Stop Fundamentalism, 5 April, 2011 – Four Members of the European Parliament, Struan Stevenson (ECR, UK), John Attard-Montalto (S&D, MT), Jelko Kacin (ALDE, SL), Mario Mauro (EPP, IT) visited Iraq on 26-29 April to meet political leaders in that country, reported the website of the European Parliament.
Stevenson called for an independent inquiry into the recent massacre in Camp Ashraf on 8 April.
“A problem that dominated our discussions last week,” said Stevenson who led the delegation, ” was last month’s massacre in Camp Ashraf.”
“This Parliament has passed two major resolutions on Camp Ashraf, calling on the Iraqi government to treat the 3,400 unarmed Iranian dissidents in a non-violent, humane manner. They’ve been there for 20 years. But on 8 April, five divisions of the Iraqi army attacked the camp and 35 innocent people were killed.” The MEP said to the European Parliament reporter.
Stevenson added that the act of the Iraqi government, “Was an international crime and we have demanded a fully independent inquiry into the circumstances surrounding this massacre. We want the perpetrators to be brought to international justice.”
Camp Ashraf is home to 3400 Iranian dissidents, members of the main Iranian opposition movement, the People’s Mujahedin Organization of Iran. Iraqi forces assumed responsibility of protecting the camp in 2009. Until then the camp was being protected by the United States.
After takeover by the Iraqi forces, the camp began to go under pressure and twice the residents who are unarmed were attacked by the fully armed Iraqi forces, the last incident occurred last month on 8 April, resulting in death of 35 men and women.
The residents of the camp were declared “Protected Persons” under the Geneva Conventions. The status make any attack on them a war crime and a crime against humanity.
