of the absence of official third
party observers on the ground during the event,
there has been little independent verification about
what really happened at the camp. In the following
days, the United Nations announced that 34 MEK died
during the incident. The MEK verified this figure –
subsequently increased to 35. Investigators for the
United Nations said that most of the dead were shot,
though an unspecified number were crushed to death
when Iraqi troops and armoured personnel carriers
moved into the camp. According to the ICRC
representative in Baghdad, some of the injured MEK
were taken to hospital in Baquba. Six were arrested
and taken to Khalis police station where they were
visited by the ICRC. The MEK, as before, produced
their own films of the event which were distributed
and broadcast with no critical qualification (for
example, that this was the view of only one side of
those involved in the incident). Calls came from all
quarters for an independent enquiry. The GOI
remained tight lipped about the event, preferring to
launch its own investigation before answering
external enquiries.
One eyewitness – a former member who was a bystander
at the scene - said that only two people (a brother
and sister) from the higher ranks were injured. They
were shot in their legs, which appeared to be
self-inflicted; that is, they deliberately shot
themselves. All the other victims among the dead and
injured came from the lower ranks. According to
Iraqi officials some individuals were killed by the
MEK as they tried to run away from the camp during
the violence. Some were killed as they were forced
to rush the Iraqi posts throwing petrol bombs and
pre-fabricated missiles.
The bodies of most of the victims – the ones who did
not die in hospital in Baquba - were kept inside the
camp by the MEK and neither their families nor any
Iraqi agencies were given access to them. Iraqi
coroners were not able to carry out post mortem
examinations on the bodies to determine the actual
cause of death. On April 10 the MEK invited an
American team comprising civilian and military
personnel into the camp to perform forensic
examinations on 28 of the victims and interview some
of the wounded. The Americans transferred some of
the injured to their facilities for medical
treatment. The Iraqi authorities were not involved
in or consulted about any of these activities. This
was a private agreement between the MEK and the US
military. (Unofficial observers stationed at the
camp perimeter report that the US military runs
daily helicopter sorties over the camp, and they
believe make regular landings inside the camp out of
sight of the Iraqi military.)
A
deplorable state of affairs reigned over the fate of
the dead as the MEK now prepared to play their
political games using the bodies as bargaining
tools.
Since the MEK’s cemetery now lay in the part of land
which had been reclaimed by the Iraqis it was
assumed that the dead would be buried according to
normal Muslim practice within a short time inside
the camp. Rajavi, the MEK leader, pronounced through
his interlocutors that the MEK would only bury the
dead in their own cemetery and only on condition
that the land which had been seized be given back to
them and that the Iraqis did not conduct further
investigations. This was a demand the Iraqi
government found impossible to even consider as it
would contravene its own laws. In any case, after a
cursory search of the reclaimed land, some unmarked
graves had been found in the MEK cemetery which
needed investigation. As well as this, caches of
arms and ammunition had already been discovered in
the cemetery and in other locations.
The Iraqi authorities were petitioned by relatives
of the dead, some of whom were among the families
who had been encamped outside the camp for the past
fourteen months. In response to appeals by these
families for humanitarian consideration, the Iraqis
agreed to allow the MEK to bury the bodies in the
original MEK cemetery. But the issue of returning
the land was not open to negotiation.
In turn the MEK rejected this concession because the
Iraqi government had stipulated that fewer than 200
MEK members attend the burials. This is because both
the government and the MEK knew that the MEK was
using this (having large numbers attend the
funerals) as an excuse to occupy the land and then
refuse to leave. They would thereby create yet
another incident in which they could shed more blood
and divert attention from the real problem which is
that they have been holding hostage thousands of
people without any contact with the outside world.
The MEK demanded that their supporters in the
European Parliament, Struan Stevenson and Alejo
Vidal Quadras as well as their supporters in the
British House of Lords, Lord Corbett and others, be
brought to Iraq for the funerals. The idea was that
they would be taken inside the MEK controlled part
of Camp Ashraf without any Iraqi oversight and the
funerals would take place as a publicity stunt for
the MEK.
The Iraqi authorities again reiterated that the
funerals could take place in the MEK cemetery with
no more than 200 MEK present. If any foreign visitor
should attend they would also be required to abide
by Iraqi law which meant that they would not be
allowed to enter Camp Ashraf without an Iraqi
security escort.
Typically the MEK and its supporters in these
Western parliaments depicted a false picture of the
crisis over the dead bodies. The MEK published
photographs of elderly Iranian women in Paris
holding pictures of the dead people with the
headlines ‘Iraqi army bars burials’. None of the
women in the pictures was a relative of the dead
people. It was a propaganda move. The message given
was that it was Iraqis who would not allow the
funerals. This was simply not the case. The MEK used
the bodies as bargaining tools, issuing impossible
demands to drag the issue out as long as possible.
They had no concern for the real families of the
victims or the rotting bodies in the camp. The MEK’s
aim was to maintain their image as victims of Iraqi
cruelty. It was also to detract attention from the
allegations that at least some of the dead were
killed by the MEK themselves as had happened in the
clashes in July 2009. The standoff also detracted
from demands by the families for independent
agencies to enter the camp and rescue their loved
ones. More than anything, MEK loyalists would parade
the ordinary camp residents past the bodies and use
them as evidence to reinforce the cult message that
the Iraqis would kill them if they tried to leave.
Several of the families of the victims lodged
official complaints with the Iraqi Judiciary and
demanded the forcible return of their loved ones to
them. As the next of kin, they argued, they had
priority rights over the bodies of their relatives.
To date no bodies have been returned to the next of
kin.
(Interestingly, the MEK’s advocates in Western
parliaments have now moved on from the issues of the
lost land and the MEK’s refusal to bury the dead,
and are again concerned with the presence of the
families at the camp perimeter.)
Investigations
The Iraqi military immediately began a process of
critically examining its own response to this
violent incident in order to develop and implement
any changes needed as a result. No doubt the
security agencies from any one of the European
countries which had recently experienced violent
riots in their own capital cities over the recent
economic crisis would have been happy to share with
the Iraqis the findings and recommendations of their
own enquiries had they been consulted. Regarding the
incident as extremely regrettable, the Iraqis were
however, confident of their ability to conduct their
own enquiry.
With violence erupting in various countries in the
Middle East and North Africa, the events at Camp
Ashraf would not normally have elicited much
interest in the West. But, the MEK’s backers in
Europe, wary of Iraq’s increasing economic and
social ties with Iran, took this opportunity to
launch a political attack on the Iraqi government.
They inflated the importance of Camp Ashraf to the
level of an international crisis. Their tactics
involved what amounted to political bullying and
their accusations were at times ludicrous (American
circuit speakers sat on MEK organised press
conference panels and with straight faces referred
to the event as a “massacre” or even “genocide”).
The result was that various parties which found it
in their own interests to condemn the Iraqi
government, including some human rights
organisations, and others who were simply too lazy
to investigate the issue further, were vociferous in
their demands that the Iraqi army be investigated.
But, the issue was not that simple or
straightforward. The incident had not been one
sided. More sophisticated people, while condemning
the killings, began to look more deeply into the
event and, taking into account the nature, the
history and the behaviour of the other party to this
incident, came up with a different view. Twelve
members of the European Parliament from five
political groups addressed a letter to their
colleagues pointing out that, “The group has
developed a very strong lobby in the European
Parliament over the last couple of years claiming to
be the only serious Iranian opposition group”. The
letter continued:
“While the main
responsibility for the incident seems to be with the
Iraqi security forces, they have so far only
acknowledged responsibility for the death of three
inmates. We therefore fully support the call of the
High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay for
an independent investigation into the incident.
“This unacceptable
blood shed should not, however, distract us from an
objective and level headed analysis of the track
record of the PMOI [MEK]. We urge all members to
seriously consider the history, actions and
behaviour of the PMOI before signing any
declarations or letters of support in favour of this
group in the future. Their method is very simple:
they mobilise MEPs justified outrage at the nuclear
issue, the human rights violations and the very
character of the Iranian regime, but
instrumentalised [sic] such opinion for a different
purpose – the political legitimation [sic] of the
Mujahedin organisation itself.
“Surprisingly, the
allegations of massive human rights violations
inside the Mujahedin organisation are never [the]
subject of debate. According to overwhelming
evidence the former militant group has turned into a
repressive sect far removed from the respectable
image the representatives of this group display when
visiting the European Parliament. The human rights
violations the leaders are committing against the
group’s members are amply documented, starting with
Human Rights Watch (HRW) and many witness reports of
ex-members who were able to flee (including
testimonies in the European Parliament).”
The letter went some way to viewing the incident
objectively.
Right minded observers acknowledged that this was an
internal issue for the Government of Iraq to deal
with, and in any case, an investigation would need
to look at the conduct of the Iraqi military and
riot police in a countrywide context rather than
being generalised from one isolated incident.
Above all it was acknowledged that the role of the
Iraqi military remained indispensable for both
protecting the individuals inside the camp from
danger and preventing the leaders from launching
attacks on outsiders who need to enter the camp to
perform the various duties needed to deal with the
camp’s residents. This is a role which they took
over from the Americans. They did not invent the
role nor did they change its character.
A unique dimension
The MEK control of Camp Ashraf and over the lives of
the residents being held hostage there does not,
however, present a normal situation. This is a
unique situation with its own dynamics and it will
require a radically different approach to find a
peaceful and effective resolution to the problem.
The phenomenon which is being dealt with here is
that of a dangerous, destructive cult rather than a
political or military group. The basic problem from
the start was that neither the American army nor the
Iraqi army was prepared in any sense to deal with
this type of group. In 2003 the US army was met by
“leaders who were fluent in English and who took
pains to establish ties with the United States by
claiming – falsely, as it turned out – that a large
portion of the group had advanced degrees from
American universities and family members resident in
the United States”. (RAND, August 2009) Because the
army was not informed about or able to deal with a
violent cult, they were persuaded on the ground by
the deceptive and manipulative methods of the MEK
leaders. Instead of demanding the surrender of an
enemy target, they entered without authority into a
cease-fire situation instead. Basically they were
duped by the MEK, which continued to call the shots
right up to 2009.
In the same way, the Iraqi army was unprepared and
unqualified to deal with the cult inspired behaviour
of the MEK. In this case, the MEK knew they would
never be able to persuade the Iraqis to allow them
to remain in Iraq. Instead of schmoozing them, they
maintained at best a hostile intransigence, and when
it suited them they did what they could to provoke a
violent reaction. Faced with what was suicidal
violence, the Iraqi army did not have the knowledge
or experience to take the sophisticated decisions
needed to control the group.
Experts in the MEK and in cult behaviour are clear
that it is not the role of the army or the police to
deal with this group. Lessons should be taken from
the 1993 standoff at the Waco ranch when police
ignored the advice of cult experts and the
confrontation ended in the mass deaths of the ranch
residents.
Key difficulties
At this stage there are two main impediments to
moving forward on this issue.
One is the deliberate smokescreen of obfuscation,
lies and deception created by the MEK itself in
relation to the camp in order to distract from the
central issue. This is accompanied by complete
intransigence in terms of accepting any alteration
to the situation of the residents of Camp Ashraf.
From the time of Iran-Interlink’s last report in
August 2009 negotiations with the MEK leaders have
yielded no progress whatsoever. Clearly this is not
a way forward.
The other difficulty is that no external body has
independent access to the interior of the camp to
either investigate or help in the camp. This is a
vital point. The MEK will currently only allow
access into the camp to agencies – including its own
political supporters - which accept MEK oversight
and control over whom they meet and where they
visit. This is not a tenable situation from which to
investigate allegations of human rights abuses and
false imprisonment of residents.
It is this second difficulty which must become the
focus for action. Only when investigative missions
are able to get inside the camp, and gain free
access to all its residents without interference by
the MEK leaders, will the first impediment be swept
aside allowing all relevant agencies to deal with
the facts on the ground rather than grappling with
propaganda and political pressure.
The problem is how to break the deadlock with the
MEK on one side refusing to even admit anyone into
the camp, and Iraq and external bodies on the other
side trying to find a peaceful and effective way to
remove the residents of Camp Ashraf.
The key difficulty attending any approach is that
the MEK loyalists will continue to resist and try to
provoke violence in order to prevent any
interference in the internal affairs of the camp.
In this respect, one particular issue which
overrides all others (political, social,
humanitarian) in dealing with the MEK is what can be
referred to as the fear factor. This is what makes
external agencies afraid to interfere in any
meaningful way. Put simply, the MEK has threatened
the mass suicide of the residents should anybody
interfere in the internal affairs of the camp. This
is a real threat and cannot be treated lightly –
European capitals witnessed a handful of public MEK
self-immolations in July 2003 which killed two and
permanently disabled and disfigured the others. But
it is necessary to assess how realistic this threat
is and work out how to avoid such a potential
outcome. It is clear from the MEK reaction to Iraqi
soldiers that MEK loyalists are prepared to launch
suicidal violence to repel such interference. It is
not clear however how many of the other residents
might be involved. An understanding of this fear
factor and how it artificially influences approaches
to the MEK is integral to finding an effective
solution.
Finding a baseline
from which to move forward
While various external bodies, prompted by MEK
lobbying, have called for an independent
investigation into the events of April 8, this will
not move the issue forward or help the Iraqi
government to deal with the problem – the hidden
agenda here is to focus blame on the Iraqi
authorities and obfuscate on the realities inside
Camp Ashraf.
But there are facts which, when taken into
consideration, will form a baseline from which a
plan can be developed. Indeed, perhaps the most
useful way to approach this problem for everyone
involved is to start with the desired outcome – the
MEK as a foreign terrorist group leave Iraq. From
this point it is possible to identify the steps
needed to achieve this goal.
An initial approach would be to first identify what
exactly is meant by the Mojahedin-e Khalq
organisation as it exists at Camp Ashraf. For the
GOI the MEK represents the last remnants of the
former Saddam regime which in addition to being
culpable for horrific crimes against the Iraqi
people over twenty years, is still being used to
interfere in the internal affairs of the country.
The Iraqis have every reason to demand the removal
of every last vestige of the MEK from Iraq.
For Western observers however, the issue is slightly
more complex. Duplicitous and misleading MEK
lobbying in the West, in particular concerning the
current existential threat to the continuation of
Camp Ashraf, has led to a completely false view of
the problem.
The fundamental error of external bodies is that
they have accepted at face value that the MEK as an
entity has a voice. It does not. That everyone in
the camp speaks with the same voice. They do not.
And, that this MEK voice represents the interests of
all the residents of the camp. It does not. When
American agencies ‘encourage’ the GOI to negotiate
with the MEK over this issue they completely miss
the point – because it is a cult, negotiations with
anyone from the MEK will only ever represent the
interests of one person, the cult leader Massoud
Rajavi.
In the recent violence of April 8, 2011, eye
witnesses have said that up to 200 members took
part. That is, 3200 members have not been directly
involved. Does this mean that Rajavi has been unable
to coerce them into defending him? Is it the case
that 3200 people therefore are unwilling to support
Rajavi? How many of the residents of Camp Ashraf are
willing and able to continue as members of a
terrorist group or as members of a mind control
cult?
The honest answer is that nobody really knows what
is happening inside Camp Ashraf.
The only reliable information we have are the
testimonies of the handful of residents who have
recently escaped and who can tell us about current
conditions in the camp. Interestingly, aside from
some new details, their stories tally in the
fundamental essentials with the testimonies of
thousands of former MEK members who have spoken out
over the years to expose severe human rights abuses
and violations inside the organisation which affect
every single member, even at the highest leadership
level.
The consistent theme of all the testimonies given by
those who have left the MEK is that the leader does
not represent their interests. The individuals
remaining in the camp are not there of their own
free will and are subject to daily psychological and
physical coercion to force them to remain there.
As irksome as this may be for the GOI therefore, it
is not possible to advocate for the wholesale
removal of the MEK from Iraq as a group. They must
not be treated as possessions. This is called
slavery and every concerned human rights group
should be alert to this situation and take an active
role in preventing the wholesale transfer of slaves
to another location where they will remain under the
ownership or hegemony of one man, Massoud Rajavi.
Recommended steps for
progressing removal of the camp’s residents
The first step toward resolving this issue is for
all the agencies involved - UNAMI, UNHCR, and others
– to gain free and unfettered access to every
resident of the camp. This will allow them to
conduct an investigation into the actual conditions
of their captivity and to ascertain any specific
individual needs which they may have, whether
medical or otherwise. This may or may not be
achieved through negotiation with the MEK leaders as
they are currently engaged. Certainly, external
agencies will need to be clear, concise and
uncompromising in their demand that the MEK leaders
give full access to the whole of the camp.
The proper framework for such an investigation is to
acknowledge that the MEK leaders will not be
truthful about the situation inside the camp and
cannot be relied upon to represent the interests of
the residents. Above all it must be acknowledged
that the MEK leaders do not have authority over the
residents except that gained through fear and
coercion and the leaders have not been elected or
appointed by the residents to represent them.
Indeed, the MEK leaders have a vested interest in
hiding many of the aspects of the situation inside
Camp Ashraf including the lack of basic human
rights, keeping people prisoner and disallowing
contact with the outside world.
In this context a leap of faith is required to
depart from all previous methods of confrontation
and containment. Untested an approach it may be, but
it will be essential for all the agencies involved
to take the advice of cult experts, particularly
experts on the MEK. The MEK has an armoury of
defensive tactics with which to prevent such
interference. The obvious one is to meet all
attempts to enter the camp with violent, suicidal
resistance. But the MEK system is also supremely
manipulative as the American army discovered in
2003. Certainly both MEK cult experts and recently
escaped residents will be needed to identify loyal
cult leaders and activists. These experts will also
be able to identify and challenge the MEK’s
manipulative techniques which would otherwise be
effective in deceiving less experienced agencies –
no matter how well meaning.
The agencies involved must also take into account
the experience and demands of the families of
current residents. It is these people who can speak
on behalf of the interests and needs of the 3400
individuals living there and not yield to the false
and distracting concepts of either protecting the
‘rights’ of an artificial entity (the MEK) or
submitting to the arbitrary dictates of its leader.
Once external agencies have been able to enter Camp
Ashraf, the first major task will be to separate
loyal MEK leaders from the rest of the residents.
Then it will be possible to establish from among the
remaining residents which are loyal to the MEK
leader Massoud Rajavi and separate these from the
residents who want to dissociate from the group.
There will also be several people who are subject to
arrest because they are under investigation by the
Iraqi Judiciary for crimes against humanity and war
crimes committed in Iraq.
Naturally at this stage it is reasonable to ask,
‘once the individuals are separated into various
types and separated from one another – presumably in
the same camp - what then is to be done with them?’
The simple answer would be that they must all be
given access to full information about their current
situation which will enable them to make informed
decisions about their individual futures. That means
facilitating contact with the outside world through
telephone, radio, television, print media and the
internet.
Individual residents should then be granted a
reasonable period of time to recover from the
pressure of the leaders and the effects of
indoctrination before being asked to determine their
next steps. After which a realistic and reasonable
set of alternative possibilities should be put
before them. For those who dissociate from the MEK
these options might include: remaining at the camp
or in Iraq as a refugee; voluntary repatriation to
Iran with the help of the ICRC, Iraqi human rights
ministry and Iranian embassy officials; transfer to
a third country as a political refugee.
But the cult experts will suggest an additional
dimension; perhaps more difficult to understand and
implement but ultimately the most effective way to
rescue the victims of this destructive cult. This
dimension is to introduce into the cult environment
– the physical, mental and emotional environment of
the cult member – exactly those elements which the
cult leader has taken extreme pains to deny them. In
the case of the MEK, in addition to access to
external information as mentioned above, the
restoration of normal emotional relations will have
a profound effect on these individuals.
It is not by random chance that Massoud Rajavi’s
reaction has revealed that the greatest enemy of the
MEK cult is not the Iraqi army or the Iranian regime
or even shifting political fortunes and
contingencies. As described above, the presence of
families of cult members immediately outside the
perimeter fence presents the greatest existential
threat to the continuation of his control over the
residents. MEK cult members are forbidden to be in
relationship with anybody except Massoud Rajavi.
They are forced through psychological coercion to
worship him – though the real emotion is fear of
course. The experience of countless former members
has shown that when genuinely loving alternative
relationships are available to them – particularly
the unconditional love of a parent and other close
family members - the cult victim very quickly snaps
out of their cult mentality and begins to regain
his/her critical faculties and the ability to begin
the process of recovery and reintegration into
normal society.
External agencies which have a genuine concern for
the individual residents of Camp Ashraf would be
advised to examine this advice and integrate it into
any rescue package they devise to resolve the crisis
at the camp.
Anne Singleton
addressing delegates at al-Mostanserieh University
Baghdad April 2011
Report written and
published by
Iran-Interlink
PO Box 148
Leeds LS16 5YJ
United Kingdom
Tel: +44 (0) 113 278 0503
Second Report on Camp Ashraf
and Mojahedin-e Khalq in Iraq
..
. The MKO
is currently demanding that U.S. Army or the U.N.
take control of Camp Ashraf from the GOI. Following
publication of the RAND Report it should be the duty
of the U.S. Army to help and facilitate in any way
possible the immediate closure of Camp Ashraf and
the removal of the MKO personnel from Iraq. The more
help given by the U.S. to achieve this, the more ...
Iran-Interlink.org
has published a second report on Camp Ashraf, Iraq
and the situation of Mojahedin-e Khalq (aka MKO, MEK)
cult members at the camp. After consultation with
the Government of Iraq, Massoud Khodabandeh has
described events since January 1, 2009.
According to the report, Iraq is determined to rid
itself of the foreign terrorist cult led by Massoud
and Maryam Rajavi as soon as possible, but is
hampered by western intransigence over where these
people should go.
The 3416 individuals inside Camp Ashraf have no
legal status in Iraq. They are not entitled to
'protected persons' status under the Fourth Geneva
Convention. Neither will they be granted political
refugee status by Iraq. Nor will Iraq forcibly
repatriate them. But, although the MKO has been
de-proscribed, at its own behest, as a terrorist
group in Europe, no western country is willing to
offer asylum to the individuals -- even though 1015
MKO members have a passport or residence permit of a
third country.
After months of fruitless negotiations with MKO
leaders -- with U.S. observation -- a police post
was established inside Camp Ashraf at the end of
July. In spite of violent resistance by the MKO
which led to 11 deaths, the camp residents are now
subject to Iraqi law. Following evidence that MKO
leaders were committing widespread and systematic
human rights abuses inside the camp, the Iraqi Human
Rights Ministry, in conjunction with international
humanitarian agencies, is now set to properly
monitor activity at the camp.
Massoud Khodabandeh made several recommendations in
his report. The Government of Iraq should remove
around seventy MKO leaders in order to protect the
rank and file members from human rights abuses and
coercion. The camp must be thoroughly searched --
something the U.S. Army failed to do since 2003.
Stressing that western governments bear a
responsibility toward the MKO's victims trapped
inside Camp Ashraf, Mr. Khodabandeh says that
western politicians must prevent further political
abuse of MKO members by the Rajavi leadership and
guarantee the rights of those individuals who
renounce violence and are willing to return to
society. European governments should work with Iraq
and the UN to find third countries to which other
individuals in Camp Ashraf can be transferred.
For more
information contact: Anne Singleton +44 (0) 113 278
0503
Contents:
Second Baghdad Report
Introduction
Government of Iraq Activity
Outline of Iraq’s demands in relation to the MKO
MKO Response
Government of Iraq dilemma
Government of Iraq tightens its control of Camp
Ashraf
July 28 and 29
Government of Iraq plans
The role of Sahar Family Foundation, Baghdad
Reaction of the MKO leaders and advocates
Conclusion
Second Baghdad Report
In February 2008 Massoud Khodabandeh reported his
findings following his visit to Iraq as consultant
to the Government of Iraq (GOI) on the issue of the
Mojahedin-e Khalq terrorist organisation (MKO) and
its headquarters, Camp Ashraf in Diyala province.
http://www.iran-interlink.org/?mod=view&id=4224
This second report is the result of a follow-up
consultation on the issue of Camp Ashraf since the
Government of Iraq (GOI) took over responsibility
for the base in January 2009 pursuant to the status
of forces agreement with the U.S.
Background information covering the period up to
January 2009 when the GOI took over responsibility
for Camp Ashraf and the Mojahedin-e Khalq
organization can be found at the following link:
Camp Ashraf Countdown http://www.iran-interlink.org/?mod=view&id=4330
Background information covering the period from
March 2003 to February 2009 when the U.S. Army was
responsible for Camp Ashraf and the Mojahedin-e
Khalq organization can be found in the RAND Report:
‘The Mujahedin-e Khalq in Iraq, A Policy Conundrum’
http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/MG871/
Introduction
Since December 2003 successive Iraqi governments
(from the first interim government to the present
elected government) have demanded that the American
Army close Camp Ashraf and remove the foreign
terrorist Mojahedin-e Khalq (MKO) militants which
U.S. forces had corralled inside it from their
country. The current situation therefore is not the
result of a new decision by the Government of Iraq.
It is based on the MKO’s historical enmity toward
the Iraqi people for two decades as part of the
suppressive apparatus of Saddam Hussein. The
Government of Iraq regards the MKO as a foreign
terrorist entity with the additional characteristic
that it is a dangerous, destructive cult. Reasons
why the U.S. Army failed to close Camp Ashraf are
detailed in the RAND report.
The following outlines the activities pursued by the
GOI and the MKO before July 28, 2009.
Government of Iraq Activity
After
the American Army handed over responsibility for
Camp Ashraf on January 1st this year pursuant to the
status of forces agreement (SOFA), the Government of
Iraq (GOI) put into effect several lines of action
toward removing the MKO and closing Camp Ashraf as a
fundamental aspect of taking full, sovereign control
of the country.
A joint committee was formed between various
governmental departments including the Defence and
Security Ministry, Interior Ministry and the Human
Rights Ministry. The Committee, headed by Iraq’s
National Security Advisor, Dr. Mowaffak al Rubaie,
drew up plans and coordinated activities on behalf
of the Government of Iraq led by Prime Minister
Nouri al Maliki and President Jalal Talabani. Dr. al
Rubaie developed a plan for the difficult task of
dismantling an extremist cult that adopts an
enlightened, humanitarian approach which could
become a blueprint for tackling similar
organizations worldwide.
Government officials held frequent negotiations with
the MKO with the observation of U.S. Army personnel.
(It should be noted that since the January 2009
handover a contingent of 25 American soldiers has
remained at Camp Ashraf in an observational role. To
date, they have not raised significant concerns
regarding the activities by the Iraqi authorities in
pursuit of this sovereign right to dismantle and
remove the MKO from the country.) The U.S. has been
involved at all times and at all levels, including
the US ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker.
Outline of Iraq’s demands in relation to the MKO
From January 1, 2009 the GOI’s primary, basic demand
was that the individuals resident in Camp Ashraf
obey Iraqi and international law. The MKO, in any
country they reside, regard themselves as ‘outside
the law’ of that country. The Iraqi Government
challenged this situation and has been completely
open about the process.
There are 3,416 people in Camp Ashraf, all
fingerprinted and eye-scanned. The GOI required that
all the residents at Camp Ashraf leave the country
within six months. The options made available to
them as individuals are that:
They could voluntarily repatriate to Iran under the
supervision of the ICRC and the Iraqi human rights
ministry. Since 2003 under an amnesty granted by the
Iranian government, over 250 individuals from Camp
Ashraf have successfully been voluntarily
repatriated.
They could find a third country to relocate to. It
is known that 1015 MKO members have a passport or
residence permit of a third country and can leave
Iraq for these countries.
If these options could not be fulfilled in a short
timescale then the GOI would remove the MKO from
Camp Ashraf and re-locate them in the far west of
the country for their security.
The GOI made it clear that political refugee status
will not be granted to any member of the MKO in
Iraq.
From December 2008, the GOI began negotiations with
western diplomats in Baghdad in an effort to find
third countries to which the MKO individuals could
be transferred. Although these western governments
were quick to demand that Iraq should not force any
of the MKO back to Iran, none were willing to accept
them in their own countries. When, on January 26 the
MKO was removed from the EU terrorism list, it
seemed there was a fresh opportunity to provide an
exit route for MKO members. Unfortunately, Western
governments have not been cooperative in offering
refuge to the individuals who must leave Iraq for
somewhere.
MKO Response
In
response to GOI efforts to negotiate a positive and
peaceful outcome, the MKO leaders showed not only
absolute intransigence - they failed to make any
concessions at all during the six months of
negotiations – but stalled the negotiations by
repeating their impossible demands of the Iraqi
government.
The MKO leaders have, throughout, continued to
claim, falsely, that they are protected persons
under the Fourth Geneva Convention, although there
can be no doubt that the Geneva Convention referred
to has not applied since June 2005: http://www.parliament.uk/commons/lib/research/briefings/SNIA-05022.pdf).
The MKO leaders demanded that the U.S. is obliged
under the terms of the Geneva Convention to continue
to protect them. The MKO leaders demand that they
remain in the camp as a group, claiming, again
falsely, that they have the right to residence in
the camp and in Iraq.
The MKO leaders have refused consistently to allow
any Iraqi (or U.S.) authorities inside the camp. On
April 7 it was reported that the MKO leaders refused
to allow a group affiliated to the Iraqi ministry of
human rights to access the residents of Camp Ashraf.
The MKO leaders refuse to allow access to individual
members for interview or to allow anyone to leave
voluntarily.
The MKO leaders continue to demand that the MKO be
kept intact as a military/terrorist organisation
inside the camp.
Government of Iraq dilemma
Hampered by this intransigence, the GOI was faced
with a dilemma. The evidence points to a situation
in which the top leaders of the MKO, Massoud and
Maryam Rajavi, continue to preside over a situation
inside Camp Ashraf in which the individual members
are subjected to a harsh and unremitting regime
involving daily violations of their basic human
rights.
Dr. al Rubaie described the MKO as "an indoctrinated
and tightly disciplined organization of extremist
zealots who have employed terrorism and at times
even self-immolation to secure their aims. In normal
everyday language we can say that they have been
‘brainwashed’".
It has been a fundamental aspect of the Iraqi
approach to ending the MKO’s presence in the country
that, in the words of Dr. al Rubaie, "The Government
of Iraq does not deal with the MKO as an
organization. We deal with the residents as
individuals."
Any implication that Iraq has made this assessment
of the MKO in isolation is wrong. An article in The
Economist (April 8, 2009) stated: “the PMOI is
widely reviled by human-rights groups for nurturing
a messianic cult of personality around Mr Rajavi and
his wife, Maryam, and for enforcing a totalitarian
discipline on its adherents. Several defectors
testify, in the words of one of them, to a “constant
bombardment of indoctrination” and a requirement to
submit utterly and unquestioningly to the cause. No
sources of news are allowed without the PMOI’s [MKO’s]
say-so.”
It is clear that in relation to human rights
violations of the individuals living inside Camp
Ashraf, it is the MKO leaders who have proven to be
the perpetrators. The MKO leaders have also been
actively obstructive, indeed provocative, toward
those wishing to investigate and alleviate this
suffering.
Since January 1, several MKO members have escaped
Camp Ashraf. Their testimonies point to a
deterioration in the human rights situation in the
camp.
Under observation by the ICRC and the Iraqi Ministry
of Human Rights, Dr. al Rubaie has focused efforts
to protect the individuals inside the camp following
allegations that human rights abuses are being
perpetrated by MKO leaders against the residents. To
this end he has said, "We believe that if we can
separate individuals from the all-encompassing
domination by their leaders, we can allow them to
begin to exercise their rights as individuals and
make appropriate choices. That is, we hope to remove
them from the toxic effects of their indoctrination
and leaders."
In response to the many obstacles thrown up by the
MKO to their removal from Camp Ashraf, Dr. al Rubaie
said, "The Iraqi Army unit posted to defend and
secure Camp Ashraf has exercised patience and
extreme restraint in spite of the staged
provocations and demonstrations that Ashraf's
self-appointed leaders have launched in defiance of
the legitimate exercise by the Government of Iraq of
its sovereignty." He added, "Ashraf is not above the
law".
Government of Iraq tightens
its control of Camp Ashraf
The
Iraqi government has given guarantees that none of
the captives will be forced to return to Iran
against their wishes. By March, in order to move
forward on this issue and establish a police post
inside Camp Ashraf, Iraqi military and police
personnel increased their control over the camp by
limiting the access and the flow of people and
goods. Only authorised personnel were allowed to
leave and enter the camp and all goods except food
and medical supplies were stopped, including
building materials such as cement and metal. The MKO
leaders lobbied agencies and lawyers to claim that
the Iraqis were blocking food and medical supplies
to the camp and had effectively laid siege to the
camp. Unfortunately none of these experts visited
the camp and relied solely on information supplied
to them by the MKO when their statements were
issued. Iraqi officials were not interviewed by
these advocates of the MKO.
On June 9, Al-Arabiya TV (Dubai) reported the
following: "The Iranian opposition group, Mojahedin-e
Khalq, whose headquarters in Iraq are confined to
Camp Ashraf in Diyala Governorate, has reported that
the Iraqi Police's Rapid Response Forces tightened
their embargo on the camp's occupants and banned the
entry of goods and people to it. The Iraqi Committee
for the Defence of Camp Ashraf had issued a
statement denouncing the tightening of the noose
around the group by the Rapid Response Forces as
well as threats to the camp's occupants of murder
and arrest, warning of a possible humanitarian
disaster."
The channel interviewed Staff Major General
Abd-al-Karim Khalaf, chief of operations at the
Iraqi Interior Ministry, via telephone from Baghdad.
Asked if the government is planning to close down
Camp Ashraf, Staff Major General Khalaf says: "As an
Interior Ministry, we are responsible for certain
matters relating to the camp, such as providing
protection for the camp and securing its outer
perimeter; guaranteeing the entry of humanitarian
goods as stipulated by international agreements - a
matter that we handle in transparent fashion; and
ensuring that the camp's residents do not interact
with security forces, and all three of these
objectives are being met."
He adds: "Some of the security units were replaced -
the brothers dispatched by the Interior Ministry
left certain positions - and the Interior Ministry
is bound by the constitution to provide protection -
and is capable of doing so - but its work is
hampered by these people [the Mojahedin-e Khalq],
who are escalating the situation with certain
positions and statements and are providing wrong and
highly exaggerated accounts. Interior Ministry
personnel have not interacted with them at all, and
no siege has been laid around the camp. The camp has
certain outlets through which some humanitarian
goods and basic necessities are allowed to pass, and
they remain operational."
Commenting on the accusations made by the Committee
for the Defence of Camp Ashraf, the Major General
maintained that "there has been no interaction with
the camp's residents, and the protection forces are
stationed around the camp's perimeter, so how can
there be a tightening of the noose? How can the
noose be tightened when the camp has specific
outlets and when more than one party - not just the
Interior Ministry - are overseeing the camp? One of
these outlets is located near a Multinational Forces
position and these forces can see what is
happening."
Asked if "you have any political or military orders
to close the camp in the near future," Staff Major
General Khalaf says: "No, not at all." He reiterated
the role of the Interior Ministry in securing the
camp and regulating the flow of goods into it.
July 28 and 29
After
six months of fruitless negotiation, the GOI decided
on a course of action. In order to ensure that the
residents of Camp Ashraf were subject to Iraqi law
and establish the right to exercise control over
protecting their human rights, it was necessary to
establish a police presence inside the camp to
oversee activities there.
On July 28 the Iraqi Army undertook an operation to
enter Camp Ashraf with the intention of establishing
a police post inside the camp’s perimeter. The Iraqi
Army assessed the target as a foreign terrorist
group with cultic behaviour which had consistently
used violence in the past. It was understood that
the group had been disarmed by the U.S. Army and
therefore, in order to mitigate the risk of
excessive force being used to take control of the
camp the Iraqi riot police used in the operation did
not carry firearms.
The Iraqi Army called in riot police to deal with
the violent resistance that was put up by the camp’s
residents. The operation took place over two days.
Eleven members of the MKO were killed and around 200
injured. Police captain Firaz al-Atbi from the
Diyala province police force reported that about 60
members of Iraq's security forces were also injured,
20 seriously.
The MKO reaction was as violent as had been
expected, perhaps more so. The MKO’s own videos,
which were broadcast uncritically in western media,
show MKO women commanders in military uniform
directing the rank and file in violent attacks on
Iraqi personnel. Iraqi riot police are shown with
rope batons, harshly beating back the massed
protestors. Iraqi police officers reported that the
MKO were being directed to throw themselves under
the path of moving vehicles and that many of the
casualties and some of the MKO deaths resulted from
this type of activity. Police also reported MKO
members hitting their own heads on the tarmac to
create superficial head injuries.
On August 1, following the approval
of Iraq's government, a medical team from the US-led
Multinational Force-Iraq arrived at Camp Ashraf to
provide medical assistance to the injured MKO
members.
By August 2, the Iraqi police had
established a post inside the perimeter of Camp
Ashraf and renamed the camp as ‘Camp of New Iraq’
under the flag of Iraq. The Diyala province's Police
Chief Major General Abdulhussein al-Shimari issued a
statement that "members of the Mojahedin-e Khalq
Organization (MKO) at Camp of New Iraq have to
comply with the one-month time limit to leave Iraq.
The organization members should either return to
Iran or seek asylum in a third country”.
August 3, Abdul Nassir al-Mehdawi,
governor of Diyala province, which has jurisdiction
over Ashraf, confirmed that 36 MKO members had been
arrested the day after the clashes. "Their cases are
being investigated now. They are being charged with
inciting trouble," Mehdawi said. "We will deal with
them according to Iraqi law; we won't send them back
to Iran."
Also on August 3, a mass grave was
discovered inside the MKO camp. Diyala province
police officials said that the mass graves contained
the bodies of Kuwaiti nationals who had fallen
victim to the Ba'ath regime's seven month-long
invasion of Kuwait. “We have been informed that a
mass grave has been found in Camp Ashraf. Of course
we knew there was a graveyard in the MKO
headquarters, but we had thought that it was a place
of burial for MKO members,” said Abdulhussein al-Shemri,
a local police commander. Independent confirmation
of this report will expose MKO complicity in Saddam
Hussein's war on Kuwait, which killed more than
3,664 Iraqis and 1,000 Kuwaitis. MKO leaders are
said to have kept the mass grave a secret so far by
refusing the entry of Iraqi (and previously U.S.)
forces into their base.
Following the operation to set up a police post
inside Camp Ashraf, the MKO launched a propaganda
blitz in western media. This relied initially on the
uncritical dissemination of films shot by the MKO
leaders from inside Camp Ashraf which showed alleged
Iraqi brutality toward the MKO ‘victims’. In line
with typical MKO propaganda tactics, they
disseminated false reports that up to two hundred
MKO had been killed by Iraqi security forces.
The Iraqi security forces announced 11 deaths from
among the MKO members. These eleven were buried very
quickly inside the camp by the MKO without any
ceremonies. Iraqi authorities were refused access to
the bodies in order to carry out post mortem
examinations. This is contrary to the normal MKO
custom of holding elaborate military ceremonies
headed by leading members to bury their martyrs.
From information gathered from various sources it
can be ascertained that of the eleven dead two had
been shot in the back. The Iraqi army and police are
clear that they did not fire any bullets during the
operation. They believe that the dead must have been
shot by the MKO themselves. On July 29, General Ray
Odierno, commander of the Multi-National Force in
Iraq said that while he had not been apprised of the
decision to launch the raid, he could confirm that
the Iraqis used "non-lethal force."
The Iraqi police say that five of the dead were
among those who deliberately threw themselves under
Iraqi vehicles during the operation to enter the
camp. There are also unconfirmed allegations that
other victims bore injuries consistent with falling
from high buildings.
Iraq's Human Rights Minister, Ms Wijdan Michael,
believes that at least some of those killed are from
among those people known to have problems with
remaining with the MKO. Among the dead was Mr.
Mohammad Reza Bakhtiari. He is known to have
attempted to escape from the camp on two occasions.
Both times he was ‘arrested’ and prevented from
escape by the MKO leaders.
During the entry to the camp tens of Iraqi police
officers were injured by MKO members throwing
hand-made bombs, stones and other missiles. Two of
them received serious injuries and were hospitalised
for some days.
The aim of the GOI was to establish a police station
inside the camp. This was negotiated with the MKO
leaders over two weeks, but they refused to
cooperate. The Iraqi Government concluded that there
was no other option but to start moving in
forcefully to fulfil its obligation to deal with the
terrorist cult. The GOI is clear about its mission
and while it is necessary to have a police station
inside the camp, every effort has been made to
respect the human rights of the people inside. In
fact according to the Human Rights Ministry of Iraq,
the police station is necessary to ensure respect
for the human rights of the residents.
Government of Iraq plans
Although a police post has been established inside
the camp, the Iraqi authorities have still not
gained access to every building. The MKO have
erected physical barriers around many of their
buildings inside Camp Ashraf and are resisting
inspections by the police.
The police have reported that the MKO place the
women in front and the men in the back. They regard
this as an attempt to present a ‘soft’ target in
order to manipulate police activity. The Iraqi
police are aware that, in line with Rajavi’s
ideological directives the leaders of the violent
activities at Camp Ashraf are women military
commanders.
Since the police post was established, the MKO
leaders have organised a sit down hunger strike
among the rank and file. From observation of this
activity, the police believe that they eat and drink
enough to keep them going for several months. But
the police are concerned that the leaders may kill
people and claim they have died in the hunger
strike.
The police say there is no doubt that the MKO
leaders have weapons in the camp. They are also
certain that there are other activities or entities
inside the camp that the MKO is very afraid of being
exposed. The police are adamant that they will
evacuate the MKO from the camp and get to the bottom
of this. This is to be done shortly.
The Government of Iraq has good reason to be angry
with the US embassy and military which are in many
ways actively supporting the MKO. One of the most
recent escapees from the camp has produced evidence
that after he handed himself over to the Iraqi
police and asked them to remove him from the camp,
US army personnel intervened, arrested him and took
him to some MKO leaders. These MKO leaders tried to
persuade and intimidate him to stay, but when he
refused they were forced to hand him back again to
the Iraqi police, who were finally able to take him
to safety in Baghdad.
The role of Sahar Family
Foundation, Baghdad
In
2008 the U.S. Army closed its temporary internment
and protection facility (TIPF) for MKO members who
asked to leave the group. This resulted in dispersal
of those who rejected MKO membership and had escaped
from Camp Ashraf. After consultation with Massoud
Khodabandeh and Batoul Soltani (a former member of
the MKO’s Leadership Council who had also taken
refuge at the TIPF), the GOI agreed to the interim
measure of creating Sahar Family Foundation, an NGO,
with the remit to provide temporary help to those
who wished to escape Camp Ashraf.
Ms Soltani remained in Iraq as the director of Sahar
Family Foundation and successfully aided the former
residents of the TIPF. Some were voluntarily
repatriated, a few remained in the Kurdish Regional
Governorate where the American Army had moved them,
and the rest were brought to Europe to establish
claims as political refugees.
Sahar Family Foundation is now in consultation with
the Human Rights Minister in relation to the people
in Camp Ashraf as well as those who have already
escaped since January 1. Sahar Family Foundation is
expected to work with the GOI to establish a
separate camp for the people who request to leave
the MKO. Sahar Family Foundation is also expected to
work with Nejat NGO in Iran to bring the families of
these people to the camp and will try to find
solutions for individuals. The Iraqi government will
help in this endeavour.
Reaction of the MKO leaders
and advocates
The
MKO’s western propaganda system includes Lord
Corbett's system in the UK, Raymond Tanter's system
in the U.S., Alejo Vidal-Quadras’s system in the EU
and U.S. Congresswoman Ros-Lehtinen ( http://ros-lehtinen.house.gov/).
In Middle East circles it is widely believed that
Congresswoman Ros-Lehtinen is the orchestrator on
behalf of AIPAC. She is also believed to be the
person co-ordinating payment to the MKO through
various channels (including the Lord Corbett
system). She is originally from Cuba and it is
believed that she uses the expertise of anti-Cuba
consultants and PR agencies in support of the MKO.
A major setback for the MKO propaganda system
following the July 28/29 Iraqi police operation has
been that it took place just as parliaments were
closing for the summer vacation. This limited their
ability to disseminate misleading information in
order to elicit support and indeed to garner any
parliamentary support. Undaunted, Rajavi’s
propaganda system was successful in having western
broadcast media give uncritical airings to the MKO’s
own footage of the event as filmed from inside Camp
Ashraf. The films as shown only superficially
described what had transpired at the camp.
However, the exaggerated figures of dead and injured
did not rouse the censure of western political
figures. Instead, the US Administration in
particular emphasised that this was an internal
matter for the Iraqi government.
Several hunger strikes were therefore established by
the MKO leaders outside U.S. embassies in western
capitals. The problem they soon encountered is that
it took some weeks for parliaments and even media to
return from their summer vacations. The hunger
strikes have now been continuing for over six weeks
and yet there have been no evidence that anyone is
starving to death.
In response, Rajavi has ordered that the MKO members
in Camp Ashraf, who are far away from the critical
observation of the western media, continue the
hunger strike to their deaths. While it is possible
that this is another of Rajavi’s propaganda tactics,
it is also highly probable, based on past behaviour,
that they will kill one or two of the rank and file
members to put pressure on the Iraqi government and
the U.S. Administration.
There are some in the Government of Iraq who believe
the U.S. has a direct interest in prolonging
resistance to entering and searching Camp Ashraf.
The MKO camp has never been searched, even after
U.S. forces disarmed the MKO in 2003 (see the RAND
Report). There are serious questions about what
might be discovered if the Iraqi police are able to
get in to investigate the whole camp. Cognisant of
this dilemma, the GOI is willing to discuss this
aspect of its activities on the understanding that
the U.S. army accepts that the removal of MKO
personnel from the camp is inevitable.
The MKO has already begun to transfer its people and
resources to Britain and Sweden to prepare for the
collapse of the camp. The MKO believes that since
France and Germany have good trade links with Iran
they will not tolerate them as much as Britain (due
in main to the influence there of the Jackson
Society and AIPAC) and Sweden (due to the relaxed
laws that they have).
Conclusion
The
MKO is currently demanding that U.S. Army or the
U.N. take control of Camp Ashraf from the GOI.
Following publication of the RAND Report it should
be the duty of the U.S. Army to help and facilitate
in any way possible the immediate closure of Camp
Ashraf and the removal of the MKO personnel from
Iraq. The more help given by the U.S. to achieve
this, the more that amends will be made not only to
the Government of Iraq, but to the MKO members and
their families who have suffered needlessly for the
past six years due to the failure of the U.S. to
deal properly with this terrorist cult.
The GOI estimates that the MKO will remove at least
one thousand of its own personnel and bring them to
Europe – the preferred locations are the U.K. and
Sweden. About 1000 will return to Iran within a few
months and the rest will disappear during the first
year.
The MKO will bring their activities to the EU (the
financial, fraud and counterfeit departments will be
transferred to London). The UK or other countries
will not be in a position to prevent this.
The best outcome will be if the rank and file can be
helped to integrate into normal society. This means
that they first have to be separated from the cult
leaders for some time.
In consultation with the GOI I have put forward the
following steps.
The leading seventy MKO personnel should be detained
and separated from the rank and file cult members.
This will allow them to be relieved of the mental
pressures imposed by MKO leaders. If this is done,
the rank and file can be detoxified and reintegrated
back into society in a matter of a few months.
(Where possible, the U.S. Army should be kept out of
this process, but they should be given whatever they
want to take out of Camp Ashraf before starting the
plan.)
The GOI should arrange for individual, private
interviews and counselling to all of the residents
of the camp. The GOI should arrange for a thorough
search of the camp. It is already known that there
are weapons inside the camp in direct contravention
of the ceasefire agreement. It is known that there
are people buried inside the camp that are
unaccounted for, in particular a mass grave
allegedly containing Kuwaiti nationals has already
been found. It is known that the U.S. Army failed to
search the camp in 2003 even though there were
rumours of illegal activities and resources at the
camp.
Western governments and humanitarian agencies must
cooperate fully with the Iraqi authorities to help
restore basic human rights to the people trapped
inside Camp Ashraf. Any activities or resolutions
should reflect the realities on the ground and give
support to the humanitarian approach taken by the
Government of Iraq to resolve this difficult
problem. Parliamentary and/or humanitarian agency
fact-finding missions should apply directly to the
GOI to visit Camp Ashraf to verify such facts as
would influence their activities and/or statements.
The focus of western politicians must be to prevent
any further political abuse of Mojahedin-e Khalq
members in Camp Ashraf held captive by their
leaders, and guarantee the individual rights of
those who renounce violence and are willing to
return to society.
Any concerns raised in western parliaments should,
above all, reflect the responsibility of western
countries toward the victims of the Rajavi cult. In
particular, for individuals in Camp Ashraf with
residency or asylum rights in western countries,
provision should be made for their rapid transfer
back to these countries. European governments also
should work with the UNHCR to find third countries
to which other individuals in Camp Ashraf can be
transferred.
The GOI should facilitate the work of Sahar Family
Foundation to open a separate temporary camp as an
alternative to Camp Ashraf to which people can
physically escape and not be forced to continue as
members of a foreign terrorist group in Iraq against
their will. (Sahar Family Foundation has a list of
over 200 individuals who have expressed their desire
to leave the MKO but who have no alternative place
to go until their final destination is determined.)
The MKO should be required to allow free and
unfettered access to all of the individual residents
inside Camp Ashraf to the Iraqi authorities and to
official humanitarian investigative agencies.
The MKO should be required to allow free and
unfettered access to the immediate family members of
all the individual residents inside Camp Ashraf
without supervision by MKO operatives.
Mojahedin leaders, Massoud and Maryam Rajavi, and
other leading members who have escaped the camp
should be arrested and brought to justice through
international courts for war crimes and crimes
against humanity.
Massoud
Khodabandeh
Report written and published by
Iran-Interlink
PO Box 148
Leeds LS16 5BL United Kingdom
Tel: +44 (0) 113 278 0503
--------------
Report on the situation of remaining
members of Mojahedin Khalq Organisation in Camp
Ashraf after Consultation with Iraqi Government
officials
In January through February, Iran-Interlink
representative Massoud Khodabandeh was invited by
the Iraqi Government for a series of consultation
meetings on Camp Ashraf. His report has now been
published.
Camp Ashraf is home
to Forward Operating Base (FOB) Grizzly, but also
contains 3,400 foreign terrorist fighters from the
Iranian Mojahedin-e Khalq Organisation (MKO or MEK)
who were corralled and disarmed by US Special Forces
in 2003. The fighters have been under US military
police protection for five years and now the Iraqi
Government wants them removed from the country.
MKO leader Massoud Rajavi has told his group to stay
in Iraq at all costs until they can be re-armed, but
human rights organisations agree that Iraq is
extremely dangerous place for the Iranian group and
that any who do not wish to be voluntarily
repatriated must be taken to third countries as
refugees.
While in Baghdad, Massoud Khodabandeh met with
officials from Iraq's Ministries of Human Rights,
Defence, National Security as well as
non-governmental agencies to formulate a two part
solution. He reported Iraq's Ministry of Foreign
Affairs position that 'both the MKO and PKK are
foreign terrorist organisations. They are especially
harmful to the relations between Iraq and its
neighbouring countries at this point of time. Iraq
cannot accept nor afford further problems by
accommodating international terrorist organizations
whether as a group or as individuals.'
An interim plan was immediately agreed by Iraq's
Ministry of Human Rights to permit the establishment
of Sahar Family Foundation. Organised by former
members of the MKO and families of people still
trapped in the camp, Sahar now provides short-term
rescue facilities for ex-MKO who are no longer being
protected by US forces in Iraq before they are taken
to third countries.
SFF can be contacted directly in Iraq on Tel: +964 -
7808481650 (Arabic and Farsi), and outside Iraq at
Sahar, BM 2632, London WC1N 3XX, U.K., Tel: +44 -
2076935044 (English only).
In his conclusion to the report Mr Khodabandeh
outlined a longer term plan which will enable
western governments to protect the human rights of
the MKO members by taking the whole group out of
Iraq to safety.
In an interview with Alaraghieh television, Massoud
Khodabandeh said he fully endorsed "the right of the
Iraqi people to enjoy security and have justice
served against the perpetrators of violent acts in
their country…" In January the Criminal Court of
Baghdad issued additional arrest warrants for three
leading MKO members in Camp Ashraf. It is believed
that the handling of members of the foreign
terrorist group which American soldiers are
protecting will be a test of US-Iraqi relations over
the coming months.
The report can be obtained online at
www.iran-interlink.org or hard copy from editor@iran-interlink.org.
Introduction – What is the problem with Camp Ashraf?
Why the MKO must leave Iraq
What is Camp Ashraf
What is happening at TIPF
TIPF to close in six months
Humanitarian intervention
Consultation meetings
Results of consultation in Iraq
Families of MKO members
Sahar Family Foundation statement
Conclusion
.
Introduction – What is the problem with Camp Ashraf?
The Mojahedin-e
Khalq (MKO) came into existence in 1965 to conduct
armed opposition against the Shah of Iran. Among
those killed during its first armed campaign the
group were 6 American contractors in Iran. Most of
its members were imprisoned during the 1970s. After
the Shah was ousted in 1979, the MKO prisoners were
released and after initially supporting the
revolution for two years, then began to challenge
Ayatollah Khomeini for more power. This led to exile
first in France and subsequently in Iraq. Saddam
Hussein gave financial, military and logistical
support to the group and used it during his war with
Iran and then to suppress Kurdish and Shiite
uprisings in March 1991, thereby guaranteeing his
grip on power.
First welcomed in the early 1980s by western
governments for its opposition to the revolutionary
government of Iran, the MKO's violent and mercenary
behaviour, which led to thousands of civilian deaths
in Iran during its terrorist campaigns, led to its
proscription as a terrorist entity. Following a
report commissioned by the US State Department in
1994 the group was added to the US terror list in
1997. The UK proscribed the group in 2000, the EU in
2002, and Canada in 2005. In May 2005 Human Rights
Watch published a report titled ‘No Exit’ detailing
human rights abuses carried out by the organization
against its own members. The incarceration of
dissenters in Abu Ghraib prison was made possible by
the full integration of the MKO in Saddam Hussein’s
security apparatus; well before 1991 the MKO had
become Saddam’s private army.
In anticipation of the 2003 invasion of Iraq,
Massoud Rajavi told MKO combatants they would launch
an all-out attack on Iran. An operation announced as
‘the black phase’. Instead, he escaped into hiding
and in April 2003 agreed a ceasefire with US Special
Forces. By June, Rajavi submitted to the US demand
that his fighters completely disarm. All MKO members
in Iraq were corralled into Camp Ashraf and have
remained there since that time as prisoners under
the protection of US military police aided by a
Bulgarian unit.
The MKO remain at risk of revenge attacks by Iraqis.
In spite of this threat, Massoud Rajavi has insisted
that the active MKO members remain in uniform in
Camp Ashraf and has resisted all humanitarian
efforts to help them move or even to have members
with residence rights in western countries brought
to safety. Rajavi’s perverse insistence that the MKO
be treated only as a whole entity and not as
individuals and the fact that, ostensibly, the group
presented no trouble, discouraged the American army
from disturbing the status quo. American soldiers
continue to protect a group which its own State
Department has proscribed as a foreign terrorist
entity, but which some in the west regard as a
possible bargaining chip against Iran.
Currently, according to US figures, there are around
3,360 active MKO members remaining at Camp Ashraf in
Iraq's Diyali province. There are now 109 people in
the Temporary International Protection Facility (TIPF)
adjacent to Camp Ashraf who have left the MKO and
are seeking refugee status and removal to third
countries. Over 100 were turned out of TIPF in
December 2007 and have met with an uncertain
situation described later in this report. The US-led
MNF also says 380 former MKO have accepted voluntary
repatriation and have been helped by the ICRC and
Iraqi Ministry of Human Rights to return to their
families in Iran.
Now however, after five years, the Iraqi Government
is insistent that the MKO be removed in totality
from Iraqi territory. In spite of claims by the MKO
in western circles that it has renounced violence,
Iraq's Ministry of Defence says there is no doubt
the group is involved in ongoing violence in the
country. A solution to deal with the group has
become more urgent.
The legal status of the MKO combatants in Camp
Ashraf is somewhat unclear. In 2004 the American
army granted the MKO 'protected persons' status
under the Fourth Geneva Convention.
According to a report by Robert Karniol, Defence
Writer of the Straits Times, on February 4, the UN
Fourth Convention Article 133 states that
"'internment shall cease as soon as possible after
the close of hostilities'."
"The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)
maintains that the Iraq war ended with the transfer
of sovereignty to the country's interim government
in June 2004, with the fighting since then
characterised as 'an internal conflict
internationalised by the presence of multilateral
forces'."
"'Neither the active MEK members nor the former MEK
refugees are being detained,' said Major Danielson [MNF
spokesman]. 'The Ashraf refugee camp refugees have
every right to depart and travel in Iraq using an
Iraqi-issued laissez-passer. They can also
repatriate to Iran if they desire, or they may stay
in the camp."
However, it is not only Massoud Rajavi's insistence
that his combatants wait in Camp Ashraf to be
re-armed which blocks moves to deal with them. Since
every major western country has proscribed the MKO
as a terrorist group, it is virtually impossible to
find a safe haven for the group outside Iraq.
The Straits Times report continues, "'They are
definitely in a legal limbo. No one wants them,'
said Mr Said Boumedouha, a researcher at Amnesty
International in London."
"The US State Department's 2007 report said the MKO
maintains "the capacity and will to commit terrorist
acts in Europe, the Middle East, the United States,
Canada and beyond."
"The report notes the MKO's "cult-like
characteristics," such that "new members are
indoctrinated in MEK ideology and revisionist
Iranian history [and] required to ... participate in
weekly 'ideological cleansings.' "Children are
separated from their parents, it adds, and Mrs.
Rajavi "has established a 'cult of personality.'."
"According to Said Boumedouha of Amnesty
International, 'Our position is that they shouldn't
be returned to Iran due to the fear of torture and
the death penalty. And they shouldn't be handed over
to Iraq for the same reason. Their immediate future
looks bleak.'"
However, events in Iraq are unfolding which make it
imperative for western countries to address this
issue.
Why the MKO must leave Iraq
In December 2007
unconfirmed reports arose indicating uncertainty
over the future of Camp Ashraf. It is understood
that the original owner on whose land the camp is
sited, who fled Iraq under Saddam Hussein, has
returned to Iraq with title deeds and has now
achieved a court order demanding that his land, part
of which was illegally gifted to the MKO by the
former Iraqi dictator to build their military base,
be evacuated and returned to him in its entirety.
Although this has not been confirmed, subsequent
events appear to verify this news. In December US
military police began removing people from the
Temporary International Protection Facility.
Visitors to the camp were also told by military
police that the TIPF would be closing in six months'
time.
In January 2008 officials of the Iraqi Government
invited Massoud Khodabandeh of Iran-Interlink to a
series of meetings in Baghdad where the issue of how
to deal with foreign terrorist groups in Iraq was
being addressed by various agencies.
As a result of these meetings Mr Khodabandeh has
reported that the Iraqi Government is united and
determined in its demand that the MKO be removed in
its entirety from Iraqi territory. In this respect,
no differentiation is made between active or former
members of the group. The Iraqi Government regards
the MKO as a terrorist entity which is still
attached to the Ba'athist remnants of Saddam
Hussein's regime. Requests to the Americans since
2004 to remove the group have not produced any
result. The government is now taking the matter into
its own hands and will deal with the group on its
own terms.
Major Danielson has said that 'they [the MKO] are
not charged with criminal offences', however this
situation has now changed. The Iraqi Government has
passed the case of the MKO to the Judiciary which is
pursuing legal action against the whole group. Three
separate judges have already issued arrest warrants
against three leading members in Camp Ashraf. As the
sovereign government of the country it is expected
that American forces will comply with its legal
rulings in relation to the MKO.
Mr Khodabandeh said, 'In each of the meetings I
attended, I put to the Iraqis a proposal which I
believe is the only realistic and humanitarian way
forward for the people trapped in Camp Ashraf, and
this was universally welcomed. It is time now for
all security and humanitarian agencies in Iraq to
stop prevaricating, to work together and to adopt a
realistic plan in order to act on this situation and
resolve it to the advantage of all parties.'
This report seeks to describe the situation and
offer what can be the only possible workable
solution which will assure a safe and secure future
for the people in Camp Ashraf.
What is Camp Ashraf
Camp Ashraf is
situated northeast of the Iraqi town of Khalis in
Diyali province, 60 kilometers north of Baghdad and
about 20 kilometers west of the border with Iran.
Along with at least six other sites in Iraq, Camp
Ashraf was given to the MKO as a headquarters and
training site by Saddam Hussein. From this base, the
Iraqi military equipped the MKO with tanks,
artillery and armored personnel carriers. Since
1983, the group has conducted operations against
Iran during the Iran-Iraq War and later conducted
operations against Iraqi Kurds during the 1991
uprising against Saddam. Before 2003 it was the base
from which terrorist operations against Iran and
inside Iraq have been planned and directed.
Named after Ashraf Rabiee a leading political
prisoner under the Shah, the camp's vital function
since 1986 has been as the main ideological training
base for both members and supporters of the Iranian
Mojahedin-e Khalq Organisation (MKO). The base is
still used for the MKO's military and ideological
training.
Following the March 2003 invasion of Iraq the base
came under bombardment by American forces. After
some initial resistance, with fifty fatalities on
the MKO side, all MKO personnel were rounded up and
corralled in Camp Ashraf. Over 3800 members were
recorded. The MKO leader, Massoud Rajavi fled and
went into hiding as American Special Forces
attacked. He now issues his directives to the MKO
members in Iraq and in western countries from a
secret hideaway. In the months leading up to the
invasion, a few hundred MKO members had been hastily
transferred to Europe where they remain today. Among
them was Massoud Rajavi's lieutenant, Maryam Rajavi,
who was arrested in France in June 2003 and is
awaiting trial on terrorism related charges. Maryam
Rajavi provides the MKO's acceptable western front.
She heads Rajavi's deception campaigns in western
political and media circles.
At present, within the boundaries of Camp Ashraf is
Forward Operating Base Grizzly (formerly FOB
Spartan, FOB Red Lion and FOB Barbarian). The FOB is
where the Coalition forces reside. The Bulgarian
Army is currently running the Temporary
International Presence Facility, where refugees who
defect from the PMOI are held.
Inside Camp Ashraf itself the MKO leadership
continues to maintain control through its harsh cult
methodology which denies all the members their basic
human rights. The group retains its military
structure with uniformed members undergoing both
military and ideological training regimes.
Organisationally the chief characteristics of the
Mojahedin-e Khalq organisation are that:
• it uses psychological coercion and manipulation to
recruit, indoctrinate and retain its members
• it forms an elitist totalitarian society
• its leader is self-appointed, autocratic,
messianic, not accountable and has charisma
• it believes 'the end justifies the means' in order
to solicit funds, recruit people, deceive potential
supporters and to achieve political power
• its wealth does not benefit either the members or
society
Even though he is in hiding, Massoud Rajavi
continues as the sole decision maker for the group.
He continues to espouse the use of violence to
achieve his political aims. The MKO's stated aim is
to overthrow the Iranian regime in its entirety
(that is removal of the system of Velayat Faghi) and
replace it with Rajavi's system of government with
him as the country's leader.
MKO personnel are indoctrinated at Camp Ashraf in
the group's ideology which involves submitting to
the total, lifelong leadership of Massoud Rajavi.
The MKO accept no other legal or moral law than that
determined by Massoud Rajavi, and they submit
without question to his dictates. According to
Rajavi's ideology he demands total obedience,
members must forswear marriage and children, they
must be willing to die or kill on demand. Under
these conditions the only reasonable deduction which
can be made is that anyone who has been
indoctrinated in Camp Ashraf is owned by Massoud
Rajavi. He has devised the term 'living martyrs' to
describe the relationship of members to him. It
means that members have effectively handed their
'life' to Rajavi to use and dispose of as he will.
The absolute value of Camp Ashraf to Massoud Rajavi
is its guaranteed isolation. Members in the camp
have no contact with the outside world. The camp is
an essential element in controlling the behaviour
and beliefs of the members. For this reason Rajavi
has resisted any and all efforts to have the MKO
re-located on any grounds, whether security or
humanitarian. Individuals who have residence rights
in western countries were instructed by Rajavi to
refuse help and to demand that the group be treated
as a whole entity and not as individual members. The
continued wearing of military uniform reinforces
this group identity.
Although the MKO combatants in Camp Ashraf enjoy
some of the highest living standards in Iraq, the
health, morale and wellbeing of camp residents has
deteriorated progressively over the past five years.
People who left the camp via TIPF have reported
rape, fighting, murder and suspicious suicides
taking place as residents struggle with the severe
restrictions imposed by the MKO leaders. The head of
Military Intelligence of Bulgaria was quoted by Fars
News as saying that during 2007 the Bulgarian unit
has had to deal with fourteen serious clashes in
Camp Ashraf, describing them as "due to the unrest
of the detainees over the years" while stressing
that there was no threat to the Bulgarian soldiers.
The residents in Camp Ashraf were severely
demoralized from the beginning of their capture when
their leader Massoud Rajavi abandoned them and went
into hiding instead of ordering the all-out attack
on Iran which he had promised them. The sheer
cowardice of this act has had irreversible effects
on the group.
If we argue that in general terms terrorism needs
both 'form' and 'content' together in order to come
into being, then in this case, Camp Ashraf
represents the form, or container, for Rajavi's
group. The content is his ideology of hatred and
violence. If the form is removed, then no matter
what is in the minds of the individuals, they will
not go on to perform terrorism. It is like taking
the gun from their hands.
What is
happening at TIPF
When the MKO
combatants were forcibly disarmed and confined to
Camp Ashraf by US Special Forces in 2003 they were
subsequently interviewed by FBI and military
interrogators. Fingerprints and DNA samples were
taken and ID cards were issued. During the course of
these interviews several individuals expressed their
wish to leave the MKO. The US army was obliged to
establish a Temporary International Presence
Facility (TIPF) alongside Camp Ashraf to house
anyone who wanted to leave the MKO.
Both the residents of Camp Ashraf and the TIPF are
guarded to protect them from revenge attacks by
Kurdish and other Iraqis whose knowledge of the MKO
is as part of Saddam Hussein's repressive apparatus.
Inside Camp Ashraf itself the MKO leadership
continues to maintain control. The methodology of
this control includes strict gender segregation,
obligatory daily 'cleansing' reports and submitting
to a micro-managed lifestyle including the denial of
any external information. This state of affairs is
what American and Bulgarian soldiers have been
protecting for almost five years.
Over these five years several hundred people have
left Camp Ashraf to take refuge with the Americans.
As its tight grip on the members came under threat
with each defection, the MKO response was to
frighten its members with tales of rape and abuse by
US soldiers if they ended up in TIPF.
The group has sent infiltrators into TIPF to try to
control the atmosphere (aimed at discouraging people
from going back to Iran) and also to direct US
military police behaviour toward the group. In
addition, conditions in TIPF until very recently
were very basic with tents and US army rations for
both soldiers and those who left the MKO. Camp
Ashraf provides a standard of living which is
excellent in comparison with air conditioned
buildings, plentiful good food, plumbed bathrooms
and a range of leisure facilities.
The refusal of the US army to make conditions
outside Camp Ashraf better than conditions inside
the MKO run camp has led to accusations that the
intention has been to give leverage to the MKO
leaders to keep people in the terrorist
organisation. Indeed, the MKO has created its own
'Exit' unit to house around 200 people inside Camp
Ashraf. These are people who have left the MKO but
who, due to MKO pressure, are too afraid to go to
TIPF and so remain under MKO hegemony.
Under the terms of protected persons status of the
Fourth Geneva Convention detainees are not to be
forcibly deported or repatriated. However, the US
military reports that from TIPF, 380 have accepted
voluntary repatriation and have been helped by
Iraq's Ministry of Human Rights and the
International Committee of the Red Cross to be
reunited with their families.
Some 208 former members, who remained in TIPF
because they did not wish to go to Iran, asked for
UN refugee status and transfer to third countries.
However, with the huge demand on the UN and aid
agencies to deal with massive internal displacement
and Iraqi refugees, nothing has been accomplished to
find places for them.
TIPF to
close in six months
In January 2008, a
senior Iraqi official appeared on Alaraghieh
television explaining that the original owner of the
land on which Camp Ashraf has been constructed has
been granted permission by an Iraqi court to
re-possess his land – land which had originally been
illegally confiscated by Saddam Hussein and gifted
to the MKO. The owner has been told that his land
will be returned to him in six months. This will
mean that both the TIPF and the whole of Camp Ashraf
must be evacuated of personnel – whether American,
Bulgarian or Iranian – within the next six months.
This news shed light on events which began in
December 2007 when US Military Police began a
process of emptying TIPF. Visitors to the camp say
they were told by American soldiers that TIPF would
be closing in six months' time. They were told that
the TIPF might possibly be moved to Mosel in
Kurdistan, but this did not happen.
According to those who left TIPF in December, US
military police told them they were free to leave
and in fact could not stay as the camp was being
dismantled. One group refused to leave at all and
are still in the TIPF. The others were taken at
intervals in small groups of up to five to a
roadside some short distance away. They were filmed
to prove they were alive and healthy and then left
to make their own way. They were given American
issued 'laissez-passer' which they were told would
facilitate their exit from Iraq. However these
papers did not allow anyone to travel south toward
Baghdad and they were forced to move north. Those
who arrived in Arbil managed to get some papers from
the Kurdish regional government which allowed them
to remain in the city. But these papers were taken
away by local police after a short time. They now
have no papers except American issued ID cards.
The Iraqi Ministry of National Security said it does
not recognize the papers given to the former TIPF
residents, and that if found outside the camp, they
would be arrested and imprisoned for belonging to a
foreign terrorist group.
Scott Peterson of the Christian Science Magazine who
has been following the MKO's situation reported on
February 11, "About 100 tried to leave Iraq, some of
them carrying US military letters for travel to
Turkey. Documents of the UN High Commissioner for
Refugees show that at one point in their saga nearly
two weeks ago, 19 were turned back to Iraq by
Turkey, dozens were picked up in Kurdish northern
Iraq and some forced to return to the dangers of
central Iraq, and 26 were missing."
Other reports state that one man was shot and
wounded by border police and is now in hospital in
Arbil the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan. Amnesty
International said it was alerted to six individuals
in prison in Turkey. They were not returned to Iraq.
There are now 109 remaining in TIPF.
Humanitarian intervention
During his trip to
Iraq, Massoud Khodabandeh intervened with Iraqi
Government officials with a rescue plan for these
people. After talks with Iraq's Ministry of Human
Rights, officials agreed to set up an NGO which
would provide accommodation and food for those
Iranians who had left the MKO but who, since the
Americans were closing TIPF, did not have anywhere
to go. The organisation – named Sahar Family
Foundation – quickly set up a network of places to
which the former TIPF people could go, including
Baghdad and Arbil.
Mr Khodabandeh then visited the TIPF near Khales in
Diyali province to inform the remaining people that
he would provide safe passage from the camp to a
place where they could stay until it was possible to
send them to another country. Three people
immediately accepted this offer of help. More have
since followed. But this is an interim measure
designed to rescue those removed from TIPF and who
reject MKO membership. It does not of course address
the main issue which is to find a place of safety
for all the residents of Camp Ashraf.
Concerned observers have pointed out the error in
the logistics of closing TIPF before the problem of
relocating people from Camp Ashraf has been
resolved. TIPF represented the only way individuals
could escape the clutches of the MKO hierarchy. It
is only fair to allow people somewhere to escape to
rather than be treated as Massoud Rajavi's chattels.
It is intended that the newly created NGO Sahar
Family Foundation will replace the function of TIPF
in providing a safety net for those who want to
leave the MKO. Once they are safe they can then be
helped either to go home to their families or to
find a third country in which to take refuge.
Consultation meetings
On January 31, 2008
Massoud Khodabandeh attended a Symposium at the
Centre for International and Inter-governmental
Studies of the University of Baghdad.
The Symposium, a round table discussion centred on
the issue of terrorism in Iraq and possible
solutions to this problem, was divided into 3 parts:
- the general threat posed by terrorist groups and
the ways they operate in Iraq
- foreign terrorist organisations in Iraq
- the creation of terrorist organisations in Iraq
and the global supporters of these terrorist groups
Participants of the Symposium included Dr. Aziz
Jabar Shayal, Dr. Samir Alshweely and Dr. Rasheed
Saleh, professors of Political Studies from the
University of Baghdad. Several governmental and
non-governmental representatives from a wide range
of ministries and NGOs, including representatives
from Iraq’s Ministries of Defence, Human Rights and
Security participated.
Massoud Khodabandeh, who is also a researcher with
the Centre de Recherches sur le Terrorisme depuis le
11 septembre 2001 (Paris), and who was in Baghdad
for meetings concerning the fate of the remaining
individuals following dismantlement of Camp Ashraf
which houses the disarmed Iranian terrorist
organisation Mojahedin Khalq Organisation, was
invited to participate in the discussion.
Prominent among the participants was Mr. Bassam
Alhassani, advisor to Prime Minister Noori Al Maleki.
The Symposium ended with a full report on the issues
discussed and Dr. Aziz Jabar Shayal delivered the
concluding resolution in which one paragraph
emphasized the necessity for the dismantlement and
deportation of the foreign terrorist Mojahedin Khalq
organisation and encouragement and facilitation by
the government and others to help the remaining
individuals find a safe palace outside Iraq and
return to normal life.
The Symposium was covered by media representatives
who reported from the meeting room.
Alaraghieh television, Iraq’s main TV network,
reported the Symposium and broadcast a brief
interview with Massoud Khodabandeh.
In the interview, Massoud Khodabandeh emphasised
above all the right of the Iraqi people to enjoy
security and have justice served against the
perpetrators of violent acts in their country, in
particular the criminal heads of the terrorist
Mojahedin-e Khalq organisation which was involved in
the massacre of the Kurdish and Shiite uprisings
against Saddam Hussein in March 1991. Mr Khodabandeh
said that in his belief and according to the studies
of the Centre de Recherches sur le Terrorisme, the
phenomenon of terrorism cannot have a single
solution and needs inter governmental cooperation as
well as the involvement of NGOs to protect the human
rights of those who have been inveigled by terrorist
leaders onto this path, and to give them a second
chance of integration back into their societies.
Thanking the organisers of the Symposium Mr
Khodabandeh emphasised the cult culture of terrorist
organisations and the methods they use to brainwash
their followers. He also gave examples of foreign
support by some influential groups and parties who
facilitate the flow of finance for terrorism. Not
the least the relationship between the remainders of
Saddam Hussein in Iraq, London, Washington and other
countries with the Mojahedin Khalq Organisation, and
the way this relationship is becoming clear in the
escalation of violence in Diyali province.
The Symposium lasted for over two hours. Afterwards
the participants formed smaller groups to further
discuss the variety of issues raised by the Seminar.
Results of
consultation in Iraq
Massoud Khodabandeh
of Iran-Interlink was invited to Iraq by the office
of Prime Minister Noori Al Maleki for a series of
consultations on the problem of foreign linked
terrorism in the country.
The Iraqi Government is seeking a rapid and thorough
solution to remove the remaining members of
Mojahedin-e Khalq from Iraq and shut down Camp
Ashraf.
While in Iraq Mr Khodabandeh met with
representatives of the Iraqi Ministries of Human
Rights, Security, Foreign Affairs and Defence. He
also had meetings with advisors to Prime Minister Al
Maleki, the Judiciary, NGOs and human rights
organisations currently in Iraq. Further meetings
have been held with representatives of the Kurdish
Patriotic Union and regional government
representatives.
The following represents a summary of the findings
of Mr Khodabandeh from these meetings. It must be
stressed that no differentiation is made at all in
the various views below between former and active
members of the MKO.
Minister of Human Rights Vajdan Mikhael Salem's
point of view: Under no circumstances can we accept
the MKO (whether as a group or as individuals,
whether before or after renouncing terrorism) to
stay in Iraq. We do not recommend this because we
know of their past and the danger posed by Iraqi
Shiite and Kurds (revenge) to them. They are only
alive in Iraq because of American protection for
them. The Ministry will help in the transfer of
individuals to Iran or other countries in
conjunction with the International Committee of the
Red Cross (ICRC). The Ministry will also give
guarantees about good treatment by Iran under the
terms of an amnesty for returning MKO and, from its
offices in Iran, regularly monitors the situation of
those who have already accepted voluntary
repatriation.
Ministry of National Security point of view: We have
evidence of the co-operation between the remains of
Saddam and Al Qaida with the MKO using Camp Ashraf
as a meeting place to plot against the Iraqi people.
They are part of the destabilization forces in
Diyali province. These individuals are trained by
Saddam's Republican Guard and if given freedom
inside the country, they will be the core trainers
for insurgents. This is not acceptable and therefore
the American Army should find other alternatives for
them outside Iraq.
(The National Security Minister Shirwan Al Va'eli
has repeatedly insisted there is no place for any
terrorist organisation in the new Iraq and that Iraq
has and will continue to have full security
co-operation with neighbouring countries including
Iran, Kuwait and etc, in order to eliminate the
threats of terrorism in the region. Minister Shirwan
Al Va'eli has stressed that he is talking with the
Prime Minister and the Minister of Defence to expand
Iraq's cooperation with other countries to fight
terrorist networks and in this respect some
workshops have already begun.)
Foreign Affairs Ministry point of view: The MKO and
PKK are foreign terrorist organisations. They are
especially harmful to the relations between Iraq and
its neighbouring countries at this point of time.
Iraq cannot accept nor afford further problems by
accommodating international terrorist organisations
whether as a group or as individuals.
Advisor to the Prime Minister's point of view: The
MKO is the tip of the anti-Iraqi forces still in
Iraq. They are responsible for the massacre of Kurds
and Shiites and they should be handed over to the
Iraq Judiciary to bring them to justice. The fate of
the MKO (and other remains of Saddam who are wanted
for war crimes and crimes against humanity) is a
matter for Iraq and the US should hand them over.
Judiciary point of view: There are already claims
against the heads of this organisation (about 150
individuals). There are arrest warrants as recent as
a few weeks ago for crimes committed in the last few
months by MKO heads (Abbas Davari, the political
liaison of MKO in Camp Ashraf, Mozhgan Parsaii,
Commander of Rajavi's army in Iraq and Sediqeh
Hoseini, Secretary General of the MKO). There are
several ongoing investigations into the deeds of MKO
leaders against Iraqi people. The Judiciary should
investigate all of these and then decide who is to
be deported and who is to be brought to justice.
UNHCR: (Ms Hanieh Mofti refused to accept a meeting
with me or any of the families of those trapped in
Camp Ashraf, although she travels regularly to Camp
Ashraf for private meetings and dinner parties with
the heads of the terrorist organisation.) As far as
I could ascertain, Ms Mofti is sympathetic to the
MKO's demand that all its members should be given
refugee status in Iraq but not under the
jurisdiction of the Iraqi Government. They should
continue to be protected as a [uniformed military]
group in Iraq but without the permission of the
Iraqi Government.
[We must assume that refugee status can only be
given to individuals and not to an army. In this
case, perhaps Ms Mofti must wait for the US army to
take the military uniforms from these people and
then treat them as individuals according UNHCR
rules.]
Amnesty International and other Human Rights
organisations' point of view: MKO members should not
be given to Iran, nor should they be given to Iraq
because of the insecurity of human rights and the
death penalty in those countries. MKO members need
to be given humanitarian protection (not indemnity
from prosecution for crimes) meaning that they will
certainly need to be taken to third countries.
American Army point of view: No official view was
made. However, after 5 years the army is apparently
still prevaricating about US polices against
terrorism. (Certainly the US army's ambiguous
approach is widely perceived as facilitating
terrorism in the region.) Actual behaviour of the US
army toward internees at Camp Ashraf can only be
interpreted as tacit approval for the group's
continued existence and activities. (Camp Ashraf is
used to host meetings of Diyali tribal leaders loyal
to the Baathists).
The point of view of the Centre for International
and Inter-governmental Studies of the University of
Baghdad: (from the report of the symposium and
according to their announcement and recommendation
to the Iraqi Government) MKO individuals have to be
helped by western countries. They should not be kept
in Iraq for the good of people of Iraq and their own
good. The group should be dismantled by US and UK
forces before transfer outside Iraq. The main
support for the group comes from London, Washington
and Tel Aviv and the Mojahedin should be transferred
to these places with the help of their backers.
Families of
MKO members
When the interim
Iraqi government assumed control of Iraq in June
2004, the internees in Camp Ashraf were granted
protected persons status under the Fourth Geneva
Convention. After years of forced [by Rajavi]
estrangement, the families of people trapped in Camp
Ashraf began to hope that they could at last get
some news of their relatives there.
The Fourth Geneva Convention of course protects the
internees from forced repatriation. Instead the
families risked their lives to travel to Iraq from
all over the world in the hopes of meeting a son or
daughter, mother, father, wife, husband, brother or
sister. Some families had not seen their relatives
for over twenty years. Some were not even sure if
they were still alive.
Such family visits were undertaken according to the
rights established under Chapter VIII which deals
with external relations of detainees, in particular
Article 116 which states: 'Every internee shall be
allowed to receive visitors, especially near
relatives, at regular intervals and as frequently as
possible'.
Article 8 also clearly states: 'Protected persons
may in no circumstances renounce in part or in
entirety the rights secured to them by the present
Convention…'
But from the beginning the visiting families met
resistance. For four years it has been almost
impossible for anyone to visit their relative
without the presence of MKO minders who overshadow
the families to prevent free association or
conversation. Even where families travelled to Iraq
after taking legal advice and procuring legal
documents outlining their right to have free and
unfettered access to their relative, they have been
unable to secure such meetings. Unfortunately, in
some cases families have been turned away by
American military police, acting presumably on
orders from MKO commanders to refuse access.
This latter state of affairs has been experienced by
so many families that there is no doubt in anyone's
mind that the American soldiers are taking their
instructions from the MKO rather than vice versa.
There is no reason whatsoever – legal, moral or for
security - that these families should be denied
these visits. In one case a UK resident family was
told by an American soldier to contact the MKO in
Britain (where of course it is proscribed so that
this action of itself would be illegal) and to ask
the group to arrange a visit, including a stay in
the MKO controlled Camp Ashraf. This family were
left wondering what the legal ramifications would be
if they had followed this advice, would they be
allowed entry back into the UK without arrest for
contacting a terrorist entity in the UK and visiting
a terrorist training camp?
Where such obstacles are overcome and visits do take
place due to the sheer courage and persistence of
families who turn up at the gate of Camp Ashraf and
refuse to leave, the conditions of the visit do not
meet even a minimum standard expected under the
Fourth Geneva Convention or indeed under any human
rights legislation.
Families are harassed, insulted, physically
assaulted and repeatedly accused of being 'agents of
the mullahs' regime' sent to undermine the MKO's
struggle for democracy and human rights in Iran.
Among the most recent cases of a family's attempt to
meet relatives was the Mohammady family from Canada.
This was their ninth visit to Iraq in an attempt to
visit their daughter Somayeh who was taken to Camp
Ashraf some years ago when she was seventeen years
old. Mr Mostafa and Mrs Mahboubeh Mohammady spent
three months in Iraq and saw their daughter for only
45 minutes.
This time the parents were allowed to stay in a
bungalow in the US part of Camp Ashraf for three
days. On December 8, after constant requests to the
Americans, they were able to meet with their
daughter, Somayeh, for 45 minutes. Somayeh was
afraid to speak to her father stating 'he is an
agent of the Iranian Intelligence Ministry', but did
talk to her mother.
On the morning of December 9 the American soldiers
in charge of TIPF asked the Mohammady family to
leave the camp since they had met with their
daughter. The Americans escorted them to the gates
and let them out while still watching them from
behind their gates. As Camp Ashraf is located in a
deserted area with the closest road and public
transport some kilometers away, the Mohammadys began
walking. Suddenly they were confronted by a group of
MKO who pretended to be passing drivers and who
offered them a lift.
Based on their prior knowledge and experiences of
the MKO, Mr Mohammady and his wife refused their
offer and kept walking towards the main road. At
this point, the MKO grabbed Mrs Mohammady by force
and pushed her into the car in an attempted kidnap.
At the same time Mr Mohammady was defending himself
against their physical attacks and also trying to
secure their bags since their assailants were
slashing them with knives and managed to break open
their camera trying to remove the memory card by
knife. When Mr Mohammady started shouting for help
one of the MKO guys pulled a gun from under the
driver's seat and put it to his head.
Realizing the seriousness of the situation the
American soldiers who were watching from a short
distance intervened to rescue them and later
arranged for a safe ride to Baghdad. Upon arrival in
Baghdad Mr and Mrs Mohammady received medical
attention for their injuries and began legal action
against the leaders of the MKO for the damages
incurred by their family, including this latest
assault.
The result was that the Baghdad Criminal Court
issued arrest warrants for the three leading MKO
members in Camp Ashraf - additional to two existing
arrest warrants for each of the three which had
previously been issued by two other courts.
In February two more families experienced disturbing
meetings with relatives. Ali Bashiri and his
daughter traveled from Norway with legal papers
demanding a visit with the girl's mother. When Mr
Bashiri went to the US embassy in Baghdad with
papers drawn up by a Norwegian lawyer he was
expelled. Eventually he and his daughter got to see
the mother in the presence of MKO minders. The
mother did not come closer than three metres and
only swore viciously at her daughter before leaving.
In another case, Mr Reza Akbari Nasab traveled to
Camp Ashraf to ask for the body of his nephew Yaser
who died there last year so the family could bury
him in Iran. Mr Akbari Nasab told Alaraghieh
television:
"I went to the American Camp at Ashraf and asked to
meet my brother and his son, I also asked them to
let me go to my nephew’s tomb and see the documents
of his death.
"The American officials told me to make my request
to the MKO authorities [sic]. During the hours I was
waiting for my beloved ones the American soldiers
and officials hosted me in a courteous manner.
"I was enjoying the friendly atmosphere of the
American camp which had decreased the pressure on me
when a man carrying a file came over shouting at me:
“why have you come here?”
"He was speaking Persian angrily so I didn’t
recognize him. But he was no other than my kind and
lovely brother, Morteza!
"He was carrying a file which he said contained my
writings on the death of Yaser. He actually
threatened me that he would hand them to the
Americans since I had written some polite criticisms
of the American officials.
"I told him sympathetically: “you may be right, but
let‘s have a short talk which is something normal in
any political organization’’. But he didn’t accept
and he didn’t even let me get closer than 3 meters.
"My former kind brother insulted me in front of the
American soldiers. My nephew Musa didn’t get
permission to visit me since he is a German citizen
and the Mojahedin were afraid. The Americans didn’t
answer my questions simply and to answer my claim
that the MKO members are manipulated they just said
that it’s not their responsibility!
"They didn’t let me visit the tomb of Yaser either.
"I expected more of American democracy.
"While leaving, I told the American lieutenant:
‘’you are developing a new Al-Qaida.”"
There are many families like the Mohammadys,
Bashiris and Akbari Nasabs, who refuse to give up on
their relatives trapped in Camp Ashraf. But they
have limited resources. Following a meeting with
Massoud Khodabandeh who explained the situation in
detail, the Iraqi Ministry of Human Rights pledged
to help by supporting a newly formed
non-governmental organization called Sahar Family
Foundation which will provide help to the visiting
families and to MKO members who leave the
organization in Iraq.
Sahar Family Foundation has already established a
network of safe accommodation in several towns,
including Baghdad, to house the individuals who were
removed from TIPF in December 2007. In January,
three others left TIPF to take refuge with the
group.
Sahar
Family Foundation statement
The Sahar (Dawn)
Family Foundation is a non-governmental,
non-political and non-profitable organisation which
has been established to provide humanitarian aid to
the families of members of the Mojahedin-e Khalq
Organisation (MKO) who are based in Camp Ashraf in
Iraq. This foundation is solely focused on
charitable and human rights issues regardless of
political or group considerations and geographical
boundaries and only aims to help the suffering
families.
The Sahar Family Foundation covers a great number of
families as well as former members of the MKO who
seek help. This foundation enjoys good support
amongst the local and international bodies in Iraq
which is the base of the foundation.
The MKO has been based in Iraq, precisely in Camp
Ashraf, for more than two decades. This organisation
is run as a classic cult and therefore would not
give its members the chance of free association with
the outside world or with their families. Therefore
the families of these members are suffering severely
and seek assistance from humanitarian organisations.
When the former regime of Iraq was toppled, a small
light of hope lit the hearts of the families and
they thought that, in the new situation in Iraq,
they would be able to visit their beloved ones
freely and adequately without the presence of a
third party. Some of these families have not heard
from their relatives for more than 20 years and some
even don't know if their beloved ones are still safe
and sound. According to these families those who are
residing in Camp Ashraf – as is the case with many
cults throughout the world – are considered to be
captives both mentally and physically and therefore
are assumed as hostages. The Sahar Family Foundation
is striving to reunite the members of these families
again using every possible means.
Camp Ashraf is the base of the MKO members which is
guarded by US forces in Iraq. On the other hand the
present Iraqi government insists that Camp Ashraf
must be dismantled. Iraqi constitutional law does
not permit any foreign terrorist organisations to
remain in that country. The US State Department as
well as that of Canada, along with the European
Union and the British parliament and many other
governmental and international bodies have
officially designated the MKO as a destructive and
terrorist cult. Obviously the members of a cult and
their families are considered to be the prime
victims who must be helped. In May 2005 Human Rights
Watch published a report called 'No Exit' which
details human rights abuses meted out by the MKO
against its own members.
At the present time Baghdad is the central meeting
point for the misfortunate families and the former
members, as well as concerned entities who are all
waiting for the crack of dawn. They seek help from
humanitarian bodies throughout the world. Anyone can
help a little. On the other hand, of course, Camp
Ashraf, according to many international security
professionals, is a centre for training terrorists.
The families are concerned about the fate of their
children who are subjected to brainwashing and
terrorist training.
Please contact us. We would be more than pleased to
have your comments and ideas. Help us in any way you
can. The members of Sahar Family Foundation are all
volunteers who have moved to Iraq to work in the
difficult situation of that country merely to gain
family reunions.
Conclusion
When the regime of
Saddam Hussein came to an end, 3,800 members of the
Mojahedin-e Khalq organisation were bombarded,
captured and disarmed by US Special Forces in Iraq
and confined to Camp Ashraf.
Five years on the American military must be given
full credit for the excellent job it has performed
in containing the MKO in Iraq and keeping the people
secure. Dealing with a dangerous, destructive cult
is not an easy task. It is widely acknowledged that
the American forces are perhaps the only ones who
could do this, particularly in the violent and
chaotic conditions of Iraq.
But the situation has now developed to the point at
which urgent action must be taken to deal with the
group. As this report has shown, the MKO can no
longer stay in Iraq. The Iraqi Government has taken
matters into its own hands and is pressing on with
moves to prosecute and punish any MKO members the
Judiciary can prove have been guilty of crimes
against humanity and war crimes in Iraq, and to
quickly remove all others. The whole organisation is
at risk if it remains in Iraq.
Organisations such as Amnesty International, Human
Rights Watch, the International Committee of the Red
Cross and others are absolutely clear that Iraq is
not a place the MKO can stay. Indeed it presents
perhaps the most dangerous place in the world for
the group’s members – even, as events with the TIPF
people has shown, for the ones who have separated
from the MKO. There should be no doubt at all that
if the group does remain in Iraq and the Americans
step back even a little from protecting it then
there will be bloodshed and violence.
At this point in time, people are looking to the
American Administration for leadership to resolve
this problem. The MKO are prisoners and must be
dealt with as such. It is expected that the American
military will continue to garner the credit for
dealing with the MKO and assist the efforts of human
rights organizations, the families and the Iraqi
Government rather than hinder them. The American
Administration is facing a legal and moral dilemma
which requires attention sooner rather than later.
In particular, does the American military intend to
defy the Iraqi Judiciary when arrest warrants are
served by not handing over the subjects? Will
American soldiers continue to defy its moral and
humanitarian obligations by continuing to repulse
the families of MKO members who want only a private
meeting with their relatives? Will American soldiers
argue that they cannot bring MKO members the short
distance from Camp Ashraf to Baghdad to meet a
parent who has travelled thousands of miles to see
them under the terms of protected persons status?
Sahar Family Foundation was established as an
interim measure to help families of MKO trapped in
Camp Ashraf and to help anyone who wants to leave.
There should be no doubt that the existence of Sahar
will increase and accelerate the defections from the
MKO. Indeed this is already being seen. American
soldiers can either help or hinder in this
situation. The result will be the same but the
credit for good action will go where it is due.
This however, does not address the fundamental
problem of what to do with the active MKO members in
Camp Ashraf. They must be given refuge somewhere and
the only feasible place is in a western country.
Currently MKO members in the camp exist in a kind of
legal and moral limbo. While western governments are
clear about the terrorist nature of the MKO in their
own countries, none wants to take responsibility for
what happens to the people in Iraq. Every major
western government has proscribed the group as
terrorist. No one wants them.
In Europe, efforts to de-proscribe the Mojahedin-e
Khalq organisation have been led, particularly in
the UK, by the neoconservatives in London,
Washington and Tel Aviv. They argue that the
Mojahedin has renounced violence. Until now, these
powerful lobbies have evaded taking responsibility
for or even acknowledging the humanitarian crisis
looming over the people in Camp Ashraf. However, the
value of this group for its supporters is that it
represents 'the largest Iranian opposition group'
because of the number of active members. It makes
sense to have those members safe rather than
languishing in Iraqi jails. Supporters like the
British Parliamentary Committee for Iran Freedom,
chaired by Lord Corbett of Castle Vale, have a moral
and political obligation to rescue exactly those
people they have vigorously promoted as the means to
bring democracy to Iran. The lives and rights of the
MKO members in Camp Ashraf must be protected as a
priority.
This is only possible if they are brought to safety
in the west. As one Iraqi Minister said bluntly,
"the western supporters of the MKO especially in the
UK should keep their tools in their own closets!".
Both Iraq and Iran see Europe as the final and
perhaps only destination for the MEK. Transformed
from an army into a civilian group, this would allow
the active members who wish to do so, to continue
with non-violent opposition to the Islamic Republic
of Iran.
Certainly de-proscription of the MKO in the UK would
enable Iraq to remove the MKO as a group and allow
London to receive them individually as refugees. The
resources which are currently used to maintain the
camp in Iraq must also be transferred to support
them in the UK. Of course, any members who wish to
voluntarily repatriate to Iran should continue to be
protected by existing guarantees by the Iraqi
Ministry of Human Rights and the ICRC.
This is a rescue package which is workable and which
will have the best outcome for Iraq, the UK and the
'Iranian Resistance' which says it has renounced
violence. This solution provides a straightforward
and humanitarian resolution to the so-far
intractable problem of what to do with the group.
Indeed, given the facts, it is probably the only
solution.
Born into a middle class
family in Tehran in 1956, I completed my elementary
schooling in Alborz High School, in 1974. A year
later I joined my brother,
Ebrahim Khodabandeh in the UK where he was already studying
Electrical Engineering in Newcastle University (Newcastle-upon-Tyne).
I graduated from Newcastle Polytechnic (now
Northumberland University) in Electrical and
Electronic engineering and spent another year in Leeds
(UK) to gain my Chartered Engineering Diploma,
before moving to
Loughborough University to study for a Master's
degree.
I was first introduced to politics in Iran, but
became more
interested in the various opposition groups while a student in
Newcastle. I joined groups of students opposing the
Shah's regime, and in the last years of my stay in
Newcastle became more and more interested in the so-called
'revolutionary groups', one of which was the Mojahedin-e
Khalq Organisation of Iran (MKO).
In 1978, when Ayatollah Khomeini moved from Iraq to Paris, I joined a
group of young people who went to visit him. This
had, of course, a profound effect on me. On my
return, I
started a Society for Iranian Students in Newcastle
Polytechnic, and soon
joined with another group of people who were supporting the
Mojahedin and who were in contact with them. By doing so,
I was able to establish a strong 'foothold' in our university.
In those days the Mojahedin comprised no more than a group of
martyred or imprisoned young people who were following Ayatollah Khomeini
- or at least that's what they told
people like me!
Later on I became more involved and was instrumental
in the foundation of the "Committee for the Support
of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organisation". The Committee was
founded and led by a known member of the
organisation, Dr. Reza Ra'eesi, who had come to London
a few years previously; a man of principle, with a wealth
of philosophical, political and organisational
skills and knowledge. (Shortly after the Revolution,
Ra'eesi
left the organisation due to his belief that the
organisation was no longer following the minimum
standards of democratic practices.)
During the course of the revolution in Iran the Committee went through
dramatic changes. The name changed to the Moslem
Iranian Students' Society, and the members, who
studied and followed the
teachings of the Mojahedin literature, became full-time
'Revolutionaries'. Demonstrations, printing and
distributing publications,
fundraising, and etc became not just part of my (and my
colleagues') life, but all of it. Individual rooms
and flats
were given up and we were now living in communal
houses, incorporating offices and dormitories. I was
soon transferred from Loughborough, where I was
studying a research course, to London, and was given
the task of heading the organisation in the north of
England.
In 1980, I and another 51 members occupied the
Iranian embassy in London for which we were sentenced to
some months of imprisonment. Dr. Ra'eesi had already
left the organisation by this time and had returned
to Iran, and we were now receiving direct orders from
the Mojahedin HQ in Tehran. I believe that the
Mojahedin ordered attacks on Iranian embassies to all of the
branches in different European and north American
countries as a last show of power before
Massoud Rajavi fled Iran following his failed coup d'etat
on June 20, 1981.
When I was released from prison, Massoud Rajavi had
already arrived in Paris. I joined him and the other
Mojahedin after a few days,
and spent a few months in the Paris base handing
over my responsibilities as head of all the
Societies outside Iran. The Moslem Iranian Students'
Society was the only asset left
for the Mojahedin outside Iran, and it was rapidly
transforming itself into the "Union of Moslem
Iranian Students' Societies" with the HQ in Paris. I was
being relieved from all my responsibilities in order
to start my
next assignment: to go to Iran for a specific mission.
I met with Mr. Saeed Shahsavandi in Germany. (Shahsavandi
was a well-known member
of the Mojahedin who had suffered in the prisons of SAVAK.
He later left the organisation due to disagreements
with Massoud Rajavi; in particular over the Internal
Revolution of Massoud and Maryam.) Shahsavandi headed a team
tasked with purchasing
a 10 Kilowatts radio transmitter as well as other
telecoms equipment - intended to connect Iran to the Paris
HQ - and other materials and to transfer them to
Iranian Kurdistan where the new Iranian Government
could not exert its power. I was appointed as technical advisor and
subsequently, the technical head of broadcasting
once the stations were
installed in Kurdistan.
Saeed and I ended up in Baghdad airport the same day
that Mousa Khiabani and Ashraf Rabiee (who had been left
in Iran after Massoud Rajavi had fled to Paris)
were killed in a gun battle with the Revolutionary
Guards in Tehran. We had with us a huge load of telecoms
and other equipment. We were working under
the protection of the Kurdish Democratic Parity (KDP)
which would allow us passage from Iraqi into Iranian
Kurdistan. The
equipment was shipped by the Iraqi military to Soleimanieh
- where the Iraqis would go no further -
and from there we were taken towards the border of
Iran by Kurdish people sympathetic to the KDP. It
was winter and it took us several months to transfer the
dismantled pieces of radio equipment into the mountains
of Sardasht (in Iran) from where the transmitter started
broadcasting the clandestine short and medium wave
'Radio Mojahed' into Iran. The transmitter (and
therefore me and my team) had to change place in the
mountains of Kurdistan more than 7 times over the next
two years in order to survive the air attacks. We
survived as a team (though of course some
individuals didn't) and continued
our broadcasting successfully.
When we first arrived in Iranian
Kurdistan, the Mojahedin base was inside the KDP
compound just outside Sardasht. But our numbers were growing rapidly. Kurdistan was becoming
the HQ for training terror teams to carry out
operations inside Iranian cities and it was the major
transit route for transferring Mojahedin executives from Iran to
France (via Turkey or Iraq/Jordan).
It took two years of military battles during the summers and
fighting with nature in the mountains of Kurdistan in
the winters before the Iranian army reached the 'Free
Zone' of Iranian Kurdistan. After a few days
of battle, we had no other choice than to abandon
everything and, crossing the border river Zab, to retreat into Iraq.
We had to blow-up everything we had in order not to let
them fall in the hands of enemy but managed to bring the
transmitter with us and even managed to get it up
and running again in only a few days to broadcast
Radio Mojahed. But now we were living alongside an Iraqi military
base with direct connection to roads, and after two
years I enjoyed the luxury of moving around with cars
instead of mules! It didn't take long before I
was given the go-ahead to return to Paris. Now that
transmission was taking place from Iraqi territory with the help of
the Iraqi Government, I was perhaps
needed more in Europe than in Iraq. So, I went back
to Paris.
With fluent English and a little French, I was
assigned to a team specifically taking care of
Rajavi's personal affairs. He was then married to Firoozeh Banisadr and my main job was partly her
protection and partly working with the Mojahedin
intelligence system which was mainly occupied with
intelligence gathering about other opposition forces
outside Iran. My boss for the specific matters
involving Firoozeh was Maryam Azodanloo (who was the
head of a team providing personal needs of Massoud
Rajavi. She later
became the 3rd wife of Massoud and co-leader of
the organisation), and for the intelligence section I
had Bijan Rahimi as my boss. When Massoud divorced Firoozeh and married Maryam (then the wife of his
friend Mehdi Abrishamchi), I was freed from my other
responsibilities to move into
the HQ of Auvers-sur-Oise to become an overt member of
the personal protection of the Leadership, which meant
Massoud and his new wife (my old boss) Maryam. My
responsibilities were mainly security, liaison with
French Security and above all, updating and
reforming the system of security according to the
available resources in Europe. Technical aspects of
the matter were my main focus. This continued until
the departure of the organisation to Iraq.
I travelled to Baghdad a few weeks before the
arrival of Massoud Rajavi from Paris. I took Maryam
with us and she prepared for his arrival.
I was now in a new environment. We were now
working in a totally different atmosphere. In Paris
everything was systematic and at the end of the day we were
a force outside the government. In Paris, security
meant a totally different thing than in Iraq. Here we
desperately
needed training in every aspect if we were going to
work and survive with the Iraqi security. But I could also see that
there were a lot of things we had brought with
us that the Iraqis hadn't known about. We were now
expected to be confident, very confident with arms.
We needed to adjust ourselves
and become a military force. We were going to be
trained to become part
of Saddam's apparatus and that's what we did.
During the years to come I never separated myself
from telecoms, IT and electronics. It was needed both for security and
for the army. I would make a few trips to Europe
every year to update myself on security and telecoms
issues. I would attend Interpol and other security
exhibitions and meetings, and of course buy and import
the necessary materials for ourselves and for the
Iraqis, from simple closed circuit cameras to metal
and explosive detectors, up to sophisticated
surveillance and counter surveillance equipment,
coders, decoders,..., . I also became the person
entrusted with arranging for the personal needs of Massoud and Maryam,
providing them with whatever was necessary for the
'Leadership'. During the years of my stay in Iraq I
participated in many joint projects and training
with the Iraqi army. These included military and
security training, special forces training specific
to the Republican Guards of Saddam Hussein, as well
as joint projects in VIP Shelter technology and infrastructural projects in
electrical and
telecommunication grids. During these years I even
escorted Maryam Rajavi on her holidays to European as
well as Arab countries across the world. And of
course, every now and then, I would be part of the
team carrying messages between Iraq and whichever country
they were destined for. I have been
responsible for the telecommunication of all the major
military operations of the MKO, sitting in the command
room connecting Rajavi and his top commanders to the field commanders
from his HQ (usually part of an Iraqi military base
near the border). Many memories from the four days of
the Forough-e Javidan operation (aka Mersad or
Eternal Light), the few months of the
First Gulf War (Kuwait), and many other
events, perhaps need more time and space. I have to bring
myself to start writing about them but not right
now.
In 1994, after two years of push and pull by
Massoud to convince a few remaining non Mojahed members of
the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) to
accept Maryam as 'the President Elect'(!!), he
sent her to Europe to "create a foothold for Massoud
if
things don't go as well as they should" (maybe
he was thinking about a rainy day like today!). As usual it
was up to me to bring her to Paris. We were supposed
to take her to the USA where she could impose herself as
a refugee, but by over-estimating the connections we
had, she insisted on getting a valid visa for the US
before departure. (She of course, did not even have
valid papers for France and the French did not know that she had
again been brought to
Paris.) The visa application alerted the Americans,
and of course after they rejected her we had
to surface Maryam in Paris. That was annoying enough,
but not as annoying as the fact that she tried to put the blame
on Mohammad Mohaddessin (Rajavi's Pentagon contact
who after being arrested in Paris in 2003 and awaiting trial
alongside Maryam, has now been replaced by Alireza Jafarzadeh),
accusing him of not using his influence with the
Americans enough.
In 1995, after a period of disagreements, now
directly conducted with Maryam Rajavi, over what was going on in Iraq as
well as her increasingly un-diplomatic and un-political and in many cases inhumane conduct, the
culmination of years of disagreement was reached and I demanded to leave.
Being in Paris was of
course to my advantage. But even so, I was forcefully
kept and even injected with sleeping and other drugs
to the point that even a few days after they stopped
the injections I still could not stand up for more
than a few minutes. This was of course the minimum
just to keep me quiet. After some compromise,
agreements and accepting some of my criticisms at face
value, I was sent back to Iraq (I was told that
the VIP (anti nuclear) shelter compound in Ashraf camp
had malfunctioned, which they could not sort out and the
engineers had asked for me). In Iraq, I found out that I was being checked by Massoud himself and there
I realised that I would lose everything (including
my life!) if
I continued to insist on my criticisms. I acted
compliant for a
few weeks until I got my Iraqi and Jordanian documents
back and was allowed to get out of Iraq once more.
This time I left for London. Soon I contacted Maryam
(and later Massoud) and told them of my final
decision to have noting to do with them any more.
I
presented myself to the British authorities (and
later the French authorities) and told them about my exit from the
Mojahedin-e Khalq Organisation. (In those days they had
not yet been proscribed as terrorists). In the same
year (1996) Maryam Rajavi went
back to Iraq after a totally disastrous failure in
achieving what she came for. The money Saddam had
invested was spent on dinner meetings promoting the
'Ideological Revolution' and expensive gatherings
"teaching feminism to Western women" and the
human
resource which went back to Iraq was considerably less
than what she had come out with.
Having left the Mojahedin with nothing but a few
pounds in my pocket, I went to an old student friend
of mine in the north of England for help. To his
lasting credit, he gave me
more than just financial help at a time when I needed
every help possible to stand on my feet again. Rajavi
tried a few times to get me back and even called to
convince me to go back to Iraq for a few days (we both
knew he would not let me out again!) But as soon
as he became convinced that I am no longer his man,
he started announcing that I am, and had been for
some time, working for the Iranian
Intelligence ministry, a label he has used for more
than 800 ex members and critics of the MKO among Iranian
opposition forces in Europe and America. In one way
this was good news. It meant he has accepted the
fact that
I have escaped him. Now the problems he would make for
me could not be more than some annoyance in the western security
services or the British Home Office. I had run away
safely. I was much luckier than many of my friends.
I couldn't believe it myself.
When I left the Mojahedin, I was a high ranking
commander of the National Liberation Army in charge of
the security of the leadership. I was a member of the
Executive Committee of the Mojahedin Khalq Organisation
and I was a member of the National Council of Resistance of
Iran, the so called political wing of the Mojahedin. My departure coincides with the departure of
many, many others including high profile people Dr. Massoud Banisadr, Dr. Bahman Etemad and Dr. Hedayat Matindaftary and Mrs.
Maryam Matindaftary and ... . later Rajavi even
blamed me for the departure of others!
It was not
surprising that one year after we came out, in 1997
the US government despite all their grievances with
the Iranian government, added the name of the Mojahedin
in their list of terrorist entities. In the year 2000,
Britain followed suit and announced the MKO as a
proscribed terrorist organisation. In 2002 the
European Union announced them as terrorists and in 2005, Canada officially listed the organisation. In
May of the same year, Human Rights Watch published a 40 page
report about human rights abuse inside the
Mojahedin. I always consider myself one of the
luckiest ones. Those who stayed after me have
gone through a much harsher experience, many lost
their lives, many their sanity.
After leaving the Mojahedin, it took me a few years
to retrain myself, get a proper job and stand on my
own feet.
In 1997 I met Anne Singleton whom I had seen a couple
of times before in the Mojahedin's bases. She had also left
them alongside many others outside Iraq. Later we
married and now have a son called Babak.
I started working with my friend in his factory
for a year and after retraining got back to my main
line of work, Telecoms. I have since worked for a variety of
companies in direct employment and/or subcontracting,
including Ericsson in the UK, Alcatel in Germany and
France, and a range of smaller companies outsourcing
parts of their Intercontinental Terrestrial Transmission projects.
In 2001 together with Anne we founded Iran
Interlink organisation to help the people who leave
the organisation to come to terms with their
experiences inside the organisation. Now our
organisation along with many other similar organisations
throughout the world are of themselves a noticeable
weight among the opposition forces outside Iran -
opposed to the Mojahedin and to the Islamic regime.
Many of my friends have been killed during the past
two decades, but the ones whose backs did not
break under the cruelties of Rajavi and Saddam have
now grown even
stronger.
In 2002 I joined the centre de recheche sur le
terrorisme in Paris as an analyst on terrorism, with
which I still work closely. I have widened my
circle ever since and now have very good friends
across the world from Tel Aviv to Riyadh and from
Moscow to Washington. In 2003, after the fall of
Saddam and the arrest of Maryam Rajavi I added my own
complaints against her to the court case in Paris. The
investigations are still ongoing but I certainly
hope that one day the truth about what has happened
will come out whether in a court room or elsewhere.
After the fall of Saddam many of my friends have
managed to leave Iraq and the Mojahedin; some from Abu Ghraib prison.
Their stories are horrifying. To think
that one day I was a member of such an organisation
sends shivers down my back. Now over a thousand people
have freed themselves from the cult. Some have gone
back to Iran, and some live in western countries. Of
course many have lost their lives and many are still
trapped inside - about 3500 in Iraq and about 300
outside Iraq in western countries and of course none in Iran.
Their average age
is approaching 50. You can guess about their morale yourselves. I can't
ignore the number of Iranians killed during
the Mojahedin's so called operations either. To come to
terms with these events - on whichever side you find
yourself - will certainly take a generation if not
more.
As a brief biography, I have tried my best not to
enter into specific events and/or specific
instances, each of which will need their own article
or even book.
One day I may enjoy the luxury of having the time
to write a thorough biography of my life (or even
write about the
Mojahedin), but for the
time being I see my time as more beneficially spent putting more
time in my work as a consultant, supporting my
family and raising my child Babak as best as I can,
and of course sparing all the effort possible
to help those people who joined the Mojahedin with the
sole purpose of helping bring about prosperity and
democracy to Iran, but who found themselves siding with
the enemies of their own country and with no escape.
... A RAND study
examined the evolution of this controversial
decision, which has left the United States open to
charges of hypocrisy in the war on terrorism. An
examination of MeK activities establishes its cultic
practices and its deceptive recruitment and public
relations strategies. A series of coalition
decisions served to facilitate the MeK leadership's
control over its members. The government of Iraq
wants to expel the group, but no country other than
Iran will accept it. Thus, the RAND study concludes
that the best course of action would be ...
At the beginning of
Operation Iraqi Freedom, Coalition forces classified
the Mujahedin-e Khalq, a militant organization from
Iran with cult-like elements that advocates the
overthrow of Iran's current government, as an enemy
force.
The MeK had
provided security services to Saddam Hussein from
camps established in Iraq during the Iran-Iraq War
to fight Iran in collaboration with Saddam's forces
and resources. A new study from the RAND
Corporation, a nonprofit research organization,
looks at how coalition forces handled this group
following the invasion.
Although the MeK is
a designated Foreign Terrorist Organization by the
United States, coalition forces never had a clear
mission on how to deal with it.
After a ceasefire
was signed between Coalition forces and the MeK, the
U.S. Secretary of Defense designated this group's
members as civilian "protected persons" rather than
combatant prisoners of war under the Geneva
Conventions. The coalition's treatment of the MeK
leaves it – and the United States in particular –
open to charges of hypocrisy, offering security to a
terrorist group rather than breaking it up.
Research suggests
that most of the MeK rank-and-file are neither
terrorists nor freedom fighters, but trapped and
brainwashed people who would be willing to return to
Iran if they were separated from the MeK leadership.
Many members were lured to Iraq from other countries
with false promises, only to have their passports
confiscated by the MeK leadership, which uses
physical abuse, imprisonment, and other methods to
keep them from leaving.
Iraq wants to expel
the group, but no country other than Iran will
accept it. The RAND study suggests the best course
of action would have been to repatriate MeK
rank-and-file members back to Iran, where they have
been granted amnesty since 2003. To date, Iran
appears to have upheld its commitment to MeK members
in Iran. The study also concludes better guidelines
be established for the possible detention of members
of designated terrorist organizations.
For more
information, or to arrange an interview with the
authors, contact Lisa Sodders in the RAND Office of
Media Relations at (310) 393-0411, ext. 7139, or
lsodders@rand.org.
.
Iran-Interlink.org
has published a second report on Camp Ashraf, Iraq
and the situation of Mojahedin-e Khalq (aka MKO, MEK)
cult members at the camp. After consultation with
the Government of Iraq, Massoud Khodabandeh has
described events since January 1, 2009. 
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