Rita Sussmuth, former speaker of the German Bundestaag, said the camp’s residents were protected as refugees under the Geneva Convention and the international community must provide them with urgent help.
She told an Iranian New Year gathering in Berlin: “They made us believe that the residents would be freed only if they left Camp Ashraf and they would be quickly transferred to third countries. But this was not the intention.
“They could have been directly transferred (overseas) from Ashraf. Nouri al-Maliki and others could have done it but they did not.
“With respect to Camp Liberty, we are indeed talking about a prison rather than a protected area for the people who live there.”
“We need to make people realise what the Geneva convention on refugees is, so that their legitimate human rights and their protection are recognized.”
She added: “Mrs Rajavi is constantly making efforts to seek to protect the lives of residents of Camp Liberty, to advance her words in the UNHCR and UNAMI, and she doesn’t give up. If we do not support her, we have betrayed the whole of the freedom movement.
“I wanted to know who was really telling the truth, Mrs Rajavi or Mr Martin Kobler (former head of United Nations Assistance Mission to Iraq)?
“And I reached the clear conclusion that Mrs Maryam Rajavi was speaking said the truth, and it is her who is a fighter with her men and women for a free Iran. “
Camp Liberty in Iraq houses members of Iranian opposition, the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) in Iraq. They have been recognized as asylum seekers and entitled to international protection.