Iranians in Canada have staged a protest outside the US embassy to mark the the fifth anniversary of deadly attack on refugees in Camp Ashraf by Iraqi forces in 2009 that killed 11 and injured more than 400.
Demonstrators outside the embassy in the capital Ottawa paid their respects to the victims and laid a wreath on a portrait of the eleven men who were killed in the outrage.
US forces at the camp failed to intervene to halt the carnage, despite all the victims holding identity cards issued by the US recognizing them as protected persons under the Geneva Convention.
A Fox News report on August 24, 2009, even showed an American soldier ‘taping the attack’ by Iraqi security forces on the defenceless residents.
Then when the residents appealed for help, she and another soldier got in a vehicle and drove away, exposing the US to criticism from human rights organizations that they had failed to honour their promise to protect the camp and its residents.
At the Ottawa protest, Iranians called for protection of all former Ashraf residents who are now in Camp Liberty in Iraq.
They urged the US government to uphold commitments made to the residents, who have been targeted with missiles on four separate occasions, with the latest attack on December 26, 2013.
Iraqi forces also refrain from taking measures to provide security for the camp, which is still vulnerable to further attacks.
Protesters including members of families of those in Camp Liberty express fears that the Iraqi government’s open hostility toward the camp’s 2,000 residents, and the Iranian regime’s desire to annihilate all opposition members could see the the situation of worsen in the coming months.
The protesters said: “More humanitarian disasters will surely happen unless the UN and US government take action to ensure the safety and security of the residents.”
Similar protest was held in Toronto.
