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In this Issue:
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Iraqi forces prevent delivery of fuel to Camp Ashraf,
NCRI Press Release,
November 5, 2009
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Dozens of Iraqi lawmakers boycott
meeting with Larijani, NCRI
Website, November 6, 2009
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Listen and you can hear the chains of
religious tyranny torn asunder,
The Global Politician, November 1, 2009
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Dissident Iranians live in limbo in Iraq,
National Public Radio, November 2,
2009
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Iraqi Government falls prey to abhorrent
plots of Iranian regime against Ashraf residents,
NCRI Press Release, October 31,
2009
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"Protected persons are entitled, in all circumstances, to respect for their
persons, their honour, their family rights, their religious convictions and
practices, and their manners and customs.”
Article 27 of the Fourth Geneva Convention
“In no circumstances shall a protected person be transferred to a country where
he or she may have reason to fear persecution for his or her political opinions
or religious beliefs.”
Article 45 of the Fourth Geneva Convention
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Iraqi forces prevent
delivery of fuel to Camp Ashraf
NCRI Press Release
Thursday, November 5, 2009
NCRI - Iraqi forces, in their continued cruel and inhumane siege of Camp Ashraf,
prevented entry of two fuel tankers into the Camp on Wednesday. They arrested
their drivers and transferred them to a detention center in the city of Khalis
near Ashraf and seized their tankers. Iraqi forces said that no fuel should be
allowed into the Camp any more.
For the past 10 months, since the beginning of this year when the American
forces transferred the protection of Camp Ashraf to Iraq, the Iraqi forces have
imposed a blockade against Camp Ashraf at the behest of the dictatorship ruling
Iran.
The Iraqi forces have been preventing the entry of most basic commodities to the
Camp and do not allow the families and lawyers of Ashraf residents, human rights
activists, and parliamentarians to go to Ashraf.
In the meantime, Ali Larijani, Speaker of mullahs’ parliament, called for
extradition of members of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI) to
Iran. Upon his arrival in Iraq on Wednesday in a visit to the Parliament, he
praised the Iraqi Government for suppression and murder of Ashraf residents and
said: “The Government of Iraq has taken many steps vis-à-vis the PMOI but this
kind of organization should not be allowed on Iraqi soil.” While defying
international laws, he added: “Most of those in this grouplet are criminals
according to international laws and must be extradited to Iran.”...
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Dozens of Iraqi lawmakers boycott meeting with Larijani
NCRI Website
Friday, November 06, 2009
NCRI - Close to a hundred Iraqi parliamentarians boycotted a meeting with the
Iranian regime’s Speaker of Parliament who is currently visiting Iraq, according
to al-Sharqiya TV on Wednesday. They called Larijani the representative of
Iraq’s occupation by Iran.
The TV report added, “Member of Parliament called on Iyad Samarrai, the Speaker
of Iraqi Parliament, who greeted Larijani upon his arrival to Iraq, to submit to
him a list of allegations about Iranian involvement in Iraqi political and
security affairs. These lawmakers asked al- Samarrai to represent all foreign
affairs officials in the meeting.”
Al-Sharqiya added: Some sources say that Larijani has given a green light to the
joining of Iraqi National Coalition and the government Law Coalition. The
sources said the joining of forces is on Larijani’s agenda...
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Listen and you can hear the
chains of religious tyranny torn asunder
The Global Politician
By Shahriar Kia
November 1, 2009
The recent uprising of the Iranian people following sham elections in Iran, the
formidable confrontation between the Iranian people and its Resistance on the
one hand and the Iranian regime on the other, as well as the recent attacks
against the People’s Mujahedeen of Iran aimed at destroying their camp in
northern Iraq and extraditing its residents to Iran highlighted three major
realities more than ever:
First - the simmering social conditions on the ground, which characterize the
Iranian nation’s readiness for democratic change;
Second – the religious talisman of the Supreme Leader (Velayat-e Faqih)
is broken and the regime is faltering apart as a result of its decision to get
rid of all its rivals and to solidify its authority;
Third – Because of the crises they are facing, the ruling mullahs attempt to
eradicate and obliterate the biggest menace to their regime, namely the Iranian
Resistance, at every available opportunity...
In order to survive, the Iranian regime has set up its frontline in Baghdad and
openly claims that Lebanon and Palestine constitute the ‘strategic depth’ of
their rule. For this reason Iraq is the scene of a strategic confrontation
between the Tehran regime against the international community in one hand and
the Iranian people on the other...
Khamenei tried to remove all the obstacles against implementation of his
policies inside Iran and all over the region as well, and to enable the regime
to forge ahead in its nuclear efforts, terrorism and warmongering policy in the
region. The Iranian Resistance and the PMOI has been always his center of
attention because it is an obstacle to export its religious fundamentalism in
Iraq. All enmity towards the PMOI in Iraq is thus provoked by a regime that sees
it as a bulwark stalling its belligerent efforts to dominate Iraq...
Today, one can say with full confidence that absolutely nobody wants to expel
the PMOI from Iraq except the Iranian regime and its agents and proxies. 5.2
million Iraqi people in July 2006, and 3 million Iraqi Shiite in July 2008,
signed declarations in support of the PMOI and its presence in Iraq. The
treatment of the Mujahedin in Ashraf has become a yardstick indicating the
distance or closeness of each party to the Iranian regime. The future of Ashraf
will make clear whether the Iranian regime is indeed ruling in Iraq or whether
western type democracy is in place...
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Dissident Iranians live in limbo in Iraq
National Public Radio
Monday, Nov. 2, 2009
A group of Iranian dissidents living in Iraq since the 1980s poses a dilemma for
the U.S. government. The Mujahedeen-e Khalq organization was given U.S. military
protection in 2003 after the American-led invasion of Iraq, but now the Iraqi
government wants it out. The trouble is that the Iranians don't want to leave.
An old Middle East aphorism says "the enemy of my enemy is my friend." With the
United States and Iran at odds, it should mean warm relations between the United
States and the opponents of Tehran.
But a group of 3,400 Iranian dissidents, currently living north of Baghdad, has
posed a dilemma for the U.S. government.
They were given U.S. military protection in 2003 after the American-led invasion
of Iraq, but now the Iraqi government wants them out. The trouble is that they
don't want to leave…
For six years, U.S. forces protected Camp Ashraf and debriefed the MEK for
intelligence about Iran. But on June 30, American forces ceded security control
to the Iraqi government. One of the first things the Iraqi government did was
force its way into Camp Ashraf to put a police station there.
The result was a bloody clash with residents of the camp, who label the current
Shiite-led Iraqi government as a mere lackey of the Iranians next door. The MEK,
which has a sophisticated public relations wing, put videos of the Iraqi
incursion on YouTube, showing Iraqi Humvees running people down.
Days later, when a few journalists entered the camp along with the Iraqi police,
crowds awaited behind a barrier. The crowd held up placards of 11 residents they
said had been killed by the police. They also complained that 36 people had been
arrested.
The Iraqi government won't allow journalists inside the camp. Hossein Amini, an
MEK spokesman, spoke to NPR by telephone.
Amini says those arrested were transferred to Baghdad, where they declared a
hunger strike. He says Iraqi officials beat the MEK members at a prison inside
the Green Zone, near the American embassy, and demanded that they agree to leave
Iraq. A local Iraqi court ordered the 36 detainees released, but Amini says the
government in Baghdad ignored the law.
"In the beginning, the charge was that they had resisted the police in the raid.
And ... they were charged with illegal entry into Iraq after 25 years," Amini
says.
Last month, after seven weeks in detention and a long hunger strike, the MEK
detainees were released, and they are now back at Camp Ashraf…
Human rights groups have criticized Iraq for its heavy hand during the June
incursion. It was especially embarrassing for the Americans, who stood by as
Iraqi forces used U.S.-supplied Humvees to run over unarmed civilians.
But Western governments aren't lining up to accept the MEK, and the group
appears determined to live out its days as an unwelcome guest in Iraq...
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Iraqi Government falls prey to abhorrent plots of
Iranian regime against Ashraf residents
NCRI Press Release
Saturday, October 31, 2009
NCRI - Today, an Iraqi committee responsible for the suppression of Ashraf
residents came to the entrance of Camp Ashraf along with a number of Iranian and
Iraqi agents of the clerical regime. The agents were disguised as journalists
and were accompanied by a busload of families sent there by the regime’s
Ministry of Intelligence and Security’s Isfahan branch (so-called Nejat
Association). At the entrance, they had a list of a number of residents who they
demanded to meet outside the camp.
This is while the Iraqi government has turned Camp Ashraf into a prison for the
past 10 months and persistently prevents journalists, families of residents,
lawyers, human rights advocates, and parliamentary committees to enter the camp.
The residents replied that they will welcome family visits inside Ashraf and
anyone willing to see them can go inside the camp. But the Iraqi agents refused
to let people who posed as families of Ashraf residents into the camp. As such,
the residents refused to assist the Iranian regime in its plot…
The Iranian Resistance condemns today’s measures by the Iraqi government’s
committee to suppress Ashraf residents. This committee is an executor of the
Iranian regime Supreme Leader’s diktats. It prevents families from entering
Ashraf and forces residents to meet with their families under the watch of MOIS
cameras and outside the camp. The Iranian Resistance considers these as inhumane
and illegal measures, which intend to exploit family sentiments and feelings to
advance the nefarious aims of the religious dictatorship ruling Iran against its
political opponents.
Turning Ashraf into a prison and making its residents comply with the model of
regular prison visits constitutes a violation of international law and
fundamental human rights…
The Iraqi government must immediately end the inhumane and illegal siege on
Ashraf, especially as it concerns the ban on entry of families, journalists,
lawyers, and international delegations to Ashraf...
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About Humanitarian Crisis for
Iranian Dissidents and their Families in Camp Ashraf
More than 3,400 members of Iran’s
main opposition, the People’s Mojahedin (PMOI/MEK) and their families, among
them nearly 1,000 Muslim women, reside in Camp Ashraf in Iraq. The PMOI
was the source of ground breaking revelation in the United States in 2002 about
Iran’s two until-then secret nuclear sites at Natanz and Arak.
On July 28-29, 2009, Iraqi forces
ordered directly by Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki acting at the behest
of Iran rulers, carried out a violent, unprovoked raid on Camp Ashraf, killing
11 residents, wounding 500, and abducting 36.
The brutal raid on Ashraf was a
blatant violation of the solemn commitment Iraq had given to the United States
that it would provide "humane treatment of the Camp Ashraf residents in
accordance with Iraq’s Constitution, laws, and international obligations."
The assault took place while U.S. service members on the scene were observing
the situation closely. Regrettably they took no action to prevent the
premeditated violence despite direct appeals by Ashraf residents at the outset
and during the attack.
International Humanitarian Law Obligate U.S. to Provide Continued Protection for
Camp Ashraf Residents in Iraq
On July 2, 2004, the United States formally
recognized members of the PMOI in Camp Ashraf as “protected persons” under the
Fourth Geneva Convention.
Both the U.S. and Iraq are parties to all four
1949 Geneva Conventions.
Article 27 of the Fourth Geneva Convention specifies that:
“Protected persons are entitled, in all circumstances, to respect for their
persons, their honour, their family rights, their religious convictions and
practices, and their manners and customs […]”.
Article 45 of the Fourth Geneva Convention specifies that:
“In no circumstances shall a protected person
be transferred to a country where he or she may have reason to fear persecution
for his or her political opinions or religious beliefs.“
United States had legal and moral
obligations and responsibilities under international humanitarian law to protect
these Iranian exiles.
About
the U.S. Committee for Camp Ashraf Residents:
The U.S. Committee for Camp Ashraf
Residents (USCCAR) was established in December of 2003 by families and relatives
of residents of Camp Ashraf. The purpose of the Committee is to ensure the
safety and security of those Iranians and others living in Camp Ashraf. The
Committee will defend the proposition that the protections of the Fourth Geneva
Convention, as well as of other treaties and customary international law, must
be applied to the Iranians in Iraq. For more information please visit:
www.usccar.org
About
Ashraf Monitor
Ashraf Monitor newsletter is a
compilation of news and commentaries about the developing humanitarian
crisis for nearly 3,500 members of Iran's main opposition, the People's
Mojahedin of Iran (PMOI/MEK) in Camp Ashraf, Iraq. Ashraf Monitor is
compiled and distributed by the US Committee for Camp Ashraf Residents (USCCAR).
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