WASHINGTON — The US Committee for Camp Ashraf Residents (USCCAR) deplores the intrusion by columns of Iraqi Humvees and armored vehicles into Camp Ashraf midnight Saturday and the subsequent deployment of BMP armored personnel carriers and Humvees inside the camp.
USCCAR calls on the United States, the United Nations Secretary General and his Special Representative to Iraq to immediately intervene to compel the Iraqi forces end this blatant violation of international law as well as the Fourth Geneva Convention and withdraw from Camp Ashraf, which is a civilian and de-militarized area.
Acting at the behest of the Iranian regime, the Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ordered the deployment of units from the forces of Iraq’s Fifth Division. It is designed to fulfill the clerical regime’s three-decade long goal of “uprooting” the principal opposition group, the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). The provocative deployment is also a vivid reminder of the looming humanitarian crisis for Camp Ashraf residents absent US protection and UN monitoring.
The incursion into Camp Ashraf, a day after paid-agents of Iran’s terrorist Qod Force attempted to tear own the protective fences around the camp for a planned assault on the residents, occurs despite repeated assurances given by the US officials to the a growing group of bi-partisan lawmakers in the US Congress who are concerned with the safety and security of 3,400 Iranian dissidents in Camp Ashraf.
As was the case during the Iraqi forces’ deadly July 2009 assault on Camp Ashraf residents, the United Sates continues to fall short of its responsibilities toward the “Protected Persons” of Camp Ashraf, further emboldening Maliki and Tehran’s other Iraqi surrogates in their nefarious plots to destroy Camp Ashraf.
USCCAR urges the Secretary of State, Hillary Rodham Clinton, consistent with the US international and treaty obligations and in the spirit of sentiments expressed in the US Senate and a bi-partisan majority in the House of Representatives (H.Res.704, 111th Congress), to personally intervene urgently to ensure that our loved ones in Camp Ashraf are protected.