Massoud and Maryam Rajavi are personally responsible for the deaths of 25 residents along with several Iraqi soldiers during a katyusha attack aimed at Camp Liberty yesterday. Maryam Rajavi’s only response has been to say ‘we warned you repeatedly this would happen’.
In the context of real events in Iraq this sounds more like a wish than a warning. What Rajavi does not reveal is that, in spite of fears of exactly the kind of attack she has repeatedly looked forward to, she and her husband have consistently refused to allow the MEK members to leave Iraq and take refuge in third countries. Since 2003, successive Iraqi governments have ruled the MEK’s presence in Iraq unconstitutional and have worked with the United Nations, the International Committee of the Red Cross, Iraq’s ministry of human rights and the Iranian embassy in Iraq to find a safe and peaceful way to remove all the MEK from Iraq. With the principle of non-refoulement accepted by all other parties as the basis of this programme, only the MEK leaders refused to cooperate.
Even when the resident’s families and even the MEK’s own lobbyists in the West like Rudi Giuliani, John Bolton, Brian Binley and Struan Stevenson, have tried to rescue the individuals trapped in the MEK camps in Iraq, the Rajavis have time and time again refused to let them go or to let them be helped. Even though many individuals who managed to escape the camps have made their way to safety in Europe. Even though millions of refugees fleeing Syria and Iraq have made their way to Europe. Even though the UN negotiated a safe haven in Albania to which it is slowly but surely transferring the remaining residents of Camp Liberty. If Rajavi had allowed these people to leave five years ago, these tragic deaths would not have occurred.
The MEK has many enemies in Iraq. As part of Saddam Hussein’s repressive apparatus and known as ‘Saddam’s Private Army’, the Rajavis and their MEK are responsible for the deaths of over 25,000 Iraqi citizens. In this context we may never discover who launched yesterday’s or any previous attacks on the MEK in Iraq. What we can state with absolute certainty, however, is that the Rajavis caused these deaths because in spite of giving ‘repeated warnings’ they refused to allow these vulnerable individuals to be taken to safety. They deliberately left them in harms way.
It should now be clear to everyone that the reason behind Massoud Rajavi’s insistence on keeping people in Iraqi is not because these aging and sick people are involved in a struggle against Iran. It is because of the ideology which he created after being released from prison in 1979 and began acting as the MEK’s spokesman. This ideology is simply expressed as ‘kill for publicity’. From 30th June 1981, the Eternal Light operation in 1988, the self-immolations in Europe in 2004 and the repeated attacks on Camps Ashraf and Liberty in Iraq, in all these cases Rajavi has caused deaths in order for an MEK spokesman to have a media interview and cry victim. The result is simply the continued survival of the MEK brand. The cost is counted in the lives of people who could easily be helped. These are not martyrs to a cause, they are victims of Rajavi’s vanity. Camp Liberty is nothing more than a blood bank waiting to be spent by Rajavi.