In a recent session held at the European Parliament at the initiative of Friends of a Free Iran Committee, Struan Stevenson, President of the Delegation for Relations with Iraq.

Thank you very much Alejo we forgive your bad temper when you aiming your anger at the mullahs in Tehran. Alejo mentioned the situation in Ashraf right now there are a hundred people remain there looking after their properties built up over 25 years we estimate that the movable properties are somewhere between 25 and 50 million Euros but the fixed property we estimate could be worth somewhere around 500 million Euros. Martin Kobler the UN envoy is saying that because 3400 people have already been moved to camp Liberty and he wants to close the dossier and get the last 100 out so he can claim a great victory for the UN we have closed Liberty we have done the bidding of Nouri Al Maliki who is a puppet as we know of the mullahs in Iran.

The UN can wash its hands of the whole affair and all of these people can be crammed into this half square kilometer camp where they were formally living in this huge sprawling place and now they are crammed into this prison like place this isn’t something that we have stated this is something that the working group of the UN has stated it is prison like conditions in camp Liberty. Martin Kobler says put all your movable property into one corner in Ashraf and then we will move the remaining 100 of you to camp Liberty and your movable property will be dealt with properly. I can tell you the intention of the regime in Iraq who are now listed and recognized internationally as the second most corrupt regime in the world only Somalia is more corrupt. They want to rob this property these people are thieves and they have stopped every attempt by the Ashraf residents to sell their property they want to clear the last hundred out in order to rob that peoperty and take possession of it for their own good and for the UN to condone that action is absolutely outrageous. Martin Kobler should not in any way condone the moving of the last 100 people the last protection that property has until we can make sure it is properly sold in a fair way our estimate is that for the expenses of the people now in camp Liberty until the people are resettle it cost about 35000 Euros per person during the next year to look after the welfare and the livelihood of these people and get help for their potential resettlement that means we will need all together 110 million Euros.
 

Well I don’t see the UN rushing forward with a pot of gold saying we will pay for this I don’t see any of the 27 member states offering to come and help financially where are these people supposed to find the money financially from the fair sale of their property and belongings and that fair sale and that right is being denied by the UN envoy Martin Kobler and I think that is absolutely disgrace and as Alejo said this place camp Liberty of camp Hurriyeh as it is called has been described by the UN working group as a prison like condition yet we continue to let the UN and Baroness Ashton to refer to it as a temporary transit location which means the refugees will spend a few weeks before being resettled we have already had people there for over a year and there is no likely movement very soon. I went last August to see Mr. Guterres in Geneva the UNHCR High Commissioner and told him we need all your assistance to get these people resettled he said to me at that time about a revolving door policy 500 or 600 would move from Ashraf to Liberty and within weeks would be assessed and provided with refugee status and then be resettled to America Canada and EU member states and friendly state countries.
Now if that happens these people are in imminent danger they are now crammed into this half a Kilometer surrounded by troops led by as Alejo said by this leading murderer of the massacre that took place in Ashraf. These people are in real and critical danger we cannot allow Baroness Ashton who has just been patting everybody on the back for the award of the Nobel prize for peace she cannot sit back and ignore this situation camp Liberty must be designated as a refugee camp it cannot go on being labeled as TTL and once re designated it will give protected status completely to the people that are trapped within it. We must start encouraging the EU member states to repatriate and resettle these people rescue them from this dreadful predicament they find themselves in. The promises made by Ambassador Dan Fried when he used to repeatedly come here to twist our arms try to persuade us trying to move the people to leave from Ashraf to Liberty and then we will take hundreds of them to America. Has he taken hundreds to America unless we are going to question his truthfulness we want to see action from United States? They have no more hiding place as you heard also from Alejo the Obama administration removed the PMOI from their terror list so there is hiding place and no excuse for Baroness Ashton or the Obama administration they must rescue these people and do it without delay. So I have three demands we should take to Baron Ashton. First of all camp Liberty must be defined as a refugee camp. Second the EU member states must recognize camp Liberty as a refugee camp and thirdly the residents of Ashraf must be able to sell their properties and we must not step back and watch the blatant theft these properties by the Iraqi government and their Iranian agents. So this morning when we heard the representatives of Nasrin Sotoudeh and Jafar Panahi the representative of Mrs. Sotoudeh said Iran is a prison that rats are climbing into. Some of the rats that are climbing into the prison of Iran are coming from Europe and I can tell you that I was horrified that some of these rats in the shape of some colleagues from this Parliament attempted to go to Tehran recently in a form of a friendly delegation to meet with the mullahs and the only reason that delegation was cancelled because we decided to award the Sakharov award to these two imminent people held in prison inside Iran. So we must be aware of these rats we must guard against them ourselves and we must look forward in 2013to bringing freedom and democracy and the kind of constitution that Mrs. Rajavi represents to the free people of Iran. Thank you very much.