Temporary Transit Location(Camp Liberty)

17 MKO members flee Camp Liberty in Iraq

Seventeen members of the terrorist Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) have fled Camp Liberty near Baghdad International Airport in Iraq. 17 MKO members flee Camp Liberty in Iraq

“Since the beginning of the current year, 17 … MKO members have fled Camp Liberty near Baghdad International Airport,” an Iraqi security official said Wednesday.

The defectors were among the senior and older members of the organization, who left the Iraqi soil after parting ways with the organization, said the official who was speaking on condition of anonymity.

The MKO is listed as a terrorist organization by much of the international community and has committed numerous terrorist acts against Iranians and Iraqis.

The group fled Iran in 1986 for Iraq, where it received the support of Iraq’s executed dictator Saddam Hussein and set up Camp Ashraf near the Iranian border.

Out of the nearly 17,000 Iranians killed in terrorist attacks since the victory of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, 12,000 have fallen victim to the acts of terror carried out by the MKO.

In December 2011, the United Nations and Baghdad agreed to relocate some 3,000 MKO members from Camp New Iraq, formerly known as Camp Ashraf, to the former US-held Camp Liberty.

The last group of the MKO terrorists was evicted by the Iraqi government on September 11 to join the other members of the terrorist group at Camp Liberty and await potential relocation to other countries.

December 21, 2013 0 comments

Human Rights Abuse in the MEK

It’s Time to Close the Camps

The last quarter century has been a time of great change across the globe, much of which has been for the better. The number of electoral democracies has grown from 69 in 1989 to 118 today. Despite

Michael Rubin Russia’s resurgence, the instability wrought by the Arab Spring, and the dangers posed by rogue regimes, the world remains far freer now than at any point in history.

How tragic it is, then, that so many tens of thousands remain effectively imprisoned in political concentration camps. North Korea, of course, is the world’s worst violator. According to the Guardian, the left’s flagship paper, up to 200,000 North Koreans remain imprisoned. CNN has detailed some of the ongoing horror in the six camps, and any report from the Committee for Human Rights in North Korea is worth reading. The Hermit Kingdom is not alone, though.

For decades, China has also maintained a series of “re-education through labor” [laojiao] camps. And while the Chinese government has recently promised to dismantle its network, actions ultimately speak louder than words.

The United States might have little leverage over China and North Korea, but low-hanging fruit which could be resolved with American diplomatic pressure does exist. The Mujahedin al-Khalq (MKO) is correct to castigate those who believe that the Iranian government or its militia proxies should enjoy an open season on group members. Opposing massacres is not synonymous with support for the group, however; it may no longer be a U.S.-designated terror group, but remains just as much an authoritarian cult. And while MKO spokesmen may castigate the Iraqi government and the Iranian regime, the real victims of the MKO lay within the group itself. Camp Liberty—the successor to Camp Ashraf—exists as much if not more to keep MKO members insulated from the real world and under the control of MKO leader Maryam Rajavi’s commissars than as a means of protection for group members.

Other camps exist in the Tindouf province of southwestern Algeria. Here, perhaps 40,000 residents of southern Morocco, Algeria, western Mali, and northern Mauritania languish in camps controlled by the once-Marxist Polisario Front, largely kept from returning home by the group’s political commissars and the Algerian government. During a recent visit to Dakhla, in Western Sahara, I had the opportunity to speak to former members who described not only their own escape from the camps, but the attempts by others who were forcibly returned to the camps, where Polisario authorities punished them for the audacity of seeking to return home rather than languish in camps 22 years after the war between Morocco and Algeria ended. Simply put, Polisario realizes that if the camps close, the gravy train of international assistance would end and the Polisario would lose its raison d’être.

The Polisario is not the only Cold War remnant stubbornly holding hostages. The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia also engages in the practice, holding some prisoners for more than a decade. While some journalists parachute in and whitewash just what happens in FARC camps, it is hard to see “cultural programming” as anything other than an attempt at ideological re-education.

The Obama administration came into office seemingly committed to prioritizing human rights, never mind the debates about how best to guarantee rights, freedom, and liberty. The State Department became a revolving door not only for journalists, but for human-rights advocates, most notably Human Rights Watch’s Tom Malinowski and writer Samantha Power. Increasingly, however, it seems such figures are either window dressing for an administration so disinterested in human rights that it is willing to sanction political concentration and re-education camps or, worse yet, that these figures are so permeated by moral equivalency and skewed in their understanding of what universal human rights are that they are willing to normalize with the regimes, sponsors, and groups which engage in such practices.

Concentration camps and slavery (discussed in a previous post) are two phenomena that simply should not exist in the 21st century. That they do is a sad testament to the reality of regimes like North Korea’s, China’s, Algeria’s, Venezuela’s, and Cuba’s, and the choices which successive U.S. administrations–both Democrat and Republican–have made to not let such issues be stumbling blocks to engaging with the United States on other issues.

Michael Rubin, Commentary Magazine

December 18, 2013 0 comments

Human Rights Abuse in the MEK

Psychological pressure and violation of human rights in Rajavi’s cult

We have informed our readers in previous articles that discontent amongst the members of Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MEK or MKO), stationed in Camp Liberty near Baghdad in Iraq, is escalating and Why do the international organizations close their eyes? more and more individuals seek to leave Rajavi’s cult. The situation is so tense that the commanders of the cult have openly declared a state of alert. The main task of the officials of the cult is to identify discontented members, place them under scrutiny and to employ their inhumane psychological techniques against them. The commanders have been warned that if any of the members under their command escapes, they will be severely punished.

In order to bring the members under tighter control and make them forget about escaping, the officials of the cult have increased the peer pressure in the sessions named “current operation” and, as they say, have heated them up. In these sessions the person who is the subject is put under severe harassment by others using insults and accusations. This is done to break down the subject mentally. The situation is so hard that after the session they closely watch the subject so they do not commit suicide.

In these sessions for instance they tell the subject that he or she has become a vampire sucking the blood of the organization. This is related to an address by the cult leader Massoud Rajavi to his followers in which he warned them against sucking the blood of the organization. Rajavi, like all cult leaders, instead of being responsible toward his followers for leading the organization into catastrophe is claiming that they are sucking the blood out of his cult.

Other examples are calling the subject ‘empty minded’ or a ‘stinky inhumane body’. They make the subject confess that all these years they were busy sucking the blood of the organization and have betrayed the leader. They make the subject feel ashamed of being alive.

In these sessions they ultimately, after shattering the subject mentally, accuse the person of still having ties with their family in their heart and that they must cut out these reactionary ties. What the person must do practically is to confess this and then publicly denounce all his or her loved ones.

One interesting issue is that the cult keeps calling the officials of the UN and the ICRC spies and elements of the enemy, and has announced that approaching them is passing a red line. Approaching these people or asking for them and even talking about them is equivalent to betraying the organization and the consequence is to become the subject of these devastating daily sessions. In each meeting Rajavi and other leaders of the cult talk against the UN and the ICRC in relation to Camp Liberty and call them the agents of Iran and Iraq. All the cult officials think about is how to prevent the members from escaping.

The way the cult treats its followers in the big prison called Camp Liberty under the absolute rule of Massoud Rajavi is an obvious violation of human rights. The treatment and conditions of the captives in the camp is most certainly inhumane. The international organizations are fully aware of these things but for some political interests close their eyes and remain silent. Such behavior is not acceptable under any standard but unfortunately the victims of Rajavi have no voice.

We have repeatedly announced that the lives and psychological health of Rajavi’s captives are in danger, and that the international officials who deliberately do not fulfill their duties and have given Rajavi an open hand, and do not ever openly say what they see with their own eyes, are responsible.

Sahar Family Foundation once again repeats previous warnings that appeasing Massoud Rajavi, the cult leader of MKO, is against the interests of his captives in Camp Liberty and makes him even more impudent and will have no benefit for anyone.

December 16, 2013 0 comments

Former members of the MEK

A group of former members condemn hunger strike in Camp Liberty

A number of former members of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization issued a statement to seriously condemn “forced and useless hunger strike” in Temporary Transit Location; Camp Liberty. They considerMaryam and Massoud Rajavi- leaders of the group as responsible for the lives of imprisoned residents of the Camp.

Former members of the MKO notify that in the MKO no activity is done unless it is ordered by the group leaders. “In fact, all political and propaganda affairs including self immolations and hunger strikes are basically organized acts and actually under the order of the leadership and members are due to execute them,” the signatories of the statement reveal.

These defectors of the cult of Rajavi who base their allegation on what they witnessed and experienced in the MKO warned about the seriously poisonous atmosphere of the organization where members are deprived from their basic rights and even their power of thought and freewill.

They emphasized that the forced hunger strike in the MKO is “a significant example of violation of human rights” thus; they urged the international community to take action against the authorities of the MKO in order to prevent a human disaster in Camp Liberty. They also asked political activists and Iranian nation to condemn the atrocities of the MKO leaders asking,” Why Massoud and Maryam Rajavi do not go on hunger strike?”

Nejat Society

December 1, 2013 0 comments

MEK Camp Ashraf

UNHCR urges states to relocate former residents of Camp Ashraf

Press Releases, 19 November 2013

The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) calls for renewed efforts from states to relocate former Camp Ashraf residents, also known as Camp New Iraq.

Since the 1 September 2013 attack on Camp New Iraq where 52 residents died, there has been limited progress in moving the remaining residents to a third country. UNHCR encourages all Member States to share in the international efforts, admit residents and offer them a long-term solution.

UNHCR and the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI) also call upon the Government of Iraq to take all possible measures to ensure the safety of the residents. UNHCR and UNAMI remain gravely concerned about the fate of seven missing individuals formerly residing in Camp New Iraq who disappeared on 1 September and call on the authorities to locate them, ensure their wellbeing and safeguard them against any forcible return.

Since 2011, UNHCR, together with UNAMI, has been engaged in an effort to find relocation opportunities outside Iraq for some 3,200 former residents of Camp New Iraq. In total, UNHCR has so far been able to secure the relocation to third countries of 300 residents.

November 24, 2013 0 comments

Britain may admit 17 Liberty residents with no links to terrorism

Menzies Campbell (North East Fife, Liberal Democrat)

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department pursuant to the answer of 10 June 2013, Official Report, column 84W, on Iraq: Iran, what the current immigration status is of the 52 residents of Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty who are seeking resettlement in the UK.

Mark Harper (Forest of Dean, Conservative)

None of the 52 residents of Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty who were previously settled in the UK have any current immigration status here. We have agreed to consider, exceptionally, their re-admission as refugees, subject to a UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) assessment of each individual to ensure that none have been complicit in acts of terrorism or other activities incompatible with refugee status. Thus far, UNHCR have submitted 17 assessments to the Home Office. No decisions have yet been reached.

October 31, 2013 0 comments

Camp Liberty

Practical solution to resolve Liberty residents’ situation

The Mujahedin Khalq is no more welcomed in Iraq. The group’s alliance with Saddam Hussein and the innumerable crimes it committed which continued even after the dictators’ overthrow and also their Practical solution to resolve the Liberty residents’ situation resistance to end the several years of illegal occupancy of a piece of Iraq land caused the wrath of the Iraqi nation and consequently led to a sequence of attacks on Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty which resulted in the deaths and injuries to numerous camps residents.

The calamity the Mujahedin Khalq is trapped in caused whoever in concern of the members of the group to be worried about their fate.

The suffering families who have for a long time been deprived to visit their loved ones are more worried than before.

Former members of the MKO who managed to escape the Cult are also restless to see their friends in danger. Over and over they have told their stories to the world, asking international organizations to help those entrapped physically and mentally within the Rajavis’ Cult.

After the deadly incidents in camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty both families and defectors wrote letters and petitions to due international bodies asking for help to find a practical solution to save the residents of the camps.

The UN High Commissioner for Refugees has several times reiterated the need for the Camp Liberty residents relocation to third countries and has opened several ways for talks with a number of European states in a bid to find a third party to host the Mujahedin Khalq. António Guterres, UNHCR chief insisted: “The residents of Camp Hurriya urgently need solutions to relocate out of Iraq".[1]

EU High Representative Catherine Ashton also called the Permanent resettlement outside Iraq as the only solution.[2]

UN Chief announced a trust fund initiative to help relocate residents of Camp Liberty. Ban ki-moon reiterated the necessity to “pick up the pace of the relocation”. [3]

The United States welcomed the UN initiative and through a statement announced the US plan to donate $1 million to the fund. Marie Harf, the US Deputy Department Spokesperson said: We share the conviction that relocation is the only lasting means of guaranteeing the safety and well-being of those residing at Camp Hurriya. [4]

Thus it seems that all parties concerned have reached to the consensus that the only way to resolve situation of Camp Liberty residents is to relocate them somewhere out of Iraq.

However there are two main obstacles on the way of the Camp residents’ relocation, one of which is the reluctance of third countries to house former terrorists as refugees. What is just before their eyes is the group’s past violent history and anti-social behaviors. So far just three countries Belgium, Germany and Albania have offered to accept a small number of Liberty residents.

Yet the main barrier on the way of the relocation process is unwillingness of the leaders of the Organization.

Martin Kobler, the former Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Iraq, several times deplored the lack of cooperation of the residents and of their leadership with the UNHCR and UN monitors. In an interview with The Associated Press in Baghdad kobler said that “residents of an Iranian dissident camp are denied freedom of movement by the exile group.”[5]

Wendy Sherman, the Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs also noted that the MEK’s leadership in Paris was obstructing the process to resettle MEK members.[6]

The MEK’s leadership demand is that the members be allowed to relocate together as a single unit, rather than to be relocated individually to different countries. In this way they can preserve the cult hegemony on members and prevent their defection.

The UN Trust Fund according to the UN chief statement is “to cover costs relating to the relocation process”. The UN Chief urged states to contribute to the fund.[7]

Conversely the point is that what is really hindering the relocation process is unwillingness of the MKO leaders rather than lack of fund.

The MKO launched multimillion-dollar campaign to bury the MEK’s bloody history of bombings and assassinations.

The group spends large sums of money to arrange Maryam Rajavi travels to European countries and to stage events to launch its propaganda campaign to direct the attentions to the ambitions of the leaders of the group.

If the Americans are really worried about the fate of residents of Camp Liberty they should put forth to convince the MKO leaders to let members participate and complete due processes and use the safe and secure relocation opportunities rather than donating for it. The US can also step forward to take at least a number of Temporary Transit Location residents to its own country.

By: A .Sepinoud

References:

[1] Bobb, Donn, UNHCR welcomes Albanian offer to Hurriya residents, unmultimedia.org, March 2013

[2]Office of Catherine Ashton, European Union, EU welcomes Albanian offer, Fully supports Kobler efforts, March 21, 2013

[3] UN News Center, Iraq: launching new trust fund, UN chief urges relocation of Champ Hurriya residents, October 23, 2013

[4] U.S. Department of State, Press Statement, U.S. Pledges Support to UN Trust Fund for Resettlement of Camp Hurriya Residents, Marie Harf, Deputy Department Spokesperson, Office of the Spokesperson Washington, DC, October 24, 2013

[5]Associated Press, UN Iraq rep urges exile cooperation, June26, 2013

[6] NIAC, MEK leader in Paris obstructing the process to resettle members, October 4,2013

[7] UN News Center, Iraq: launching new trust fund, UN chief urges relocation of Champ Hurriya residents, October 23, 2013

October 28, 2013 0 comments

USA

U.S. Pledges Support to UN Trust Fund

U.S. Pledges Support to UN Trust Fund for Resettlement of Camp Hurriya Residents

Press Statement

Marie Harf

Deputy Department Spokesperson, Office of the Spokesperson

Washington, DC

October 24, 2013

The United States welcomes the establishment of the United Nations Trust Fund to support the resettlement of individuals currently residing at Camp Hurriya in Iraq. We are pleased to announce that the United States plans to provide $1 million to the UN Trust Fund. The Administration will continue to work with the U.S. Congress regarding these funds. The United States hopes other countries will also support this important humanitarian effort.

We share the conviction that relocation is the only lasting means of guaranteeing the safety and well-being of those residing at Camp Hurriya. Achieving this goal has become an ever more urgent humanitarian imperative in the aftermath of deadly attacks on Camp Hurriya in February and June of this year, and the horrific attack on individuals at Camp Ashraf in September. We also continue to support the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in their efforts to resettle the residents of Camp Hurriya outside of Iraq.

The United States is actively engaged in working with the international community to move the UNHCR-led relocation process forward. To that end, the Department of State recently appointed Jonathan Winer as Senior Advisor for Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) Resettlement, to oversee our efforts towards resettling the residents of Camp Hurriya to safe, permanent and secure locations outside of Iraq as soon as possible.

October 26, 2013 0 comments

Ban Ki-moon to resolve situation of Camp Liberty residents

Ban Ki-moon committed to resolving situation of former residents of Iraq camp

BAN KI-MO Ban Ki-moon to resolve situation of residents of Camp Liberty ON COMMITTED TO RESOLVING SITUATION OF FORMER RESIDENTS OF IRAQ CAMP, TRUST FUND LAUNCHED

•The Secretary-General is committed to resolving the situation faced by the former residents of Camp New Iraq (Ashraf) – now residents of Camp Hurriya (Liberty) – in accordance with international human rights and humanitarian standards.

•He has taken note of the letters and other expressions of concern over their well-being and safety, from parliamentarians, political figures, civil society groups, and private individuals.

•Energies should be focused urgently now on the relocation of the residents of Camp Hurriya to safe and secure locations outside of Iraq. This is the only durable and sustainable solution. While the Secretary-General welcomes the generous offers by Member States that have enabled 240 out of the 3,174 individuals to settle outside of the country, it is essential to pick up the pace of the relocation. The Secretary-General calls on other Member States to follow suit and to offer residents the opportunity for safe relocation.

•In this connection, the United Nations is launching a Trust Fund initiative to cover costs relating to the relocation process. The Secretary-General appeals to Member States to contribute to this Fund.

•The Secretary-General reiterates the continued responsibility of the Government of Iraq to ensure the safety and security of the residents during their stay in Camp Hurriya.

Office of Spokesperson for the Secretary-General

October 26, 2013 0 comments

Germany

33 residents of Camp Liberty relocated in Germany

An official of Iraqi Foreign Ministry declared that 33 members of the Mujahedin Khalq Organization (the MKO) were received as refugees by German government, according to news reports. 33 residents of Camp Liberty relocated in Germany

The Iraqi official stated that the German government, on Saturday, October 12th, received 33 residents of Camp Liberty.”We hope that we manage to accomplish the relocation process of Liberty residents in near future resettling them in third countries,” he said.

He also noted that some of these individuals, who were interviewed by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, suffer from distressed mental state and fear their stay in Iraq.

Germany had previously announced its preparation to accept 100 members of the Mujahedin Khalq terrorist organization.By the first convoy seven residents of Camp Liberty transfered to Germany in July 2013.

October 15, 2013 0 comments

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