NCRI – Leading British MP has called for the urgent release of seven hostages taken captive during the Camp Ashraf massacre and demanded immediate United Nations protection for all Iranian dissidents in Iraq.
David Amess said in a speech: “In the early hours of 1st September 2013, assassins and butchers from the Iraqi military apparatus launched an assault on Camp Ashraf. The attack was launched with the sole aim of hunting and annihilating the 100 women and men remaining in Camp Ashraf.
“In an act of sheer barbarity, these savages murdered in cold blood 52 unarmed women and men. Some, as you have just seen, had their arms tied behind their backs before being summarily executed with a bullet to the head.
“Seven residents were taken hostage, six of them being women, and their fate is still unknown.
“We need now to take immediate action to stop further atrocities.
“The residents of Camp Ashraf, as we all know, should have been protected by international law. They are protected people under the Fourth Geneva Convention, as well as being recognized by the UNHCR as asylum seekers and persons of concern.
“They were actually in Camp Ashraf as part of the legally binding quadripartite agreement between the Iraqi Government, the United Nations, the United States and the residents of Camp Ashraf and Camp Liberty, and it was agreed that they would remain in Camp Ashraf to oversee the sale of the residents’ possessions.
“The 42 Ashraf residents who survived the attack are indeed witnesses to the atrocities which have been carried out. They must be protected through international law in order that they can give evidence against the perpetrators of these crimes.”
Mr Amess said urgent measures now needed to be taken at, including the immediate release of the seven hostages, the permanent stationing a UN unit of blue helmets and the return of concrete T-walls and other protective equipment being withheld by the Iraqi government.
He added: “Giving orders to its agents in Iraq to attack Camp Ashraf was a huge sign of weakness from the Iranian regime whose economy is in tatters. They are isolated, and whose most senior officials are involved in open factional infighting, and is a regime which is about to lose what it describes as its 35th state, Syria. It also illustrates the extent to which the Iranian regime fears the Iranian Resistance.
“It is time for the international community to completely isolate this regime and redouble its efforts to apply wide-ranging sanctions, thereby creating the circumstances for the Iranian people and their democratic resistance to topple the regime.”
