NCRI – The immediate return Camp Liberty resident to their homes at Camp Ashraf is a ‘human, legal and ethical necessity’, the International Committee in Search of Justice said on Wednesday.
The demand came on the first anniversary of the enforced relocation of people from Camp Ashraf to the Camp Liberty ‘prison camp’ in February last year.
The 2,000 Camp Liberty residents who had already been interviewed by the UNHCR should be the first to be moved, and US, European Union and UN must also all work harder to relocate them to safe third countries, said the ISJ which enjoys the support of over 4000 parliamentarians on both sides of the Atlantic.
It wrote in a press release issued on February 6: “This is a human necessity, a legal necessity, and an ethical necessity that the European Union, the US government, and the United Nations must try to immediately make happen.
Forcible eviction
Camp Ashraf residents were forcibly evicted from their homes and relocated to Camp Liberty by the Iraqi government on the orders of the Iranian regime – and with the complicity of the UN’s representative in Iraq Martin Kobler – with officials also blocking the transfer of their property, according to the ISJ.
It added: “Forced evacuation is illegal except in cases of specific military or security concerns. In the case of Camp Ashraf, neither did such a need exist nor have such conditions been met.”
It added: “To date, 3,100 residents have gone to Liberty, yet only 5 people have been transferred abroad.”
Camp Liberty cannot accommodate 3,000 people
It wrote: “In respect to its infrastructure and living conditions, Liberty cannot accommodate 3,000 people.
“But relocation abroad is not within sight, the Iraqi government does not allow Camp Liberty’s infrastructure to be completed and fixed, it does not allow expansion of the camp’s area, and is not willing to allow Camp Liberty to be designated a refugee camp.
“Therefore continued presence in Liberty has no justification (or is a moot issue) and the residents must be immediately returned to Ashraf.”
Liberty was initially designated as Temporary Transit Location (TTL) by Iraq and Mr Kobler, defined under UN; under UNHCR standards as a location for staying ‘a few days, weeks or maximum of a few months’ But after a full year, the TTL designation has ‘utterly failed’, the ISF said.
And there was no longer any excuse for the 2,000 at Camp Liberty who have been interviewed by the UN to remain there, it added.
Fraud and abuse of power
The ISF also accused Mr Kobler of ‘fraud and abuse of power’ for illegally claiming Liberty met basic humanitarian standards, when a January 2012 report by a UNHCR shelter expert clearly stated it did not.
Former UN official Tahar Boumedra had also told an Iranian resistance conference in Paris last weekend that the Memorandum of Understanding agreed by Kobler and Iraq was in breach of the Vienna Convention because it was signed under the threat of use of force.
It was also illegal because Iraq did not recognise that Camp Liberty residents have rights as refugees, the ISJ stated.
It went on: “In light of this, ISJ stresses the immediate return of Camp Liberty residents to their homes of 26 years in Ashraf. The process for relocation to third countries can be carried out there.”
US has responsibility
The ISJ said Camp Ashraf residents were protected under the Fourth Geneva Convention, and the US government had agreed to protect them in return for their weapons until their cases could be dealt with.
Therefore the US has an ongoing responsibility to protect them, and should not offfload this duty to the UN, whose own representative is in service of the new Iraq’s dictatorship.
The ISJ called on the US to ‘actively intervene for the return of residents to Ashraf’, warning: “Otherwise it will be also responsible for whatever happens from now on.”
