www.iranpeyvand.com

Link to No Exit, the first published report by HRW
Link to report from HRW
In May 2005, Human Rights Watch issued a report on alleged human rights abuses committed by an Iranian opposition group, the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO/MEK),1 inside its military camps in Iraq from 1991 to February 2003, prior to the fall of Saddam Hussein’s government. The report, No Exit: Human Rights Abuses Inside the MKO Camps, detailed allegations by twelve former members of the MKO who told Human Rights Watch of a range of physical and psychological abuses they had suffered and witnessed.2 In addition, the report made use of the published memoir of the MKO’s former chief diplomatic representative in Europe and North America, Masoud Banisadr.

Following publication of this Human Rights Watch report, individuals associated with the MKO and others, in communications to Human Rights Watch as well as publicly on Web sites connected with the MKO, raised objections to the findings of the report. We have investigated with care the criticisms we received concerning the substance and methodology of the report, and find those criticisms to be unwarranted.

A number of critics of the report claimed that Human Rights Watch was calling on the United States, Canada, and the European Union not to remove the MKO from their respective lists of groups identified as perpetrating or advocating acts of terrorism, in the face of a campaign by the MKO to have itself removed from such lists. Human Rights Watch in fact at no point, either in the report or in responses to media and other queries, took any position whatsoever on whether the MKO should be on such lists or removed from them. Rather, we did no more than report what we believed to be credible testimonies alleging serious abuses perpetrated by MKO officials against dissident members of the group, including prolonged deprivation of liberty and torture.

(more…)

Download PDF

Link to original report (english)

NO EXIT: Human Rights Abuses Inside MKO Camps

Human Rights Watch interviewed five of these former MKO members who were held in Abu Ghraib prison. Their testimonies, together with testimonies collected from seven other former MKO members, paint a grim picture of how the organization treated its members, particularly those who held dissenting opinions or expressed an intent to leave the organization.