NCRI, October 15 – In a parliamentary debate at the House of Commons on October 10, Mr. Andrew Mackinlay, a member of the Select Committee on Foreign Affairs from the Labour Party, expressed his concern over the status of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran and its members residing in Camp Ashraf in Iraq in view of recent developments in that country and referendum on the draft constitution.
Addressing Mr. John Reid, he asked: “will the Secretary of State use his good offices to reaffirm the United Kingdom’s concern to ensure that the people at Camp Ashraf, Iranian refugees, continue to enjoy protected person status and do not become the Cossacks of this period? The great fear is that they will be treated in the same way as the Cossacks were treated in 1945. The people of Camp Ashraf must have the protection of both the United Kingdom and—I hope my right hon. Friend will emphasise to his friends when he meets them—the Iraqi Government.”
Stating the position of the government, Mr. Reid said: “Yes, I can give my hon. Friend that specific assurance.”
The debate on Iran involving members of all three major British political parties continued on wider issues the following day. Conservative Member of Parliament David Amess, initiated the debate by referring to his visit to New York together with his colleague, Brian Binley and said: “We jointly addressed a rally of 20,000 people outside the United Nations building in support of the National Council of Resistance of Iran.” To introduce Mahmoud Ahmadinejad he quoted Mrs. Maryam Rajavi’s interview with the British daily The Scotsman who described him as a “hostage taker, murderer and terrorist.”
Amess continued: “Ahmadinejad was a ringleader of the takeover of the United States embassy in Tehran just after the 1979 revolution. He is accused of plotting to murder Salman Rushdie, of interrogating, torturing and executing Iranian dissidents during his time with the Islamic Revolutionary Guards’ [Corps] internal security brigade, and of terrorist assassinations around the world when he was a key figure in the formation of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards’ Jerusalem force.”
On human rights abuses in Iran, Chris Bryant, Labour MP expressed his grave concern and said: “Thirty juvenile offenders are currently on death row in Iran.” He added that Iran continues to execute children under the age of 18 in violation of international conventions banning the practice.
Nick Clegg, a Liberal Democrat MP, also expressed concern over the ongoing human rights violations in Iran and mullahs’ growing influence in Iraq. He alarmed his colleagues of the threat of escalating nuclear proliferation in Iran.
Conservative MP Bob Spink, who recently returned from a visit to Iraq, said, “Senior politicians there are deeply concerned about Iran’s wish to stop democracy and stability developing in Iraq and particularly in Kurdistan, where excellent progress has been made since the war. Senior Iraqi politicians told me that they believe sincerely that Iran’s nuclear programme is continuing and most certainly with a military objective.”
Fellow MP Julian Lewis warned of a danger that Tehran could develop nuclear weapons and supply them “to non-state actors that would have no hesitation about using them for terrorist purposes.”
Andrew Mackinlay, once again, sought the British government’s assurances on the safety of several thousand Iranian dissidents in Camp Ashraf. The Foreign Office Minister for the Middle East, Kim Howells, said: “I have asked about the matter … and the safety of the camp has been guaranteed.”
Conservative MP Brian Binley warned that the Iranian regime had a direct impact on the UK. “Only last week the Foreign Office officially confirmed that Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps was behind the deadly attacks that recently claimed the lives of eight British soldiers. … Also last week a member of the British diplomatic service said that the Iranians were colluding with the Sunni Muslim insurgent groups in southern Iraq and were providing them with the deadly terrorist technology perfected by Iranian-funded Hezbollah militia in southern Lebanon. This does impact on us.”
Amess, who was thanked by his colleagues for initiating the debate, urged the British government to take immediate steps to remove the Iranian main opposition , People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI), from the list of proscribed organizations. “By taking such steps, apart from supporting the Iranian people in their quest for freedom and democracy, our government will be acting in their own interest by defeating the scourge of Islamic fundamentalism and the terrorism emanating from it.”
He called on the government to “abandon their policy of engagement vis-à-vis the Iranian regime. Instead, they should adopt a firm policy towards the mullahs, beginning with an active involvement in referring the Iranian regime’s nuclear file to the United Nations Security Council without delay. In that way, they can show that they stand with the Iranian people in their struggle for freedom and democracy, and not with the mullahs who oppress them.”
Responding on behalf of the government to the questions raised, Kim Howells, the Foreign Office Minister, said that Iran represented “the great contradiction,” adding that “pretty terrible things” were occurring there and there existed “great dangers for the whole world.”
“It is all the more hurtful, in a way, that Iran chooses to snub our approach when we have kept the country, for at least the last two years, from having to face an immediate referral to the United Nations Security Council,”Howells said, referring to the EU policy of “constructive engagement.”
On the nuclear front, the minister reiterated, “There is absolutely no explanation for Iran’s programme of nuclear conversion and nuclear enrichment, other than that they are building a nuclear bomb.”
Addressing MPs worries over the mullahs’ meddling in Iraq, Howells said that there was “no question that there has been at least Revolutionary Guard involvement there.”
“If Iran thinks that it can somehow stymie the efforts of the people of Iraq to create a democracy, it should think again. The world is watching and wants Iran to play a role that is constructive, not destructive,” Howells concluded.
