The Common Ills: The Ashraf community

Thursday, November 07, 2013

The Ashraf community

Violence continues in Iraq. National Iraq News Agency reports a Mosul roadside bomb claimed the lives of 4 people (3 were Iraqi soldiers) and left two injured, and a Mosul attack left 2 people dead and one woman injured, car bombing. All Iraq News adds that a Jisr Diyala roadside bombing claimed 1 life and left five injured, a Baghdad car bombing left 3 people dead and ten injured, a Baquba car bombing left 2 police dead and a civilian injured, a Tikrit home bombing left 6 people dead (all members of the same family), a Tikrit armed attack left 2 police dead and three more injured, and a Beji Refinery worker was kidnapped in Tikrit. Sameer N. Yacoub (AP) reports a bombing of pilgrims en route to Karbala which left 4 dead and six more injured. Through yesterday, Iraq Body Count notes 132 violent deaths in Iraq.

Still on violence, Fanar Haddad (Foreign Policy) reflects on trends in Iraq including:

Between August and September, videos emerged of three separate but strikingly similar incidents in Baghdad: angry crowds of Iraqis lynching alleged militants who had allegedly attacked or were trying to attack civilian targets. The gruesome details in the three incidents are near identical. In each of the Baghdadi areas of Kasra, Shuula, and Jisr Diyala, a militant's corpse is dragged through the streets, beaten, stabbed, stoned, and mutilated before being strung up and burnt. Nevertheless minor differences between the three incidents are highly instructive in that they aptly illustrate the interplay between sectarian and national identities and the tenaciously persistent belief of Arab Iraqis in the Iraqi nation-state.
Jisr Diyala is an impoverished Shiite area on the southeastern outskirts of Baghdad. Indeed both the poverty and the area's Shiite makeup are clearly discernible from the video. In celebrating the lynching, the crowd is heard repeating the invocation of Mohammad and the house of the Prophet in the melodic fashion characteristic of the Shiites. At no point in the clip are references made to Iraq, Sunnis, or Shiites, indeed little beyond the invocation of the house of the Prophet is audible in the rather brief footage. In short, although there is nothing to suggest anti-Sunni sentiments, the Jisr Diyala incident is a Shiite affair as can fairly be expected in a Shiite area.
Kasra on the other hand is a mixed area that in all likelihood has a Shiite majority. The behavior of the lynch mob in Kasra and the frames of reference it deployed differ from those of Jisr Diyala in a most indicative way. As the alleged would-be suicide bomber's corpse is dragged through the streets, amidst the deluge of blows, rocks, kicks, and profanities, a voice is clearly heard addressing the corpse with the following words: "Hey you, all these people standing here are all Sunnis and Shi'as, you pimp." Later, after several failed attempts, the corpse is set alight. As the flames burst, a roar of "Allahu Akbar" is raised by the crowd -- indeed throughout the clip "Allahu Akbar" is the most frequently heard rallying call. Most interestingly, in the midst of this euphoric outpouring of vengeful violence, this moment of raw, furious, spontaneous release, the chant that was eventually raised was none other than the old call to Iraqi sectarian unity: "ikhwan Sinna wa Shi'a, hatha il watan ma inbee'ah," followed by that most Arab and, in the current climate, rather antiquated retro-nationalistic chant: "bil rooh, bil dam, nifdeek ya Iraq."

It's a fascinating post which should be read in full as he explores the likelihood of whether or not a national identity can survive in Iraq.

Now we're going to return to the topic of the Ashraf community. Camp Ashraf in Iraq is now empty. All remaining members of the community have been moved to Camp Hurriya (also known as Camp Liberty) as of last month. Camp Ashraf housed a group of Iranian dissidents who were welcomed to Iraq by Saddam Hussein in 1986 and he gave them Camp Ashraf and six other parcels that they could utilize. In 2003, the US invaded Iraq.The US government had the US military lead negotiations with the residents of Camp Ashraf. The US government wanted the residents to disarm and the US promised protections to the point that US actions turned the residents of Camp Ashraf into protected person under the Geneva Conventions. This is key and demands the US defend the Ashraf community in Iraq from attacks. The Bully Boy Bush administration grasped that -- they were ignorant of every other law on the books but they grasped that one. As 2008 drew to a close, the Bush administration was given assurances from the Iraqi government that they would protect the residents. Yet Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ordered the camp repeatedly attacked after Barack Obama was sworn in as US President. July 28, 2009 Nouri launched an attack (while then-US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was on the ground in Iraq). That's the attack Lara Logan reported on. In a report released this summer entitled "Iraqi government must respect and protect rights of Camp Ashraf residents," Amnesty International described this assault, "Barely a month later, on 28-29 July 2009, Iraqi security forces stormed into the camp; at least nine residents were killed and many more were injured. Thirty-six residents who were detained were allegedly tortured and beaten. They were eventually released on 7 October 2009; by then they were in poor health after going on hunger strike." April 8, 2011, Nouri again ordered an assault on Camp Ashraf (then-US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was again on the ground in Iraq when the assault took place). Amnesty International described the assault this way, "Earlier this year, on 8 April, Iraqi troops took up positions within the camp using excessive, including lethal, force against residents who tried to resist them. Troops used live ammunition and by the end of the operation some 36 residents, including eight women, were dead and more than 300 others had been wounded. Following international and other protests, the Iraqi government announced that it had appointed a committee to investigate the attack and the killings; however, as on other occasions when the government has announced investigations into allegations of serious human rights violations by its forces, the authorities have yet to disclose the outcome, prompting questions whether any investigation was, in fact, carried out." Those weren't the last attacks. They were the last attacks while the residents were labeled as terrorists by the US State Dept. (September 28, 2012, the designation was changed.) In spite of this labeling, Mohammed Tawfeeq (CNN) observed that "since 2004, the United States has considered the residents of Camp Ashraf 'noncombatants' and 'protected persons' under the Geneva Conventions." So the US has an obligation to protect the residents. 3,300 are no longer at Camp Ashraf. They have moved to Camp Hurriyah for the most part. A tiny number has received asylum in other countries. Approximately 100 were still at Camp Ashraf when it was attacked Sunday. That was the second attack this year alone. February 9th of this year, the Ashraf residents were again attacked, this time the ones who had been relocated to Camp Hurriyah. Trend News Agency counted 10 dead and over one hundred injured. Prensa Latina reported, " A rain of self-propelled Katyusha missiles hit a provisional camp of Iraqi opposition Mujahedin-e Khalk, an organization Tehran calls terrorists, causing seven fatalities plus 50 wounded, according to an Iraqi official release." They were attacked again September 1st. Adam Schreck (AP) reported that the United Nations was able to confirm the deaths of 52 Ashraf residents.

Last week, Nouri al-Maliki visited DC. The supporters of the Ashraf community protested him and his visit repeatedly and were most visible at the US Institute of Peace when Nouri spoke last Thursday. At Grio, the former chair of the RNC Michael Steele writes:

While this face-to-face meeting may have served to raise Maliki’s diplomatic profile, in the eyes of many it diminished the profile of the United States and its professed commitment to justice, human rights, and international law. The president should have refused this meeting.
No one should doubt, least of all Prime Minister Maliki, that he owes his position to the United States, which sacrificed its blood and spent billions of its treasure to pave his way to power. But Maliki’s failure to be a true partner with the U.S. and his cozy relationship with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, as well as his recent actions, have created more problems than solutions for the United States.
On September 1, 2103, at the apparent request of the Iranian Mullahs and on the orders of Nouri al-Maliki, Iraqi security forces attacked and killed 52 Iranian refugees (and kidnapped seven, including six women) at Camp Ashraf in eastern Iraq.
Camp Ashraf was settled more than 25 years ago by 3,400 members and sympathizers of the principal Iranian opposition known as the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK). The U.S. military disarmed Ashraf City in 2003, and in 2009 turned over control of the camp to the Maliki government in Baghdad. At that time, the United States assured residents of Ashraf City that the Iraqi government would treat them humanely in accordance with international law. As refugees, members of the opposition and their families are protected persons according to the Fourth Geneva Convention, and should not be subject to harassment, much less kidnapping and murder by the military forces of Iraq.

Steele is not a lone voice in the US. Other prominent voices calling attention to the attacks on the Ashraf community include Senators Robert Menendez, Carl Levin and John McCain, former Governor Howard Dean, former US House Rep Patrick Kennedy. Those are only some of the people who have called for the US government to honor its legal obligation, under Geneva, to protect the Ashraf community.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton never managed to go to Iraq while holding that position. She held hands with Hoshyar Zebari and maybe played footsie with Nouri's boy toy but she refused to honor her obligations with regards to the Ashraf community. She refused to comply with a court order until after she was slammed publicly for over a year. She refused to do her job. Forced to, by the court and by the court of public opinion, she did it begrudgingly. While she was SoS,she refused -- and her department refuse -- to answer the Office of the Special Investigator General for Iraqi Reconstruction. Secretary of State John Kerry has shown no inclination to address Iraq either. This despite the request that billions of tax payer dollars continue to flow to Iraq as they did, via the State Dept, during Hillary's term.

The easiest way to end the legal obligation to the Ashraf community?

Get them out of Iraq. Hillary Can-Do Clinton had four years to get them out. She failed. We're talking less than 4,000 people. If she'd just re-settled one thousand each year, they'd be out now. 4,000 could be resettled in one year. John Kerry's failing today to do his job.

They may not like it, they may not like the residents. It doesn't matter one damn bit. There is a legal obligation, it needs to be honored and the easiest way is to get the residents out of Iraq.

The other way to honor it? Send in troops. US or UN or NATO.

I'm not for more troops in Iraq. And it would certainly be less expensive financially to resettle the residents.

The continued failure to do so appears to indicate a desire by the White House to justify the return of more troops to Iraq.

Rebecca's "debra winger" and Elaine's "Jessica Lange" went up last night as did: Those two posts aren't showing up on the links to the side but they're part of the theme posts last night in response to 'the female Brando.' The others include: