USCCAR Condemns UN Cover-up in Iraq, Calls for Swift Investigation Following Revelations by Former Senior UN official

WASHINGTON, Aug. 22, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The U.S. Committee for Camp Ashraf Residents (USCCAR) has learnt of shocking revelations made by Mr. Tahar Boumedra, chief of the Human Rights Office for the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq (UNAMI), regarding the outrageous cover-up by Ambassador Martin Kobler, the United Nations Secretary-General's Special Representative for Iraq, to deceive the international community about the prison-like conditions at Camp Liberty. 

Since February 2012, some 2,000 residents of Camp Ashraf – home since 1986 to members of Iran's principal opposition group, the People's Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) – have relocated to Camp Liberty after Mr. Kobler assured them of satisfactory living conditions there. 

The revelation by the former senior UN official leaves no doubt that the UN process, currently directed by Mr. Kobler, to resolve the humanitarian crisis at Camps Ashraf and Liberty utterly lacks transparency and accountability. USCCAR calls on the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon to immediately order a swift internal investigation into this matter. 

We urge Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to also launch an investigation into these revelations. She must assure the U.S. families of residents of camps Ashraf and Liberty that the State Department was in no way a participant in Mr. Kobler's cover-up efforts or had any knowledge of it. In the past several months, the State Department has astonished many with its defense of Mr. Kobler's less than impartial handling of the Camp Ashraf case.  

SOURCE U.S. Committee for Camp Ashraf Residents (USCCAR)