Self-Sacrifice (20 page)

27

The Stevenson Plan

It was clear from all the discussions I’d had in Iraq that an urgent agreement, acceptable to the Iraqi government, the PMOI and the international community, had to be found to resolve the ongoing crisis in Camp Ashraf. Ad Melkert, the UN Secretary General’s representative in Iraq, had specifically asked me to make contact with the leadership of the Ashraf refugees at their headquarters in Paris, to explore possible avenues for a long-term resolution. So, on my return to the EU from Iraq, I travelled immediately to Paris and engaged in intense discussions with Mrs Maryam Rajavi, Mohammad Mohaddessin, the foreign affairs spokesman for the PMOI, and other members of the leadership of the Iranian opposition movement. We made frequent conference calls to Ashraf to consult the PMOI leadership there. Together, we thrashed out a plan that provided the only viable alternative to violence and further bloodshed.

I realised that, without their agreement, there was little hope of a just, long-term solution. But there was considerable reluctance from the Ashrafis. They justifiably argued that Ashraf had been their home for almost three decades. Their friends and colleagues who had died were buried there. They had invested tens of millions of dollars on the development of the camp. They didn’t want to move.

The proposal required the active involvement of the UN, the US and the EU. It recognised the Iraqi government’s right of sovereignty over its own territory. But it also encompassed the rights of the 3,400 unarmed residents of Ashraf to protection under the Fourth Geneva Convention. The scheme laid the groundwork for negotiations involving the Iraqi government and set out a proposal to re-settle all of the refugees to countries of safety like the US, Canada, Australia, Norway, Switzerland and the 27 EU Member States, depending on where they had previous associations, connections or family contacts.

The proposal, known as ‘The Stevenson Plan’ contained the following important pre-conditions:

The plan envisaged groups of residents being moved from Ashraf to a new location, where they could be individually interviewed and registered as refugees by the UNHCR in a ‘revolving door’ system that would see them re-settled to countries of safety within weeks of being registered as refugees. I envisioned groups of up to 500 Ashrafis at a time being relocated to the new camp, interviewed and registered by UNHCR, then shipped out to countries of safety, almost before the next batch of 500 from Ashraf arrived. The plan also embraced the idea of UN ‘blue-helmets’ on permanent deployment at the camp to provide protection for the residents.

We all agreed that the security situation facing the refugees at Camp Ashraf had been in a perilous state for far too long. What was needed now was for all the main parties concerned to show the political will to resolve the situation once and for all and to ensure that justice prevailed over brutality. I tabled my plan at the next meeting of the Delegation for Relations with Iraq in the European Parliament
and it was unanimously agreed. We also got the backing of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Parliament. I then asked for the support of Baroness Ashton. Following the April massacre, Ashton, the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs, had called for a strong and united EU response and an immediate inquiry into the killings. She now agreed to support the ‘Stevenson Plan’. Of equal importance was the fact that my plan also received active support from several political factions inside the Iraqi Parliament, including a letter signed by 74 Iraqi MPs.

So we had taken a decisive step towards solving the Ashraf crisis by convincing the residents to leave Iraq, while reaching a practical solution acceptable to the camp’s residents, which would also serve the interests of the Iraqi government. This was a huge victory. But the reality was the Iranian regime had no intention of arriving at a peaceful resolution to the Ashraf crisis. The intentions of the Mullahs in Tehran were entirely destructive.

While we in the European Parliament, together with Mrs Rajavi, the PMOI, NCRI and other friends of the Iranian resistance, had started a campaign to sort out the transfer of the residents to third countries, suddenly we heard that the American diplomat, Larry Butler, had shown up in Ashraf, urging and threatening the residents to accept his plan to move to another camp inside Iraq. In fact the US government began to put pressure on Ashraf in line with the policies of the Iranian regime and Maliki, against the interests of the residents.

His concept, again aimed at clearing Ashraf of all of its residents within the timescale set by Maliki and before the departure of the last of the US troops from Iraq, involved re-locating groups of Ashrafis to a series of different former US bases spread across Iraq. The Ashrafis, who said that this played directly into the Iranian Mullahs’ ‘divide and rule strategy’, understandably vetoed this idea. They feared that once they were split up into smaller groups they could be annihilated at will, away from public view. They said they would rather stay within the fragile confines of Ashraf, where at least the world was watching and where it was more difficult for Maliki and his Iranian puppeteers to mount another massacre. But in any case, Larry Butler put a lot of US diplomatic effort into
promoting his plan and it diverted much of our focus for at least three months, while we tried to convince people that it was a bad idea and that the Stevenson Plan was the only viable alternative. Butler had arrogantly even threatened the people in Ashraf with the prospect that if they did not move, then ‘Soon we will have to mourn at your funeral!’

Both the residents and Tahar Boumedra, who used to go with Larry Butler to Ashraf every week at that time, gave me regular reports on the situation. It was very clear to us that the idea of relocation within Iraq was in direct contradiction to our plan for evacuating all of the residents out of Iraq. At that time Ad Melkert was the UN Secretary General’s special envoy to Iraq and he refused to collaborate with the US plan for relocation within Iraq because he was fully aware that such a plan would be harmful to the residents.

Butler visited Ashraf seven or eight times between May and July and deployed all sorts of pressure to try to force the residents to leave Ashraf for another camp. The residents categorically rejected his demands. They said only if the US would accept full responsibility for the protection of any new camp would they even consider such a transfer. The Ashrafis offered several different plans of their own by way of a compromise. One of their suggestions was that all of the residents would be transferred to the US and held temporarily under surveillance, while other candidate countries were found for their permanent residence. Another was that the US would ask a friendly neighbour like Turkey, Jordan, Kuwait or Saudi Arabia to allocate a piece of arid land so the residents could build it up themselves as a temporary safe haven while permanent homes in third countries were found. But the US rejected all of these ideas. It seemed they were keen to avoid anything that might upset the Mullahs.

Butler’s last trip to Ashraf was combined with a deeply immoral act for an official envoy. He had brought with him a
New York Times
journalist whom he falsely introduced as an American diplomat. The subsequent article written by this journalist was published on 23 July in the
New York Times
. Two weeks later this dishonest action was criticised by the
New York Times
’ own editor in an article entitled: ‘A reporter shields his identity and an Iranian exile group’s viewpoint goes missing.’

I and other MEPs repeatedly insisted that all our energy and efforts must be focused on transferring the residents directly from Ashraf to third countries; finally Butler’s plan was ditched and he had to leave Iraq with his tail between his legs. Ambassador David E. Lindwall, who in his first trip to Ashraf on September 2011 stressed that the idea of relocation to camps within Iraq belonged to the past, replaced him.

When we got rid of Butler in July, everything began to get back on track. But now we had to resolve another problem involving the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The residents rightly stressed that the PMOI had been recognised as political refugees in Iraq since 1986, and that as such the UNHCR should recognise them collectively as political refugees and start looking for third countries to which they could be safely relocated
en masse
.

The UNHCR did not accept this argument, and said that first of all each person would have to resign from the PMOI and then ask for political asylum as individuals. The NCRI and many world-class jurists published legal opinions strongly rejecting the UNHCR claims. I, along with Alejo Vidal-Quadras and some influential American friends of the Iranian resistance, also expressed our opposition and the UNHCR finally accepted that membership of the PMOI was not related to becoming a political refugee.

So, on 24 August 2011, I travelled to the UN headquarters in Geneva to get the approval of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, António Guterres, to the Stevenson Plan. I described my April visit to Iraq only days after the massacre at Camp Ashraf had taken place, and I explained that none of the key points of the Erbil Agreement had been implemented; that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki was therefore in full control of both the military and security forces, which ultimately gave him the power of a dictator and the ability to carry out attacks on Ashraf. I outlined the key conditions of the Stevenson Plan and asked for his support.

António Guterres expressed equal concern over the massacre and stated that the UNHCR had been working toward and had achieved a better relationship with the Iraqi Ministry of Migration and Displacement (MoMD). Nevertheless, he stated that it had always been a challenge to engage with Prime Minister al-Maliki. He
further explained that he had sent al-Maliki a letter the previous week concerning the very serious human rights and humanitarian problems in Camp Ashraf and had requested an extension of six months to the closing date of the camp, which had been set for the end of 2011. He said his letter also described what the UNHCR was willing to do to resolve the situation, given the fact that Iraq was not a signatory of the 1951 Human Rights Convention.

He explained that the biggest problem the residents of Camp Ashraf faced was the refusal by potential receiving countries to take any of them. To explain this, he mentioned that a first group of 200 people had applied for refugee status with the UNHCR in Baghdad, yet until now not one of them had been resettled. He stated that a more open attitude towards resettlement was crucial to unblock this situation, implying that the Ashrafis themselves were resisting leaving the camp. I told Guterres that the Italian embassy was leading the way in their new attitude towards resettlement, having already issued seven visas for people with serious illnesses and injuries due to the attack in April, and had begun the process of issuing another seven.

With regard to
prima facie
refugee status for the residents of Camp Ashraf, Guterres stated that the UNHCR was unable to grant refugee status for a ‘blanket group’ in this case, since the residents of Camp Ashraf had different backgrounds.

I mentioned that one of the roadblocks to resettlement in the US was that the PMOI remained on the US State Department list of Foreign Terrorist Organisations (FTO). Nevertheless, I explained, the federal courts in Washington D.C. had ruled that there was absolutely no reason for the PMOI to remain on this list and it was expected that a reviewed list was to be issued, hopefully within the next few days. Andrew Harper, Head of the UNHCR’s Iraq Support Unit, added that the PMOI were also on FTO lists in Australia and Canada, which are the other two major receiving countries with regard to refugees. However, if they were to be removed from the US foreign terrorist organisation list, Australia and Canada would most likely follow suit.

I ended the meeting by stating that the US and Canadian embassies had been to Ashraf to study the situation, and I enquired whether anyone from the UNHCR had visited Camp Ashraf. Guterres replied
that they had requested a joint mission with UNAMI, which would take place within the next few days. I thanked Guterres for his efforts and said that I would immediately convey to the residents of Ashraf the urgent need for each to write a letter to the UN seeking refugee status. I passed this news to lawyers representing Camp Ashraf. Within four days, 3,400 letters were duly delivered to Guterres in Geneva.

In September 2011, we had a feeling of triumph, believing that we had made a big step forward. We were looking for a suitable place for UNHCR to hold their interviews. UNHCR officials had checked various locations and chosen some sections of Ashraf as suitable for interviews and had even started preparations. The interviews were scheduled to begin in October. But again the Iranian regime, Maliki and the USA, this time through UNAMI and the UN envoy in Iraq, raised obstacles by again insisting on the relocation of all 3,400 residents within Iraq.

Maliki disliked Ad Melkert, and in a blatant act of political capitulation Ban Ki-moon decided not to renew his term in Iraq; at the end of August 2011, Melkert left the country for good. The farewell meeting between Melkert and Maliki turned into a diplomatic incident because of Ashraf. The
Washington Post
headline of 29 August 2011 was: ‘On last day in Baghdad, UN envoy denies embracing Iraqi PM’s plan to deport Camp Ashraf exiles’. The article added: