Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
05BAGHDAD4145
2005-10-08 08:47:00
UNCLASSIFIED//FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY
Embassy Baghdad
Cable title:  

REQUEST FOR GERMAN ASSISTANCE IN TWO HUMANITARIAN

Tags:  MOPS PHUM PTER XF GR 
pdf how-to read a cable
This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.
UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 BAGHDAD 004145 

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE

THIS CABLE IS SENSITIVE, ALBEIT UNCLASSIFIED, AND IS NOT
SUITABLE FOR INTERNET DISTRUBUTION.

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: MOPS PHUM PTER XF GR
SUBJECT: REQUEST FOR GERMAN ASSISTANCE IN TWO HUMANITARIAN
REPATRIATIONS

REF: BERLIN 3707 04

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 BAGHDAD 004145

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE

THIS CABLE IS SENSITIVE, ALBEIT UNCLASSIFIED, AND IS NOT
SUITABLE FOR INTERNET DISTRUBUTION.

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: MOPS PHUM PTER XF GR
SUBJECT: REQUEST FOR GERMAN ASSISTANCE IN TWO HUMANITARIAN
REPATRIATIONS

REF: BERLIN 3707 04


1. (SBU) Post requests that the Department ask
Embassy Berlin to approach the German MFA regarding a
request for assistance from two German residents
currently attempting to return to Germany from Iraq.
(Post first contacted Embassy Berlin through the
Department regarding these cases in the summer of
2004, but has heard of no new developments since
Reftel, sent November 2004). All information included
below may be passed to German government officials.


2. (SBU) SAID SEDAGHATI, DPOB 27 September 1983,
Madrid, Spain: Mr. Sedaghati is the holder of expired
German travel document No. 0683117, issued 13 May

1997. He arrived in Germany via France in 1990 at the
age of six, and was placed in a private orphanage run
by members of the US-designated foreign terrorist
organization the Mujahideen-e-Khalq (MeK). He was
later transferred to a German government orphanage in
Koln, run - to the best of his recollection - by a
"Christopher Meertens", in association with the
"I.R.F.K." agency. MeK representatives had, according
to Mr. Sedaghati, ongoing access to this facility.

At the age of sixteen, in 1999, Mr. Meertens was
removed from the Koln orphanage and sent by MeK
leadership in Germany to Camp Ashraf, the MeK's
headquarters in Diyala Province, Iraq. Upon arrival,
his travel documents were confiscated, and he was told
he would not be permitted to leave. (Camp Ashraf is
isolated in desert which was at the time patrolled by
Saddam's security forces, who were friendly with MeK
leadership. It appears that Mr. Sedaghati, as a non-
Arabic-speaking minor without documents or money, may
have had no reasonable outlet of escape.)

Soon after the arrival of Coalition Forces at Camp
Ashraf, Mr. Sedaghati approached Coalition Forces and
asked for their assistance in his return to Germany,
and for their protection against MeK leadership. He is
extremely critical of the MeK organization, and blames
it for his involuntary removal from Germany. He has
had no contact with the organization since his appeal
to Coalition forces in 2004.

For more than a year, Mr. Sedaghati has been living in
a fenced camp, the Temporary Interview and Protection

Facility (TIPF),set up by Coalition Forces for non-
MeK members attempting to depart Camp Ashraf.
Screening has not uncovered any evidence of his
participation in criminal or violent activity, and he
is not wanted for prosecution. He is free to depart
Iraq at any time; Coalition Forces have retrieved his
expired travel document, and can transmit a scanned
copy upon request.

Mr. Sedaghati now shares an air-conditioned tent
inside a razor-wire compound with several other men in
his situation; Coalition Forces provide part-time paid
employment, food, medical care, and some entertainment
(satellite television, movie nights). Residents of the
TIPF are not, for reasons of their own safety, allowed
to exit the perimeter of the camp without military
escort. Mr. Sedaghati has asked that we pass on his
request for immediate German assistance to alleviate
his situation, on humanitarian grounds.


3. (SBU) AZADEH BOUSTANI, DPOB 23 April 1977,
Zandijan, Iran. Ms. Boustani is the holder of expired
German travel document No. 0684057, issued 11 March
1997 and renewed 11 March 1999. She was smuggled by
her mother out of Iran through Turkey as a small
child, following the execution of several family
members and the torture of both parents in Iranian
prisons. She arrived in Germany in 1991, at the age of
fourteen, and took up residence in Koln.

In 1999, at the age of twenty-two, Ms. Boustani
departed Germany in order to visit her brother at the
MeK headquarters at Camp Ashraf, Iraq. According to
Ms. Boustani, she was not aware of the organization's
para-military nature, and planned only a short visit.
However, her travel documents were confiscated upon
arrival, and she was not permitted to leave. Ms.
Boustani's claim that Ashraf residents found planning
to depart were punished and threatened with death is
corroborated by numerous former residents.
Shortly after the arrival of Coalition Forces, Ms.
Boustani and another female Ashraf resident stole a
water truck and escaped the camp. Both approached
Coalition Forces voluntarily, handed over the keys,
and asked for assistance in returning to their
respective countries of residence. Both denounced the
MeK, indicated they had been held against their will,
and requested that they have no further contact with
the organization.

Since last summer, Ms. Boustani has lived alongside
the TIPF in a fenced adjunct compound reserved for
female residents. She is employed during business
hours by Coalition Forces as a telephone operator, and
has some savings. Like Mr. Sedaghati, she is fluent in
German, does not speak Arabic, and has no knowledge of
Iraq outside the borders of Camp Ashraf.

Ms. Boustani is a secular and, in her words, "modern"
woman who is fearful for her treatment in an Iran she
has not seen since she was a young child; she has
repeatedly requested assistance in returning to
Germany. She is free to depart Iraq at any time;
Coalition Forces have retrieved her expired travel
document, and can transmit a scanned copy upon request.


4. (SBU) Post and Coalition Forces have effected the
repatriation of a number of citizens and former legal
residents of Camp Ashraf to Sweden, Canada, Pakistan,
and elsewhere. We work closely with ICRC with regard
to onwards transportation, and are able to move both
candidates securely from Camp Ashraf to Baghdad
International Airport on short notice in coordination
with ICRC if requested.


5. (SBU) We understand the natural reluctance of many
governments to consider the repatriation or return of
citizens or residents associated with FTOs. However,
we hope the German MFA will give serious consideration
to the situation of the two young German residents
described above, whose association with the MeK
appears to have been involuntary, who are not believed
to have committed violent acts, who have taken the
earliest opportunity to dissociate themselves from the
MeK, and whose living conditions for the past year
(tents in a fenced desert compound) have posed an
extreme hardship.
Khalilzad