Self-Sacrifice

by Struan Stevenson

  Both the residents and Tahar Boumedra, who used to go with Larry Butler to Ashraf every week at that time, gave me regular reports on the situation. It was very clear to us that the idea of relocation within Iraq was in direct contradiction to our plan for evacuating all of the residents out of Iraq. At that time Ad Melkert was the UN Secretary General’s special envoy to Iraq and he refused to collaborate with the US plan for relocation within Iraq because he was fully aware that such a plan would be harmful to the residents.

  Butler visited Ashraf seven or eight times between May and July and deployed all sorts of pressure to try to force the residents to leave Ashraf for another camp. The residents categorically rejected his demands. They said only if the US would accept full responsibility for the protection of any new camp would they even consider such a transfer. The Ashrafis offered several different plans of their own by way of a compromise. One of their suggestions was that all of the residents would be transferred to the US and held temporarily under surveillance, while other candidate countries were found for their permanent residence. Another was that the US would ask a friendly neighbour like Turkey, Jordan, Kuwait or Saudi Arabia to allocate a piece of arid land so the residents could build it up themselves as a temporary safe haven while permanent homes in third countries were found. But the US rejected all of these ideas. It seemed they were keen to avoid anything that might upset the Mullahs.

  Butler’s last trip to Ashraf was combined with a deeply immoral act for an official envoy. He had brought with him a New York Times journalist whom he falsely introduced as an American diplomat. The subsequent article written by this journalist was published on 23 July in the New York Times. Two weeks later this dishonest action was criticised by the New York Times’ own editor in an article entitled: ‘A reporter shields his identity and an Iranian exile group’s viewpoint goes missing.’

  I and other MEPs repeatedly insisted that all our energy and efforts must be focused on transferring the residents directly from Ashraf to third countries; finally Butler’s plan was ditched and he had to leave Iraq with his tail between his legs. Ambassador David E. Lindwall, who in his first trip to Ashraf on September 2011 stressed that the idea of relocation to camps within Iraq belonged to the past, replaced him.

  When we got rid of Butler in July, everything began to get back on track. But now we had to resolve another problem involving the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The residents rightly stressed that the PMOI had been recognised as political refugees in Iraq since 1986, and that as such the UNHCR should recognise them collectively as political refugees and start looking for third countries to which they could be safely relocated en masse.

  The UNHCR did not accept this argument, and said that first of all each person would have to resign from the PMOI and then ask for political asylum as individuals. The NCRI and many world-class jurists published legal opinions strongly rejecting the UNHCR claims. I, along with Alejo Vidal-Quadras and some influential American friends of the Iranian resistance, also expressed our opposition and the UNHCR finally accepted that membership of the PMOI was not related to becoming a political refugee.

  So, on 24 August 2011, I travelled to the UN headquarters in Geneva to get the approval of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, António Guterres, to the Stevenson Plan. I described my April visit to Iraq only days after the massacre at Camp Ashraf had taken place, and I explained that none of the key points of the Erbil Agreement had been implemented; that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki was therefore in full control of both the military and security forces, which ultimately gave him the power of a dictator and the ability to carry out attacks on Ashraf. I outlined the key conditions of the Stevenson Plan and asked for his support.

  António Guterres expressed equal concern over the massacre and stated that the UNHCR had been working toward and had achieved a better relationship with the Iraqi Ministry of Migration and Displacement (MoMD). Nevertheless, he stated that it had always been a challenge to engage with Prime Minister al-Maliki. He further explained that he had sent al-Maliki a letter the previous week concerning the very serious human rights and humanitarian problems in Camp Ashraf and had requested an extension of six months to the closing date of the camp, which had been set for the end of 2011. He said his letter also described what the UNHCR was willing to do to resolve the situation, given the fact that Iraq was not a signatory of the 1951 Human Rights Convention.

  He explained that the biggest problem the residents of Camp Ashraf faced was the refusal by potential receiving countries to take any of them. To explain this, he mentioned that a first group of 200 people had applied for refugee status with the UNHCR in Baghdad, yet until now not one of them had been resettled. He stated that a more open attitude towards resettlement was crucial to unblock this situation, implying that the Ashrafis themselves were resisting leaving the camp. I told Guterres that the Italian embassy was leading the way in their new attitude towards resettlement, having already issued seven visas for people with serious illnesses and injuries due to the attack in April, and had begun the process of issuing another seven.

  With regard to prima facie refugee status for the residents of Camp Ashraf, Guterres stated that the UNHCR was unable to grant refugee status for a ‘blanket group’ in this case, since the residents of Camp Ashraf had different backgrounds.

  I mentioned that one of the roadblocks to resettlement in the US was that the PMOI remained on the US State Department list of Foreign Terrorist Organisations (FTO). Nevertheless, I explained, the federal courts in Washington D.C. had ruled that there was absolutely no reason for the PMOI to remain on this list and it was expected that a reviewed list was to be issued, hopefully within the next few days. Andrew Harper, Head of the UNHCR’s Iraq Support Unit, added that the PMOI were also on FTO lists in Australia and Canada, which are the other two major receiving countries with regard to refugees. However, if they were to be removed from the US foreign terrorist organisation list, Australia and Canada would most likely follow suit.

  I ended the meeting by stating that the US and Canadian embassies had been to Ashraf to study the situation, and I enquired whether anyone from the UNHCR had visited Camp Ashraf. Guterres replied that they had requested a joint mission with UNAMI, which would take place within the next few days. I thanked Guterres for his efforts and said that I would immediately convey to the residents of Ashraf the urgent need for each to write a letter to the UN seeking refugee status. I passed this news to lawyers representing Camp Ashraf. Within four days, 3,400 letters were duly delivered to Guterres in Geneva.

  In September 2011, we had a feeling of triumph, believing that we had made a big step forward. We were looking for a suitable place for UNHCR to hold their interviews. UNHCR officials had checked various locations and chosen some sections of Ashraf as suitable for interviews and had even started preparations. The interviews were scheduled to begin in October. But again the Iranian regime, Maliki and the USA, this time through UNAMI and the UN envoy in Iraq, raised obstacles by again insisting on the relocation of all 3,400 residents within Iraq.

  Maliki disliked Ad Melkert, and in a blatant act of political capitulation Ban Ki-moon decided not to renew his term in Iraq; at the end of August 2011, Melkert left the country for good. The farewell meeting between Melkert and Maliki turned into a diplomatic incident because of Ashraf. The Washington Post headline of 29 August 2011 was: ‘On last day in Baghdad, UN envoy denies embracing Iraqi PM’s plan to deport Camp Ashraf exiles’. The article added:

  The departing head of the U.N. mission in Iraq on Monday bluntly disputed Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s account of their farewell meeting, saying he did not embrace the government’s efforts to deport a group of Iranian exiles by the end of the year. The public disavowal was rare for the U.N. office in Baghdad, which goes to great lengths to avoid engaging in political disputes. A deadly April raid on the camp by Iraqi forces drew international criticism of Baghdad’s treatment of the group, and al-Maliki responded by pledging
to deport the Ashraf residents by the end of the year. In a statement after they met to say goodbye Sunday, al-Maliki said U.N. envoy Ad Melkert affirmed U.N. support on a bevy of matters, ‘including the issue of Camp Ashraf and the necessity of implementing the Cabinet’s decree to deport its residents outside Iraq by the end of this year.’ In one of his last acts after two years as envoy to Iraq, the mild-mannered Melkert flatly said that was not true.

  ‘The U.N. continues to advocate that Camp Ashraf residents be protected from forcible deportation, expulsion or repatriation,’ Melkert’s office said in a statement Monday. It said Melkert reiterated the position during his meeting Sunday with the prime minister.

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  Interviews with PMOI Refugees in Camp Liberty, September 2014

  Amir Ali Seyed Ahmadi

  ‘My name is Amir Ali Seyed Ahmadi and I was born in 1980 in Tehran. I continued my education to the second year of tech school. For some time in Tehran I was employed in various workshops carrying out the repair and maintenance of vehicles. I was born into a religious family, and by the time I was 6 months old, due to the fact that our house was raided by the armed forces of the regime for the “crime” of supporting the PMOI, all of my family members, including my mother and uncle, were killed. Due to the hatred the regime had for my mother, father and the PMOI, they held me inside Evin Prison for four years. There I was under the care of PMOI supporters. This was how I came to know the PMOI and how I began my political life. Two of my uncles were executed during the 1988 massacre of political prisoners and I went with my grandmother to receive their belongings. From then on I have always tried to get revenge for the blood of these martyrs and all the other martyrs who lost their lives in the pursuit of freedom and their quest to establish a popular, just and free state in Iran.

  Following the July 1999 uprising staged by college students against the regime throughout the country, I began my activities as a supporter of the PMOI. A few months later I came to Ashraf and joined the National Liberation Army of Iran, because I saw them as the only solution to overthrowing this dictatorial regime. Following the 1988 massacre of political prisoners I will never forget my grandmother’s resistance and dignity in the face of vicious Revolutionary Guards members when they gave her the belongings of her executed loved ones. They never even informed her about the location where her sons were buried. My aunt also suffered psychological problems resulting from the execution of her brothers and when I called her recently she was still suffering from these illnesses.

  I came to Ashraf with the help of friends, and after three days of hiking I crossed the border into Iraq. Before the 2003 war I was a member of the NLA and I received the necessary training in order to carry out my duties in the war against the Mullahs’ regime. After April 2003 and the US-led war against Iraq, we voluntarily handed over our weapons to US forces. After that, in Ashraf, I started working in trailer workshops, but Maliki’s government – at the behest of the Iranian regime – prevented us from continuing these income-generating activities. This is a long story, but one cannot fight and lead an ordinary life at the same time. As a result, I decided to give my all so that my people could have everything.

  During the July 2009 attack by Iraqi forces against Ashraf, one of my very good friends by the name of Sha’ban Souri received many blows to the head and face. He was suffering from extreme pain for many days afterwards. However, he didn’t say anything and didn’t allow anyone to realise the excruciating pain he was going through. As a result, 20 days later he suffered a stroke due to DVT, and he died in a helicopter while being transferred to a US hospital in Balad. I will never forget Sha’ban. Also my father was killed in the September 2013 massacre in Ashraf. When I see these scenes I become more determined than ever regarding the path I have chosen to overthrow this regime, and I pledge yet again to continue his path.

  On 8 April 2011, I was hit in the leg with a metal rod wielded by the Iraqi forces attacking Ashraf. They attacked us just to prevent us from using one of the camp’s roads. On that day I saw many scenes of sacrifice by my friends. We were all backing each other up. Thirteen of my close friends were injured and wounded in that attack, and two of them are still suffering from the blows they received to their heads.’

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  Martin Kobler

  Martin Kobler, who came to Iraq at the end of October, replaced Melkert. He took up the Ashraf file in an unconventional manner. It seemed that everything had been decided before he arrived in Iraq. Clearly he had already reached agreements with Iran, Maliki and the US, who were determined to use him as a tool for promoting their plan for the total closure of Ashraf and the internal relocation of the 3,400 residents. They had settled on a new location called Camp Liberty, a former US military base near Baghdad airport. Maliki, with the backing of Kobler, prevented the UNHCR interviews from going ahead in Ashraf and stated that interviews would only be possible in Camp Liberty.

  Here, it was proposed, the residents could be individually interviewed by UNHCR, registered as refugees and quickly flown out to countries of safety. The ‘revolving door’ strategy that I had lobbied hard for now seemed a reality. But first we had to assess the suitability of Camp Liberty and we had to convince the Ashraf residents to move there.

  I had received news of Kobler’s appointment in August 2011. I was informed that Kobler, a German diplomat and former advisor to the Green Party’s former Foreign Minister, Joschka Fischer, had replaced Ad Melkert as the UN Secretary General’s Special Representative. The news did not fill me with confidence. The Green Group in the European Parliament, dominated by the German Greens, were almost universally the biggest apologists for the Iranian Mullahs and, consequently, had a gut hatred of the PMOI instilled in them by the endless propaganda dished out by their friends in Tehran. I was constantly battling against outright prejudice from the Greens, and I was now alarmed that a Green had taken on the key role of Special Representative of the UN Secretary General in Iraq. My fears turned out to be well-founded. Ad Melkert had become increasingly critical of Maliki and the UN was nervous that good relations with the Iraqi Prime Minister and his government were being jeopardised. They decided he had to be replaced by someone more compliant.

  Kobler asked to meet me in Brussels in October 2011, before he went to Iraq to take up his post. He told me that he was coming to the European Parliament and said that he had arranged a special meeting room in which we could talk. I found this rather strange, as in my role as President of the Delegation for Relations with Iraq I had a large meeting room of my own attached to my office. I soon discovered why Kobler had arranged the meeting in this way. It was the first indication of his true agenda. I was not the only person he had invited to the meeting. He had summonsed his Green Party colleagues, all known enemies of the PMOI, including the senior Green Group foreign affairs advisor Sabine Meyer, also a German, with close links to the Iranian Embassy in Brussels. Meyer and I had crossed swords on many occasions. Her prejudice against the PMOI was visceral, and I suspected that she was being manipulated by the Iranian regime. I was disturbed that Kobler had chosen to invite unelected officials from the Greens to a meeting between him as an ambassador and me as a parliamentarian.

  Kobler opened the meeting by stating that in his opinion I was the only person who could persuade Mrs Rajavi in Paris to order the 3,400 Ashraf residents to agree to relocation to a new camp inside Iraq. Kobler said that unless they re-located they would almost certainly be subjected to a violent assault, and he wanted to do everything in his power to avoid further bloodshed. I countered by stating that we should not tolerate threats of violence by Maliki, and that in any case, the leadership actually in Camp Ashraf would take the final decision on whether or not they would relocate. At this point Sabine Meyer interrupted me to say that I was talking rubbish and that the PMOI were an evil sect who took all of their orders from Maryam Rajavi. I was furious. ‘How dare you interrupt,’ I said. ‘I am elected to serve as a Deputy in this House and I have been privileged t
o chair the Delegation for Relations with Iraq. I am not going to be interrupted and contradicted by a mere parliamentary official from the Green Group or indeed any other group.’ Sabine’s eyes flashed in anger. She tossed her long, blond hair aside and began scribbling furiously in her notebook. However, she took no further part in the meeting. For once I had silenced her!

  I told Kobler that I had visited Iraq immediately following the massacre at Ashraf in April and had been denied permission to visit the camp by the Iraqi Foreign Minister himself. I bitterly condemned Maliki’s government for the murderous attacks they had carried out, and I said it was appalling that we were now being threatened with more bloodshed unless we managed to vacate the camp by the end of the year. I explained to Kobler that if the real intention of the Iraqi government was to move all the Ashraf residents out of Iraq, then the best way surely was to transfer them from Ashraf to third countries; things would be much simpler and smoother, and I explained we had already spoken with UNHCR about it and they agreed with this idea. But, I argued, moving them to another place in Iraq would make things much more complicated, would delay the process and might endanger the residents more than before. I told Kobler that I agreed with the residents for not accepting a move to another camp inside Iraq. Of course, I accepted the reality of the situation and told Kobler that I would do what I could to help avoid any further bloodshed. I explained my initiative, which I had floated with Mrs Rajavi on my return from Iraq in the spring; Kobler said he liked the sound of the Stevenson Plan and he’d look into it, although what he was advocating was in clear contrast to my plan.