Iranian Dissidents Languish in Iraq

On February 29, a bipartisan group in Congress expressed concern about the State Department’s terrorist classification of an Iranian dissident organization—the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MeK)—and about a number of its members currently under siege in Iraq. In response, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced that Washington would help ensure the security of the dissidents as they relocate to another Iraqi camp. She also leveraged the MeK’s desire to be removed from the U.S. list of terrorist organizations, stating that the MeK’s cooperation in the American-backed relocation plan “will be a key factor in any decision” to delist it. In doing so, Clinton accepted that the U.S. has a responsibility to protect the dissidents and implicitly acknowledged the lack of evidence that the MeK engages in terrorism.