After ten days of a stand-off, a small group of Iranian families have staged a sit-in outside the gates of Camp Ashraf in Diyala province in Iraq . The families’ simple, straightforward and only demand is that they be able to meet with their relatives who are trapped inside the camp.
Families came from Iran to Iraq to meet their children who are members of the Mojahedin Khalq and who for years have been held captive by the organization’s leaders in Camp Ashraf.
In what can only be interpreted as an attempt to assert their hegemony over their terrorists in Iraq, fifteen American soldiers arrived yesterday (March 01, 2010) in armoured vehicles at the gates of Camp New Iraq (formerly Ashraf) to confront the families who have established a long-term picket there.
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| Families to US army: bring Obama himself and we will not be intimidated |
The families have travelled from Iran and other countries to demand that the MKO leaders allow their children to meet with them. The MKO have refused and have bunkered down out of fear. Now the Americans have had to intervene on their behalf to try to send the families away.
The Americans were accompanied by three MKO personnel who acted as translators and who hid their faces so they would not be recognized. The Americans and the translators tried to approach the families to get information from them and film them, but Iraqi soldiers advised the families to keep their distance.
Hourieh Mohammadi from Canada, who is in Iraq to find her sister, used a loudspeaker to inform the Americans of the families’ demands. She told them ‘even if you bring Mr. Obama himself here I will not leave until I have found my sister’.
Iraqi officers at the camp said they will not take action now but the role of the Americans in this situation has been noted. The Iraqi’s have assured the families that if the intimidation becomes more invasive, they will certainly step in to protect them.
The Mojahedin Khalq Organisation (MEK, MKO) has refused to grant meetings to the families who have came from Iran to Iraq to meet their children who are members of the Mojahedin Khalq and who for years have been held captive by the organization’s leaders in Camp Ashraf.
Mojahedin leaders did not allow the families who came from Iran to Iraq with the consent and support of the Iraqi government to Camp Ashraf in Diyala province since last month, to meet with their children who are in Camp Ashraf in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad and who have been detained by the Organization since the eighties of the last century with the cooperation and support of the former regime.
The protest surprised officials of the Organization who refuse to allow members of the Organization meet relatives for fear they will leave the organization and Camp Ashraf and return to their homeland and their families. The Organisation launched excuses such as lack of names required for the interview between the elements of the organization, or failure of the children themselves to desire to meet with their families and their refusal to communicate with their families and their relatives.
Sources said that the Iraqi government has sought the presence of the delegation of the United Nations and International Red Cross and international human rights organization to hold direct negotiations with the leaders of the organization. The Iraqi government continued throughout the last month to convince them of the need to deal with this situation in a humane and approved way to allow meeting between Iranian families and their children, and not to accept false statements and counterfeit, which accuses the Iraqi government of violating human rights laws. The failed negotiations have resulted in the rejection of the absolute leaders of the organization to this humanitarian initiative.
Ultimately, to reach an end to the sit-in by dozens of Iranian families outside the gates of Camp Ashraf, the Iraqi government and international community must intervene to pressure the leaders of the organization in Camp Ashraf in order to allow meetings with their children and allow them to make personal decisions in response to their emotions and their sensations.
translated by Iran Interlink
Declaration of Ancient Iran Association in solidarity with the Cult’s victims families
Ancient Iran ,Glorious future Association declares its solidarity with the honorable families who have been waiting behind the closed gates of notorious Ashraf Garrison to meet with their loved ones for almost a month .
The cult’s dictator leaders who are terrified of giving permission to any meetings and visitations to their members, have hampered of families’ meeting with their loved ones up to now . Face to face Meeting and visitation is everyone’s legal right and according to that the leaders of this cult must allow their victims to meet with their families.
The Ancient Iran , Glorious Future Association based on its humane task urge and entreat of all humanitarian organizations and Iranian freedom lovers as well as the critics and separated members of this cult for their solidarity with those sad families who have been in sit- in for days behind the closed gates of Ashraf Garrison. In this regard notifying all humanitarian organization such as UNHCR, Amnesty International, ICRC, Human Rights Watch and get in touch with Press and Media throughout the world are the first priority to help these families.
Respectfully
Ancient Iran, Paris
Seyed Yousef Jarfi and Abdolghader Ostadi escape the Washington backed terror group in Iraq – Rajavi cult – to join families picketing outside Camp Ashraf
(Mr. Seyed Yousef Jafari and Mr. Abdolghader Ostadi joined the Picket)
Reporters from Iraqi and International media are at the gates of Camp Ashraf to report on a protracted stand-off between the leaders of the terrorist cult Mojahedin-e Khalq and the families of residents held hostage in the camp. The families are demanding to meet with their relatives.
The MKO have refused. The MKO leadership enforces strict isolation on its members and does not allow them to leave the camp or have access to media or communications. Because of this, their families have not had news or met up for over twenty-five years.
Since the MKO was forced to disarm by US forces in 2003, many people have travelled from all over the world hoping to find their lost relatives held hostage by the Rajavi cult. Now a group of families have vowed to stay at the gates until Iraqi officials and the international community take notice of the grave human rights abuses committed by the Washington backed terrorist group against their family members.
For some of the families, this is not the first attempt to find their relatives. Mohammad Mohammadi has travelled many times from Canada to Iraq to rescue his daughter. Somayeh Mohammadi was taken to Iraq by the MKO when she was 17 at the time of Saddam Hussein and has not been allowed to leave since. This time her sister, Hourieh has joined her father in the rescue bid. Hourieh told reporters, “This time I will not leave until I take my sister with me. We are determined to free her from this cult”.
Employing its usual propaganda blitz, the Mojahedin leaders are convincing Western media and political circles that these families are dangerous, evil agents of the Iranian Intelligence Ministry who have come to suppress the Mojahedin. But media reports direct from the camp entrance tell a different story.
Al Iraqia TV channel broadcast a full report on its 8 pm news programme yesterday.
According to media reports from Baghdad two members of the Mojahedin were able to break away from the Rajavi cult and join the families in their picket outside the camp. Mr. Seyed Yousef Jafari from Ahwaz and Mr. Abdolghader Ostadi from Iranshahr spoke to reporters about their own ordeal as long-term captives inside the camp.
They expressed their joy at gaining their freedom and claimed the Mojahedin Khalq leaders have been deeply involved the murder and torture of Iraqi civilians and have carried out scores of terrorist activities during their stay in Iraq. They say they have unequivocal evidence to prove their claims. Iraq’s Judiciary is already investigating the many crimes committed by the leaders of this terrorist group.
The Mojahedin Khalq Organisation (Saddam Private Army) was disarmed by US military in 2003 as an enemy force, but the Pentagon ordered the US military to protect the group until the hand over of security to Iraqis in January 2009 despite the fact that the group has been listed as a terrorist entity in the US since 1997.
A report by RAND in August 2009 about the failings of the US army in dealing properly with the Mojahedin Khalq, said that 14 US army personnel were killed and up to 60 injured while providing protective escort services to the terrorist group’s leaders on their shopping trips to Baghdad.
MKO supreme leader Massoud Rajavi has been in hiding (believed to be under the protection of the CIA in Iraq) ever since the occupation. His second-in-command and 3rd wife Maryam Rajavi was discovered and arrested in Paris in 2003 where she was hiding with millions of dollars allegedly stolen from the central bank of Iraq.
Reporters from Iraqi and International media are at the gates of Camp Ashraf to report on a protracted stand-off between the leaders of the terrorist cult Mojahedin-e Khalq and the families of residents held hostage in the camp. The families are demanding to meet with their relatives.
The MKO have refused. The MKO leadership enforces strict isolation on its members and does not allow them to leave the camp or have access to media or communications. Because of this, their families have not had news or met up for over twenty-five years.
Dear Mr. Talebani, President of the Republic of Iraq
We, some of the families of the residents of Camp New Iraq (formerly Ashraf) have been denied access to our children for over 20 years due to the deceitful policies of the Mojahedin Khalq Organisation.
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| Families of some of the captives in Camp Ashraf, Outside the gate, February 2010 |
We have gathered from different places such as Iran, Canada, … in the land of Iraq to visit our loved ones. During the last two weeks of our stay here, the leaders of this organisation have refused our demand to meet our families on the direct order of Massoud Rajavi, fearing that such meetings may lead to the ability of our children to decide for themselves and break free from this organisation and join the free world.
We urge your good self, while condemning the anti-humane actions of Massoud Rajavi, to order the facilitation of free meetings between ourselves and our children.
Families of some of the captives in Camp Ashraf
February 18, 2010
CC:
Mr. Noori Al Maliki, Prime Minister of Iraq
Ms. Vojdan Michel, Human Rights Minister of Iraq
Mr. Ad Melkert, UN representative in Iraq
After ten days of a stand-off, a small group of Iranian families have staged a sit-in outside the gates of Camp Ashraf in Diyala province in Iraq. The families’ simple, straightforward and only demand is that they be able to meet with their relatives who are trapped inside the camp. Camp Ashraf still houses around 3500 members of the terrorist Mojahedin-e Khalq organisation which the Government of Iraq plans to remove from the country.
From the start, Iraqi security forces who guard Camp Ashraf would not allow the families to enter the camp because they could not guarantee their safety. Instead, the Iraqis told the MKO to release the handful of individuals concerned to meet with their families before returning to the camp.
So far the Mojahedin leaders are not cooperating. The MKO’s immediate reaction to the family visits was to state that “agents of the clerical regime’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security are being dispatched to Camp Ashraf under the cover of family members of Ashraf residents, the Iraqi committee responsible for suppression of the residents, under the instructions of Nouri al-Maliki, has intensified cruel and inhumane siege on Ashraf”.
Iraqis urged to help relatives outside Camp Ashraf
After ten days of a stand-off, a small group of Iranian families have staged a sit-in outside the
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| After ten days of a stand-off, a small group of Iranian families have staged a sit-in outside the gates of Camp Ashraf in Diyala province in Iraq |
gates of Camp Ashraf in Diyala province in Iraq. The families’ simple, straightforward and only demand is that they be able to meet with their relatives who are trapped inside the camp. Camp Ashraf still houses around 3500 members of the terrorist Mojahedin-e Khalq organisation which the Government of Iraq plans to remove from the country. From the start, Iraqi security forces who guard Camp Ashraf would not allow the families to enter the camp because they could not guarantee their safety. Instead, the Iraqis told the MKO to release the handful of individuals concerned to meet with their families before returning to the camp.
So far the Mojahedin leaders are not cooperating. The MKO’s immediate reaction to the family visits was to state that “agents of the clerical regime’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security are being dispatched to Camp Ashraf under the cover of family members of Ashraf residents, the Iraqi committee responsible for suppression of the residents, under the instructions of Nouri al-Maliki, has intensified cruel and inhumane siege on Ashraf”.
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| A quote from Massoud Rajavi stated that members were not allowed to visit with their families even if an MKO minder was present. |
The MKO’s advocates in Britain and America also joined the fray and demanded of their respective governments to intervene to stop the Iraqis harassing them and to ‘protect the human rights of Camp Ashraf’s residents’. But, in all these cries for help, no mention was made that it was the MKO leaders who were not allowing the members to leave the camp and visit with their families outside the camp.
Although responsibility for Camp Ashraf was transferred to the Government of Iraq on January 1 2009, America still maintains a unit of 25 soldiers inside the camp to protect the MKO – which is on the US terrorism list. However, in this latest episode of family visits, the Americans refused to challenge Iraqi jurisdiction. Iraqi soldiers have not allowed the families to go inside the camp, but nor have they attempted to prevent their sit-in.
Finally, two days ago on the 19th February, the MKO admitted in their website Iran Efshaa’gar that
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| “up until now we didn’t want to make a fuss. We believed that if we avoided any publicity or confrontation, the MKO would co-operate out of humanity. Now we have stayed a week and they don’t let us visit so we will sit here until we find out what happened to our children. We demand that Iraqis do something to help us.” |
the families and not ‘agents of the Iranian regime’ were the real problem and that the MKO itself was refusing to let the members have contact with their families.
A quote from Massoud Rajavi stated that members were not allowed to visit with their families even if an MKO minder was present. This is a new development. In previous attempts to have family visits, the MKO would not allow members out because of the fear they would run away. Now, the leaders have ruled that families are not even allowed to come inside the camp under supervision.
One of the relatives waiting outside Camp Ashraf told Iran-Interlink’s representative in Baghdad, “up until now we didn’t want to make a fuss. We believed that if we avoided any publicity or confrontation, the MKO would co-operate out of humanity. Now we have stayed a week and they don’t let us visit so we will sit here until we find out what happened to our children. We demand that Iraqis do something to help us.”
The simple demand of these families is to know if their relatives inside Camp Ashraf are alive or dead, healthy or ill; in what state are they living if they are not allowed to visit their mothers or fathers.
Ultimately, the MKO leaders have no legal jurisdiction over Camp Ashraf or its residents. It is the Americans who still have 25 soldiers inside camp to protect them and the Government of Iraqi who are responsible to answer these families concerns. The families have begun meeting with human rights groups and journalists to explain their dilemma. With all the problems which Iraq faces, it is hoped that the Government will be able quickly to resolve this minor situation to the satisfaction of all the responsible parties.