Pro-Baath Group Opposes Majority Calls for MKO Expulsion
An Iraqi group with records of cooperation with Iraq’s former Baath regime announced that it supports presence of the anti-Iran terror group, the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) inside Iraq.
The Iraqi Habilian website reported that the group, Islamic al-Sadr Society, which formed in Lebanon’s southern city of Tyre in 2002 announced in a statement that it supports MKO’s stay inside Iraq.
Iraq’s security forces took control of the MKO’s training base at Camp Ashraf – about 60km (37 miles) north of Baghdad – last month and detained dozens of the members of the terrorist group.
The Iraqi authorities also changed the name of the military center from Camp Ashraf to the Camp of New Iraq and underlined expulsion of the group’s members from Iraq.
The society which is not more than a 5 roomed building had first become a gathering center for former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s opposition figures and refugees inside Lebanon, the website said.
Yet, former Iraqi opposition figures say that later the group recruited Iraqis and gathered information about anti-Baath Iraqis via detailed questionnaires.
Habilian reported that "Valid Mayahi" an opponent of Saddam regime was assassinated at the center of the suspicious group. After Mayahi’s death, 100 application forms and questionnaires with data and information about identification of anti-Saddam figures disappeared and were later transferred to the Baath regime’s intelligence apparatus.
The report also noted that the group’s formation was aimed at identification of anti-government figures and transferring their list to the Intelligence ministry.