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Members of the opposition US Committee for Camp Ashraf Residents set up a vigil in front of the White House in Washington on April 9. (Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images)
WASHINGTON—On the morning of April 8, Iraqi military forces entered Camp Ashraf, 60 miles northeast of Baghdad in eastern Iraq near the border of Iran, and proceeded methodically to shoot and kill 34 and wound over 300 of the unarmed camp residents. Later two more died.
The number of fatalities and injured is based on resident reports because the Iraqi government would not permit journalists inside the camp. Human Rights Watch reported on April 14 that United Nations human rights spokesperson Rupert Colville had seen 28 bodies at Camp Ashraf. Most had been shot, including several women, and some were run over. Six bodies were missing, Colville said.
The weapons, armored vehicles, and Humvees were provided by the United States for use by Iraqi security forces to protect their country. A similar raid occurred July 2009 when 11 residents were killed.
For 25 years, the camp has been the home of over 3,400 members of the Mujahedin-e-Khalq or “MEK,” an opposition group to the current Iranian government. The group is also known by other designations: the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI) and the MKO. Saddam Hussein allowed the MEK to base itself in Iraq in 1986 when Iraq was fighting a protracted war with Iran in the 1980s.
Several questions have been raised about this attack. Who ordered it? Was the Iraqi government aware it was going to happen? Did Prime Minister Maliki act at the behest of the Iranian regime? Why was a U.S. unit deployed at Camp Ashraf ordered away just hours before the attack?
A congressional hearing was held July 7 to get the facts of what appears to be the murder of unarmed, innocent refugees.
MASSACRE: Four witnesses address the reasons for a deadly raid by Iraqi security forces April 8 against Camp Ashraf, where a dissident Iranian organization resides. The hearing was held July 7 at the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee of the House (Gary Feuerberg/Epoch Times)
“I believe it was an atrocity, a massacre and crime against humanity,” said Congressman Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.), chairman of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee of the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
The hearing chaired by Congressman Rohrabacher began with a video clip made by camp residents of the shootings and assaults on the population. This was followed by a teleconference video with one of the wounded, Neda Zanjanipour. She is a Canadian citizen and came to Camp Ashraf at the age of 20 in 1999 to work for freedom in Iran. Recuperating in a small clinic at the camp, she said an Iraqi soldier threw a grenade at her feet that destroyed the muscles from the knee to the hip in both legs and both arms were severely fractured.
“Iraqi sharp shooters were firing with the intention to kill, especially targeting those filming the massacre,” she said. She described the armored vehicles and the Iraqi forces were fully equipped, but the residents had no arms. “We were defenseless.”
In written testimony, Zanjanipour said that the U.S. Embassy told them that the Iraqi forces were going to launch an operation. A U.S. force was at Ashraf since April 3. The residents pleaded with the commander to remain, but the unit was ordered out on the evening before the raid on April 7.
US ‘Deeply Troubled’
[caption id=”attachment_128995″ align=”alignleft” width=”350″ caption=”Dr. Gary B. Morsch (l), Battalion Surgeon at Camp Ashraf, 2004, U.S. Army Reserve and Dr. Ray Takeyh, Council of Foreign Relations, express opposing views regarding the nature of the Mujahadeen e-Khalq or MEK
