Press Release
Patriotic Iraqi people, tribes have no part in such inhumane and shameful acts towards their guests
UN, US and EU who presented public guarantees for Ashraf residents transfer plan must pledge minimum assurances
Sixty Iraqi general tribal sheikhs from across the country condemned the transfer of 400 Ashraf residents to a location where prison conditions are enforced, describing such measures as shameful towards people who have been our guests for the past 26 years. The sheikhs added such actions are nothing but giving into the Iranian regime’s repressive plans and agendas.  The shameful and disgraceful conditions where the brave children of Iran’s Muslim nation are deprived of freedom of movement, unfettered access to their lawyers and medical services, and where they must pass a police checkpoint to go to the dining facility.
Iraqi general tribal sheikhs stressed that from the very beginning, Ashraf residents’ relocation inside Iraq lacked legal justification and any convincing reasoning. The true Iraqi people and tribes consider the residents as a part of their own population and family, and have become committed to their protection until freedom returns to their country. And now, it has been proven it is the Iranian regime and its Iraqi proxies who seek their expulsion from Iraq, and these disgusting behaviors has nothing to do with the Iraqi people. Ashraf residents have announced their readiness to depart Iraq by foregoing their rights and the UN High Commission for Refugees could have from months before initiated the process of their resettlement in third countries. There is no understandable necessity for Ashraf residents’ relocation, making them homeless in a concentration camp or the abnormal behavior towards them.
However, the Iraqi government insisted on their relocation inside Iraq and unfortunately, the UN Secretary General’s Special Representative to Iraq for reasons not clear to us gave in to these illegal measures. Nonetheless, it has been clarified today that the objective of relocation was not resettlement in third countries. The aim was to imprison, harass and enforce pressure on the residents to pursue the evil goals of the Iranian regime against its dissidents.
Iraqi general sheikhs, including the tribes of Dehlegi, al-Jourani, al-Meyah, al-Mahdia, al-Hamed, al-Derawasha, al-Khezrej, al-Nemr, al-Bayij, al-Rouk, al-Shahwani, al-Berzenji, al-Bou-Shaban, al-Bou-Ashia, al-Lami, al-Salami, al-Awarif, al-Atla, al-Mousawi, Al Hamd, Al Majed, al-Ghezi, al-Fa’ahiba, Bani Saeed, al-Khaledi, al-Shouilat, al-Seyyed Saleh, al-Badour, al-Ebawa, Al Nassrollah, Bani Rekab, al-Gartan, al-Nawafila, al-Anbarioun, al-Ziyar, al-Mazarii, al-Magadima, al-Obaid, al-Dolaim, Bani Zaid, al-Taii, al-Aribi, al-Boushoket, Al-Bou-Teif, Bani Ajil, Al Shamkhi, Al al-Arezi, Bani Jamil, al-Mashhadani, al-Dawoudi, Al-Bou-Hamdan, al-Ezzi, al-Asakerat, Bani Veis, al-Nedaa, al-Massari, by noting the history of attacks and mass killings of Ashraf residents and the application of new deadlines to set the stage for future killings, emphasized that the presence of police in the PMOI’s living environment at Camp Liberty, especially in light of the presence of Muslim women, is a concerning, alarming and unacceptable issue that is contradictory to Islamic and Iraqi values.
Now, the UN Secretary General, the US Government and EU who were sponsors of the plan to relocate the Ashraf residents, and have given official assurances for it, must be accountable for such repressive behavior towards the Ashraf residents and their imprisonment, for the people of Iraq and its native and patriotic tribes have no part in such inhumane and anti-Islamic behavior towards their own guests.
Therefore, we urge the UN Secretary General and his special representative to Iraq to facilitate the visit of a delegation of tribal sheikhs of the residents at Liberty in order to become informed of their humane conditions.