Germany’s Ambassador to Iraq Britta Wagner said her government supports expulsion of the member of the terrorist Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) from Iraq.
According to a report by Buratha news website, Wagner praised in a statement the performance of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI) in monitoring transfer of the MKO members from Camp Ashraf, the terrorist group’s main training camp in Iraq, to the Camp Liberty, a transient settlement facility in Iraq.
"I would like to express the full support of the German federal government to the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI) that has monitored the transfer of Camp Ashraf residents to Camp Liberty," she said.
The MKO, founded in the 1960s, blended elements of Islamism and Stalinism and participated in the overthrow of the US-backed Shah of Iran in 1979. Ahead of the revolution, the MKO conducted attacks and assassinations against both Iranian and Western targets.
The group started assassination of the citizens and officials after the revolution in a bid to take control of the newly-established Islamic Republic. It killed several of Iran’s new leaders in the early years after the revolution, including the then President, Mohammad Ali Rajayee, Prime Minister, Mohammad Javad Bahonar and the Judiciary Chief, Mohammad Hossein Beheshti who were killed in bomb attacks by MKO members in 1981.
The group fled to Iraq in 1986, where it was protected by Saddam Hussein and where it helped the Iraqi dictator suppress Shiite and Kurd uprisings in the country.
The terrorist group joined Saddam’s army during the Iraqi imposed war on Iran (1980-1988) and helped Saddam and killed thousands of Iranian civilians and soldiers during the US-backed Iraqi imposed war on Iran.
Since the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, the group, which now adheres to a pro-free-market philosophy, has been strongly backed by neo-conservatives in the United States, who argued for the MKO to be taken off the US terror list.
The US formally removed the MKO from its list of terror organizations in early September, one week after Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sent the US Congress a classified communication about the move. The decision made by Clinton enabled the group to have its assets under US jurisdiction unfrozen and do business with American entities, the State Department said in a statement at the time.
In September 2012, the last groups of the MKO terrorists left Camp Ashraf, their main training center in Iraq’s Diyala province. They have been transferred to Camp Liberty which lies Northeast of the Baghdad International Airport.
Iraqi professor: USA and a few Iraqi officials back the Mujahedin e-Khalq organization and try to keep the terrorist group in Iraq for a while.
Referring to the U.S. role in the region’s instabilities, Seyyed Mohammad Javad Hasheminejad addressed the 
recent developments in the region and threats facing the nations in a friendly meeting with a delegation of Iraqi university Professors and scholars and said: “After the new Iraqi government came to power, the Americans found the developments in Iraq against their will and started to support and enhance terrorist groups to destroy the country’s security, they promoted the very same thing they had apparently came to fight.”
Habilian’s Secretary General added: “One of the most destructive terrorist groups in Iraq is Mujahedin e-Khalq organization. As though the group is acknowledged by the USA and other western countries as the sample of murder and crime and it is hated by Iraqi and Iranian nations since it has assassinated many innocent people in both countries, the United States is MEK’s most prominent supporter in Iraq.”
After Hasheminejad’s speech, Ali Abood Ne’emeh, a member of the Iraqi delegation, pointed out recent Islamic movements and said: “We believe the Islamic movements in Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq,… wouldn’t have succeeded without Islamic Republic of Iran’s help and support and we have to thank you for this. We also appreciate our leaders who had a very impressive role in the movement of people.
Dr. Rashid Hussein, a university professor in Iraq, referred to the deep, ancient ties between Iran and Iraq and said:” Of course sometimes foreign factors cause problems for the ties between the two countries, but whenever these foreign factors are removed, the ties will be normal again.”
In another part of his speech he addressed the Imperial governments’ wickedness and stated: “The conspiracy of imperial governments is too obvious in the region and it has always existed. What is now happening in the Islamic Wakening countries is a good proof for this. These are due to foreign and imperial intervention.
Dr. Hussein added: “The Iraqi people don’t ever tolerate the MEK, but unfortunately some Iraqi officials and the United States back the group and want them to stay in Iraq for a while.”
He pointed out the American propaganda and said: “We know what the USA is seeking in the world. But unfortunately they are using their propaganda machines and false advertisement to claim they have come to Iraq for Human Rights. They can easily promote themselves since the media is at their disposal.”
At the end Dr.Rashid Hussein appreciated Habilian Association’s activities and included: “We are very happy to see NGOs are so active in Iran and hope we can use Iran’s experience in this field in our country. We are still at the beginning in Iraq. It is such a useful experience. Specifically about Habilian, it is so nice to support families of the people who have sacrificed themselves for your country. This would encourage Iranian people for further sacrifices in the future.”
United States uses MKO to spread terror and chaos inside Iran: Paul Sheldon Foote
Terrorist organizations are in the job of doing terror. In recent years they have been inside Iran conducting 
terrorist activities, bombing up places. The fact that they are Iranians, the fact that their native language is Persian means that they can move in and out of Iran a lot easier than anyone else could and so this would be a continuation of (the United States) using them inside Iran to kill people and blow up buildings.”
An analyst says the recent US, MKO meeting signifies that Washington is trying to use the organization for killings and bombings inside Iran as acts of terrorism are what terrorist groups typically do.
The comment comes as a bipartisan group of US congress members has met with the anti-Iran terrorist group Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO) in France.
The congressional team led by Dana Rohrabacher, a California Republican, met the MKO terrorists in Paris on Sunday and expressed strong support for the group.
The MKO is listed as a terrorist organization by much of the international community.
On September 28, the terrorist group was taken off the US State Department’s terrorism blacklist a week after US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sent the US Congress a classified memo about the move.
Press TV has conducted an interview with Professor of California State University Paul Sheldon Foote to further discuss the issue. What follows is an approximate transcription of the interview.
Press TV: Sir welcome to the program. Well the MKO is well-known for carrying out a long list of terror acts. How do you see the sequence of events that led to Europe and the United States delisting the MKO from their list of terrorist organizations and also about the timing of this meeting in France?
Foote: The problem America has had for very many years is that the Iraqi government has said you say we are a free country now well why do we have to keep Iranian communists, free terrorists in our land and there have been frequent action for some of the Mujahidin cult terrorists have been killed by Iraqi troops.
So America keeps trying. It’s a real shame that Dana Rohrabacher who claims to be a Republican from Southern California is continued being reelected. It shows you how stupid Republican voters are when you have Republicans supporting communist terrorists.
Press TV: And what do you think the United States has in mind next for the MKO?
Foote: Terrorist organizations are in the job of doing terror. In recent years they have been inside Iran conducting terrorist activities, bombing up places. The fact that they are Iranians, the fact that their native language is Persian means that they can move in and out of Iran a lot easier than anyone else could and so this would be a continuation of using them inside Iran to kill people and blow up buildings.
An Iranian exile group attacked in Iraq this month has moved from terrorism lists to international good graces, but Baghdad wants it out over its opposition to Iran’s rulers and ties to Saddam Hussein.
On February 9, mortar rounds and rockets slammed into Camp Liberty, a former US military base near Baghdad that now houses some 3,000 members of the People’s Mujahedeen Organisation of Iran (PMOI), killing five people, according to Iraqi security officials.
The attack triggered condemnation from the United States and United Nations, but in Iraq officials are eager to see the group depart.
The PMOI’s "presence in Iraq is illegal and illegitimate," Ali Mussawi, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s spokesman, told AFP. "Their presence is rejected."
Iraqi political analyst Ihsan al-Shammari said the "nature of the relationship between the (Iraqi) Shiite political powers and Iran," Baghdad’s Shiite neighbour to the east with which it has close ties, is a key factor in Iraq’s insistence on the PMOI’s ouster.
Shammari also noted other factors including the PMOI’s links to executed dictator Saddam, under whose rule Iraq’s now-empowered Shiite majority was oppressed.
Saddam allowed the PMOI to establish a base called Camp Ashraf northeast of Baghdad after he launched the 1980-88 war with Iran, in which the group fought alongside his forces.
According to the US State Department, Saddam armed the group with "heavy military equipment and deployed thousands of (PMOI) fighters in suicidal, mass wave attacks against Iranian forces" near the end of the war.
Following the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, the PMOI turned over "2,000 tanks, armoured personnel carriers, and heavy artillery," the State Department said.
The group was also allegedly involved in Saddam’s violent suppression of 1991 Shiite and Kurdish uprisings in Iraq.
"The former regime used (the PMOI) to carry out repression" in Iraq, said Dr Adnan al-Saraj, who has written books about the group.
Saddam gave the PMOI four bases in Iraq, buildings in central Baghdad and other perks including Iraqi passports and free petrol, Saraj said.
Almost all PMOI members in Iraq have moved to Camp Liberty from Camp Ashraf, the last of their bases, as part of a UN-backed process that aims to see them resettled outside the country.
But after this month’s attack, the PMOI complained about the slow pace of the process, which has dragged on as few countries have come forward with concrete offers of resettlement.
The PMOI has not taken the move from Camp Ashraf, where some members have lived for decades, quietly, alleging Baghdad is acting at Tehran’s behest.
It has also criticised the UN’s assertion that the camp meets minimum humanitarian standards and complained about a variety of alleged shortcomings including restrictions on using forklift trucks, which it said amounted to "torture".
While not accepted in Iraq, the PMOI has made strides internationally.
The group, which was founded in the 1960s to oppose the shah of Iran but took up arms against the country’s new clerical rulers after the 1979 Islamic revolution, successfully campaigned for its removal from US and EU terrorism lists.
The PMOI said it renounced violence in 2001 after carrying out attacks in Iran and elsewhere for decades. It now issues deluges of statements to the media and has enlisted well-known western politicians and officials as advocates.
The language of the official US condemnation of the attack on Camp Liberty also indicates the progress made by the PMOI, which was listed as a "terrorist organisation" by Washington until last year and by the EU until 2009.
The US State Department condemned it as a "terrorist attack," and also referred to the attack as a "tragedy".
Although the PMOI has gained international acceptance, Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran expert and senior associate with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said the same is not true within Iran.
"They’re widely viewed as a backward and intolerant cult by their opposition peers in Iran," Sadjadpour said.
By W.G. Dunlop – Dailystar.com
THE US has rejected calls for Iranian exiles housed in a camp near Baghdad that came under mortar and rocket attack to be sent back to their former base near the Iranian border.
The death toll from Saturday’s assault on Camp Liberty, which houses about 3000 members of the opposition People’s Mujahedeen of Iran (MEK), has risen to seven, the group said.
Iraqi authorities are now investigating who was behind the attack, but the MEK and its supporters have called for the group to be allowed to return to their old base dating back to the 1980s – Camp Ashraf near the Iranian border.
"The answer for the individuals at (Camp Liberty) is not to relocate back to Ashraf, in our view," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.
"The only peaceful and durable solution for these individuals is resettlement outside Iraq, and that should continue to be the focus of everybody involved in this effort."
The camp residents were reluctantly and finally moved from Camp Ashraf last year, on Iraq’s insistence, as part of deal negotiated via the United Nations.
They are now in the process of being resettled, and it is understood the United States and several European countries have agreed to take them in.
Nuland said the United States has still not made any decisions on whether to accept any of the residents.
"We are now in the process of evaluating some of the referrals that UNHCR has sent our way, and we’re strongly, as I said, encouraging others to do the same," Nuland said.
The MEK was founded in the 1960s to oppose the shah of Iran and took up arms against Iran’s clerical rulers after the 1979 Islamic revolution that ousted the shah.
The group says it has now laid down its arms and is working to overthrow the Islamic regime in Tehran by peaceful means.
Britain struck the group off its terror list in June 2008, followed by the European Union in 2009 and the United States in September.
France expressed support over transferring members of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization outside Iraq, underlining its readiness to take part in coordination with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
Iranian Fars news agency quoted French Foreign Ministry Spokesman Philippe Lalliot as saying that his country supports the UN plan to move the MKO to a third country.
Head of an Iraqi human rights group had said that Iraq seeks to try in absentia the members of the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO, also known as the MEK, NCR and PMOI) in Iraq.
He said the people of Tuz Khurmato, who are victims of the MKO and the trial is going to be held in their city, expressed happiness and satisfaction over the issue.
Six people were killed and more than 50 were wounded on Saturday when several dozen mortar shells fell on a refugee camp for members of an Iranian opposition group, according to an Iraqi police official.
The camp, on the site of a former American military base near the Baghdad airport known as Camp Liberty, is home to about 3,400 Iranian exiles who are members of Mujahedeen Khalq, or M.E.K., a militant organization. It was removed from the State Department’s terrorist list in September after years of intensive lobbying from prominent American politicians and former military officers, who viewed the group as a legitimate democratic alternative to the Iranian government.
In an e-mail sent to news media outlets in Iraq, the military wing of Hezbollah in Iraq, a militant organization believed to have connections to the main Lebanese group and to Iran, claimed responsibility for the attack and warned that others would follow.
Although Hezbollah in Iraq was active during the American military presence there, attacks by the group died down after the Americans left, and its leaders said they would lay down arms and join the political process. But in an ominous sign that a recent spate of deadly sectarian conflicts in Iraq might escalate, the group announced at a recent news conference that it was establishing a militia to fight Sunni groups that had been attacking Shiites. Camp Liberty is meant to be a temporary residence for the Iranian refugees while the United Nations works to find host countries for them. In a statement issued from Geneva, the United Nations high commissioner for refugees, António Guterres, called the attack “a despicable act of violence” and said the residents of the camp were asylum seekers entitled to international protection.
In a statement, the M.E.K. accused the Iranian government and Iraqi forces of being behind the attack, and said the Iraqi government had recently removed the blast walls surrounding the camp, leaving the refugees unsafe. The group said that more than 100 had been injured in the shelling and that its demands to return to its previous location in Iraq, Camp Ashraf, had been ignored.
“The residents and their representatives have warned about a massacre by the Iranian regime and the Iraqi forces,” the statement said, “and demanded several times from the secretary general of the United Nations and U.S. officials to return to Camp Ashraf, where concrete buildings and shelters are available.”
Ali al-Moussawi, an Iraqi government spokesman, denied that Baghdad was involved, saying the accusation from the M.E.K. “is not the first time when they blame us for everything.”
The United Nations demanded that the Iraqi government open an investigation, saying in a statement that Martin Kobler, the United Nations special representative for Iraq, “called on the Iraqi authorities to immediately ensure medical care for the wounded.”
The M.E.K. had long resisted leaving Camp Ashraf, on land that had been set aside by Saddam Hussein, the toppled Iraqi dictator, and did so only because the United States made it a condition of dropping the group’s terrorist designation. An American official said in August that the M.E.K. had been using Camp Ashraf for paramilitary training.
The group carried out bombings in Iran in the 1970s against the shah’s government and later against the Islamic government, causing the death of several Americans, but by most accounts it has not engaged in terrorism in recent years. But Iraq’s current government, a close ally of Iran, views the M.E.K. as a terrorist group and wants it out of the country.
By YASIR GHAZI
Expressing disapprobation of the terrorist Mujahedin-e Khalq group’s presence in Iraq, head of the Iraqi 
parliamentary committee on martyrs and political prisoners said that, if compelled, they would extradite MKO members to Iran.
“The United Nations should expedite the process of their expulsion from Iraq,” Muhammad al-Hindawi said, as quoted by FNA, Habilian Association reported.
“One day we may be forced to hand the MKO elements over to the government of Iran,” he said, adding that nobody in Iraq thinks about aggression against MKO members held in the country, but they have to leave Iraqi soil.
The Iraqi MP finally concluded that the government of Iraq is not responsible for the lives of these people, as it has not granted them political asylum.
Earlier this week, the temporary home of some 3000 MKO members came under mortar attack, leaving 6 dead and dozens injured.
In an e-mail sent to news media outlets in Iraq, the military wing of Hezbollah in Iraq, claimed responsibility for the attack and warned that others would follow, NY times reported.
The High Commissioner for Refugees, António Guterres expresses his shock about this 
morning’s mortar attack on Camp Liberty in Iraq that reportedly killed six and wounded dozens.
"I strongly condemn this attack," Mr. Guterres said, noting that the residents of Camp Liberty are asylum seekers undergoing the refugee status determination process and thus entitled to international protection. "This is a despicable act of violence."
"I call on the Iraqi Government to do everything it can to guarantee security to the residents," he said. "The perpetrators must be found and brought to justice without delay," he said.
The High Commissioner also calls on all countries to help find urgent solutions for the Camp Liberty residents.
Mr. Guterres expresses his deep condolences to the families of the victims.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today strongly condemned a mortar attack on an Iranian exile camp near Iraq’s 
capital, Baghdad, which reportedly killed six people and injured several others.
According to media reports, the Hurriya camp, formerly known as Camp Liberty, was attacked this morning while most of the residents were sleeping. Iraqi police officers were among the wounded.
The camp serves as a transit facility for more than 3,000 exiles, most of them members of a group known as the People’s Mojahedeen of Iran, where a process to determine their refugee status is being carried out by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
Camp residents were previously situated at Camp Ashraf in eastern Iraq, but were relocated last year, in line with an agreement signed in December 2011 between the UN and the Iraqi Government.
“The Secretary-General calls on the Government of Iraq, which is responsible for the safety and security of residents of both Camp Liberty and Camp Ashraf, to promptly and fully investigate the incident and bring perpetrators to justice,” said Mr. Ban’s spokesperson in a statement. “He has repeatedly stated that violence and provocation are unacceptable.”
Mr. Ban also reiterated the UN’s strong commitment to continue its long-standing efforts to facilitate a peaceful and durable solution for residents of both camps.
The High Commissioner for Refugees, António Guterres, expressed his shock about the attack calling it “a despicable act of violence.”
“I call on the Iraqi Government to do everything it can to guarantee security to the residents,” he said. “The perpetrators must be found and brought to justice without delay.”
In a news release, the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI) said it is closely liaising with the Government on the response to the incident, including medical assistance to the wounded.
Mr. Ban’s Special Representative in the country, Martin Kobler, has also asked Iraqi authorities to promptly conduct an investigation into the mortar explosions.