The article, entitled “Defectors Tell of Torture and Forced Sterilization in Militant Iranian Cult”, contains numerous smears that have been lobbed at the MEK for decades by the Iranian regime and their apologists.
Colonel Wes Martin, who served as Base Commander for the MEK’s Camp Ashraf in Iraq from 2006, wrote a response to the horrific false claims on Iran News Update on March 31.
Martin, who was assigned during the US-Iraq war to protect the 3,800 MEK members living in Iraq at the time who were designated as protected persons under the Geneva Convention, worked closely with active and former MEK members, as well as the soldiers assigned to their protection detail. He was privy to intelligence relating to the MEK’s activities, as well as those of US soldiers
Here we will look at what he had to say about the fake claims made about the MEK.
The Intercept article contains a claim from former MEK member, Reza Sadeghi, that he was prevented from leaving the MEK in 2006.
Sadeghi said he told his MEK commander that he wanted to go to the Temporary Internment and Protection Facility (TIPF), where members who wished to leave were housed by the US army until they could be safely relocated. After this, Sadeghi said he was beaten and thrown into a vehicle to be taken to a confinement facility. He claimed that the vehicle was stopped by US soldiers and he was finally taken to the TIPH.
The problem is, Martin said, that never happened.
Martin wrote: “I was the senior commander at Camp Ashraf during the summer of 2006. We only had one person who left the [MEK] compound – and he walked into our camp. The [MEK] did not know that the person had left until he was in our compound. I conducted an interview with him. He simply wanted to move on with his life.”
He further debunked the bizarre claim that the MEK recruited and trained Iraqi youth, a rumor that reached the US State Department personnel based in Baghdad in 2006.
They tasked Martin with investigating the claim against the MEK at the time and it was taken very seriously, with a platoon of US Marines ready and waiting to respond to any armed assault.
He wrote: “I went to the alleged training and housing location. The alleged recruiting/training location turned out to be a small housing area for local workers who would leave the camp once a week to deliver their pay to their families. Daily travel in and out of the perimeter would have increased the risk of capture by al Qaeda or other hostile operatives in the area.”
He found that the rumor was started by Iranian loyalists inside the Iraqi government.
As you can see, the regime is always ready to attack the MEK through any means necessary. Their lies should be exposed.
Read More:
Col Martin Rejects Baseless Allegations Against MEK Article: Part 1
