Future uncertain for Iranian dissidents living in Iraq

[Rose Siding]

CAMP ASHRAF, Iraq - Iraq has an oasis where fountains gurgle over pebbles and flowers blossom in lush gardens.
The hospital is spotless and fully stocked, schools offer violin lessons and drivers obey traffic laws. The electricity is always on, and the water is always clean in this serene, self-sufficient compound.

The only thing missing is an exit.

This never-never land is Camp Ashraf, home to nearly 4,000 Iranian militants on windswept plains in the heart of Iraq's most treacherous region. At once sympathetic and strange, the People's Mujahedeen of Iran, or Mujahedeen Khalq, have spent the past two decades on a single-minded mission to overthrow the fundamentalist clerics of the neighboring Iranian regime.
...
The Mujahedeen once had tanks and guns, but were forced to surrender their armaments after the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. They had a protector in Saddam Hussein, who gave them land and sold them millions of dollars in weapons, but now he's gone. They had recruits lining up to join the cause, but now the ranks are thinning as defectors ponder a risky return to Iran.

All the Mujahedeen have left in Iraq is their idyllic refuge at Ashraf, north of Baghdad, and even that has become a prison-like place overseen by the U.S. military. The State Department lists them as an international terrorist organization, and some former members brand them as a cult......MORE......

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/11174110.htm

[Rose Siding]

1. LAT found these guys, too- perfect playmates for DoD's new strategy

Straddling Line Between Commune, Cult
A group of Iranian militants in Iraq is now the U.S.' responsibility. But no one is quite sure what to do with them.

snip>
The MEK, as the group is known, is one of the stranger side stories in the U.S.-led invasion to oust Saddam Hussein. When American forces overthrew Hussein's regime, they inherited this 4,000-strong group of Iranian dissidents that the dictator allowed to set up shop here in the mid-1980s.

With enough firepower for a mechanized brigade and an emphasis on self-reliance, celibacy, feminism and fervor, the MEK was a kind of Shaker army of the Iraqi flatlands. The Americans took away their weapons, threw a fence around Camp Ashraf and placed them in "protective custody."

Two years later, nobody — even the members — seems quite sure what to do with the MEK, a U.S.-designated terrorist group. Many members say they want to stay put and continue the fight, even without weapons. But the future Iraqi government, sure to be stocked with pro-Iranian leaders, may want to kick them out.
...
To detractors and former members, the MEK is a dangerous, deeply paranoid cult guilty of imprisoning and brainwashing new recruits. To camp residents and their supporters, including some members of the U.S. Congress, it's the best hope for regime change in Iran and a misunderstood natural ally of the Bush administration.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-camp19mar19,0,4893647.story?coll=la-home-headlines

[LynnTheDem]

2. The US govt have been for years doing to the MEK what they did to OBL

And one day the MEK will do what OBL allegedly did. And Americans will scream about being hated for their #13th in the world ranking of "freedoms".