HUMANITARIAN CRISIS LOOMING IN IRAQ
Fox News, August 21, 2008
Transcript
Since 2003, the ayatollahs’
regime has been relentless in sowing terror and mayhem in
Iraq. Capitalizing on a series of U.S. errors, both
strategic and tactical, Tehran has accelerated its drive to
force the Multi-national forces out of Iraq and become the
de-facto power-broker in Iraq. Perhaps the most despicable
of the many nefarious acts by Tehran and its Iraqi proxies,
is the assassination of non-sectarian, pro-democracy Iraqi
leaders. According to the Associated Press, the Qods Force,
aided by Arabic-speaking agents of the Lebanese Hezbollah,
has been training Iraqi Shiite assassination teams in four
locations inside Iran. Recruits are drilled in methods to
murder Iraqi political figures, including many judges, U.S.
soldiers and Iraqi forces. AP also reports that the training
operation has the ''knowledge and approval of Iran's supreme
leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.''
While Tehran’s terrorist campaign in Iraq has been widely
reported, little has been written about its concerted
efforts to eliminate its principal opposition, the People’s
Mujahedin Organization (MEK/PMOI), which is based in Iraq.
In recent months, Tehran has tried to exploit the
complicated negotiations between the United States and Iraqi
government over the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA), to
advance its strategic aims, including the elimination of the
3,500 MEK members in Camp Ashraf in Iraq.
Hassan Kazemi Qomi, a senior commander of the notorious Qods
Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp, who is now
Tehran's ambassador to Iraq, told the state-run media on
August 21, 2008 that the MEK "has six months to leave Iraq,"
and that the Iraqi security forces intend to take over the
control of Camp Ashraf. The camp has been protected by the
United States military since 2003.
Who is the MEK and why does Tehran think now is the time to
eliminate it — something it has failed to accomplish for
nearly three decades?
Established in 1965 in opposition to the Shah, all of the
MEK’s founders were arrested by the Shah’s secret police in
1971-72 and most executed. Following the 1979 revolution,
the MEK became Iran’s largest political party, with hundreds
of thousands of followers across Iran.
Early on, the organization was active in the political
process, but soon found itself in conflict with the forces
of Ayatollah Khomeini. Khomeini ordered a brutal crackdown
in June 1981. As many as 120,000 MEK members and supporters
have since been killed.
Beginning with the 1981 crackdown, many MEK members and
supporters went into exile in France, but in 1986 when the
French government sought improved relations with Tehran, it
expelled them. The MEK leadership with several thousand
followers relocated to Iraq, where they established a number
of bases. The largest of these is Camp Ashraf, located near
the town of Khalis, in Diyala Province.
Long before the outbreak of war in 2003, Ashraf declared its
neutrality and remained non-belligerent. In May 2003, in a
move which won the praise of CENTCOM for its ''significant
contribution'' to the ''Coalition’s mission to establish a
safe and secure environment for the people of Iraq,'' the
MEK agreed to the ''voluntary consolidation'' of its forces
and disarmed. At the time, General Raymond Odierno
acknowledged the group's ''cooperation with US forces and
its commitment to democracy in Iran.''
In July 2004, after a vigorous 16-month review by seven
different U.S. agencies, including the State Department and
Federal Bureau of Investigation, every MEK member in Camp
Ashraf was cleared of any violations of American law. U.S.
Forces recognized the Ashraf residents as ''protected
Persons'' under the Fourth Geneva Convention. Multinational
Force-Iraq has been responsible for the protection of the
base.
The MEK has maintained close ties with its Iraqi neighbors,
who share its aversion to Tehran’s agenda in Iraq. This
common bond was underscored on June 17, 2008, when it was
announced that more than 3 million Iraqi Shiites had signed
a petition condemning Iranian meddling and declaring support
for the MEK and Ashraf residents. This was a strategic blow
to Tehran’s efforts to depict Iraq’s Shiites as its
supporters.
In retaliation, Tehran is trying to compel Washington to
hand over the protection of the unarmed residents of Camp
Ashraf. The mullahs’ surrogates — Trojan Horses in the
highest political echelons of Iraq — are exerting tremendous
pressure on the Nuri al-Maliki government to demand that
Ashraf’s ''protection'' be undertaken by Iraqi security
forces, known to be permeated with agents on Tehran’s
payroll.
Members of the U.S. Congress as well as Middle East experts
insist the U.S. must not comply. Lt. General Edward Rowny
(ret.), former Special Advisor for Arms Control to
Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, believes that
Tehran seeks the transfer "as a step to create a sister
theocratic state — the Islamic Republic of Iraq." Ambassador
Rowny said that such developments would be a severe setback
to the gains MNF-I has made with its "counterinsurgency
strategy, military surge, and political bounce from the
surge."
Professor Raymond Tanter, an adjunct scholar at The
Washington Institute, noted, ''If Ashraf's security
responsibilities were transferred to Iraqi security forces,
as demanded by the Iranian regime, it would be a flagrant
violation of international laws and conventions…such a move
would certainly invite a humanitarian catastrophe. No U.S.
president would want to leave such a legacy.''
Daniel Pipes, director of the Middle East Forum and the
Taube Distinguished Visiting Fellow at Stanford University’s
Hoover Institution, wrote that ''According to the Convention
against Torture of 1984, to which the U.S. government is a
party, expiration of the U.N. mandate does not end the
American obligation to continue to protect MEK members in
Iraq.''
Pipes states that ''The Bush administration has stayed
silent about these developments but it has the duty and the
interest — based on its humanitarian commitments, its
international law obligations, and its need for allies
against Tehran — to insist in its status-of-forces
negotiations with Baghdad that MEK members at Camp Ashraf
remain under the protection of the U.S. military.''
Congresswoman Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX) declared in a recent
statement that ''The U.S. must maintain its commitment to
uphold the legal and humanitarian obligations as they relate
to the people of Ashraf. In order to prevent a large scale
humanitarian catastrophe, the U.S. government must retain
the sole responsibility for their protection in accordance
with the Fourth Geneva Convention rules.'' Sounding the
alarm about ''a near slaughter of these refugees by the
Iranian regime and its proxies,'' Congressman Ted Poe (R-TX)
also called on the U.S. government to continue its
protection of Camp Ashraf.
Congressman Bob Filner (D-CA) stated that handing Camp
Ashraf over to Iraq’s security forces "would be an obvious
breach of the U.S. obligations under international law and
would invite a humanitarian catastrophe." He concluded "This
must be avoided at all cost."
Alireza Jafarzadeh is a FOX News Channel Foreign Affairs
Analyst and the author of "The
Iran Threat: President Ahmadinejad and the Coming Nuclear
Crisis" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
Jafarzadeh has revealed Iran's terrorist network in Iraq and
its terror training camps since 2003. He first disclosed the
existence of the Natanz uranium enrichment facility and the
Arak heavy water facility in August 2002.
