Watch film on:
Lord Brian Cotter who described himself as 'dumfounded' at the lack of
action over Ashraf speaks to the Foreign Office from outside the US Embassy.
Picture and film: Glyn Strong
CAMP ASHRAF PROTEST – DAY 68
Dear Mr Obama . . .
Dear Mr Obama . . .
Twenty hunger strikers outside the US Embassy in London’s Grosvenor Square will be joined by hundreds of supporters tonight (Saturday, 3rd October) between 6.00pm and 8.00pm. Some of those fasting have not eaten for 68 days and are seriously unwell.
Since the original 12 friends and relatives of those living in beleagured Camp Ashraf started their vigil many non-Iranians have joined them, for short or extended periods, including British barrister Margaret Owen and activist Leon Menzies Racionzer. Similar protests are taking place around the world.
Appeals by Amnesty, Reporters Without Borders, the Chartered Institute of Journalists, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Carlile, Lord Cotter, Lord Clarke and many MPs and MEPs neither the British, nor the US governments have engaged with the protestors.
An open letter to Mr Obama, signed by hundreds of concerned supporters people and all hunger strikers, will be presented at the event this evening. There will also be a performance showing how the 36 hostages have been forcefully removed from prison by Iraqi security forces and taken to an unknown location in Baghdad. Many were injured in the original assault on Ashraf - all are weak. Fears are mounting that they will be tortured and deported to Iran.
On Tuesday, 29 September 2009 AFP reported: “Iraqi authorities have refused to allow 36 Iranian dissidents seized in a July raid to return to their base despite a court ruling they must be released, a judicial official said today.The members of the People's Mujahedeen, an exiled opposition group, were arrested by Iraqi police during a raid on Camp Ashraf, in Diyala province north of Baghdad, which left 11 camp residents dead. "I released them; I said that they should go back to Camp Ashraf," Judge Ali al-Timimi told AFP, referring to a decision he delivered on Sunday.
A judicial official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Iraqi authorities had refused to release the group because they considered them having illegally infiltrated Iraq. "It ... became clear that the allegations were unfounded from the start and were meant for covering up the crimes against humanity that took place in Ashraf," People's Mujahedeen spokesman Shahriar Kia said in an e-mailed statement. Earlier this month, US Ambassador Christopher Hill vowed to press the Iraqi government, which the Mujahedeen say answers to Tehran, to live up to assurances to treat the residents humanely and make sure they are not repatriated to Iran.
The group was founded in 1965 in opposition to the shah of Iran. It has subsequently fought to oust the clerical regime which took power in the 1979 Islamic revolution. The group set up Camp Ashraf in the 1980s - when former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was at war with Iran - as a base to operate against the Tehran government.”
