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Obama's dilemma in Iraq's camp Ashraf - -

By John Hughes

Obama's dilemma in Iraq's Camp Ashraf

The US isn't supposed to intervene. But unless it does, Iranian exiles there face retribution from a brutal regime.

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The Obama administration is facing a difficult foreign-policy and humanitarian challenge that could have serious implications for its relationship with Iran.

It concerns 36 Iranian dissidents, promised protection by the United States, held captive in Iraq by Iraqi soldiers. Without American intercession, they may be returned to Iran, where they face dire retribution from a regime that has shown how brutal it can be to those who defy it.

The decision the US must face is whether to detach itself from the disposition of the dissidents, risking criticism on humanitarian grounds, or to intervene, irritating the sovereign government of Iraq, and infuriating Iran.

The 36 exiles are part of a force of more than 3,400 members of the People's Mujahideen of Iran (PMOI) who once mounted military operations against the Tehran regime from sanctuary in Saddam Hussein's Iraq. During the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, the US military surrounded the PMOI's Camp Ashraf, some 60 miles north of Baghdad. The PMOI surrendered their weapons and the Americans pledged protection of the camp and its inhabitants. The Mujahideen have been credited with supplying US authorities accurate information about clandestine Iranian nuclear facilities, and other intelligence.

With the signing of the Status of Forces Agreement and the beginning withdrawal this year of American forces to their bases, the US ceded sovereignty over Camp Ashraf to the Iraqis. The US sought, and received, promises from the Iraqi government that Camp Ashraf's population would be protected after the hand over.

But Iran has been pressuring sympathetic Iraqi politicians to close the camp and expel the PMOI members. On July 28, Iraqi forces, saying they were establishing a police presence in the camp, launched an attack, killing 11, wounding 450, and taking 36 hostages. US forces nearby remained aloof.

An Iraqi judge ruled that the 36 dissidents, who went on a hunger strike in captivity, should be released. But Iraqi Interior Ministry officials, using new tactics, have argued that the dissidents entered the country illegally and should be expelled – obviously to Iran. If this tactic is successful, it could be applied to the 3,400 or so PMOI members remaining in Camp Ashraf.

One bizarre complication is that the PMOI is listed by the US State Department as a terrorist organization, mainly on grounds of guerrilla action it took earlier against the Iranian regime. The US Army was directed in 2003 to protect this "terrorist" organization largely because it has provided helpful information to the US.

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