By Shahriar Kia ——Bio and Archives--December 11, 2014
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On Wednesday, December 10, dozens of Iranian women, members of opposition to the Islamic fundamentalist regime of Iran, in Camp Liberty marked Human Rights Day and held placards calling for human rights to be respected in this camp.“After receiving the Camp Ashraf security dossier from US forces, the Iraqi government under Maliki’s watch staged six bloody attacks and massacres in Ashraf and Liberty, and imposed an inhumane medical and logistical siege. During these assaults 116 residents lost their lives and over 1,375 others were injured. Seven residents were abducted, including six women, and 22 have suffered to death under an ongoing inhumane medical siege. We have time and again called on the UNHRC and other international organizations to conduct independent probes into these crimes and massacres. But unfortunately to this day no serious measure has taken place, and our murderers are still busy with their repressive measures against us. One of the women taking part in this protest gathering said, “Despite the all the commitments the UN and US gave us during our transfer from Camp Ashraf to Camp Liberty, all being violated, today we are witnessing that Iraqi repressive forces have made this camp into a prison with harsh conditions for the residents.”The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, at its sixty-fourth session, 27–31 August 2012, reported:
“In its previous Opinion, concerning Camp Liberty (Opinion No. 16/2012 (Iraq), para. 31), the Working Group found that conditions in Camp Liberty “are synonymous with that of a detention centre as there is no possibility of freedom of movement and interaction with the outside world. There is no free movement and life within the camp as well rendering residents as detainees or prisoners.” The Working Group also considered that “there is no legal justification for holding the (...) individuals in Camp Liberty and such detention lies beyond the pale of domestic and international human rights law (articles 9 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and 9 and 10 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).”
Another protester said in this rally, “As you see, we are living in a prison. Of course, it is much worse than a prison here because no human rights are respected and we are even deprived of seeing our lawyer. This camp, ridiculously named ‘Liberty’, is actually designed to physically and psychologically break an individual.”
Iraqi security agents, who control this camp based on their repressive laws, have during the past 44 days started psychologically torturing the residents by installing very powerful loudspeakers in the police station adjacent to the camp.
A young lady said, “Loudspeakers mounted by security agents to broadcast monodies are actually used to psychologically torture us and rob us of our sleep. The deafening noises can only be described as a means of torture.”
She said, “When we were in Camp Ashraf similar measures were carried out for two years, from February 2010 to December 2011, through 325 powerful loudspeakers used to torture and threaten to murder and massacre us, day in and day out, 24 hours a day; and they finally did exactly that. Experience has shown us that these are prelude measures to pave the path for Iran’s Quds Force and Ministry of Intelligence agents to impose even more pressure and psychological torture on us here.”
In their letter to Prince Zeid as chair of the highest human rights organization in the world, the protesters referred to Human Rights Day and asked for the following:
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Shahriar Kia is a press spokesman for residents of Camp Liberty, Iraq, members of the People’s Mujahedin Organization of Iran opposition group(PMOI, also known as MEK), which advocates for a democratic, secular, nuclear-free Iran with separation of church and state and gender equality. He graduated from North Texas University and currently resides in Iraq. His Twitter handle is @shahriarkia