By Hanif Garmabi, Camp Liberty

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Nearly 2 years ago I left my beloved father in Ashraf in the situation in which I believed that after accomplishing the matter of our possessions in the Ashraf, I would meet him again in the Camp Liberty, because in the quadripartite agreement, in which UN and US took part, the Iraqi government pledged to ensure the security and safety of those PMOI members who remained in Ashraf till the matter of possessions were settled.

But later on 1 September 2013 in total disbelief we heard the news of attack of the camp Ashraf by Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki’s Dirty Division forces. I was shocked by this news, running to watch the news as it was being broadcasted. In the first broadcasting of the pictures of the victims of this atrocity, I saw my father lying dead on a bed in Camp Ashraf’s clinic. He was drenched in blood and had gunshots in his body, true signs of crime against humanity.

Later I watched that painful picture many times, and stared with agony to the innocence of my father who was betrayed, and always this question hurting me why?

Why was the Ashraf clinic bed, which supposed to be the place of healing, transformed to an altar of execution and the massacre of my father and his friends?

Now, even though more than one year has passed since that crime, yet not only those in charge have not been brought to justice, but also criminal behavior against us continues in the other forms.

Because of harsh medical blockade in “Camp Liberty” prison, healing beds also have been regarded as death and torture beds.

One day at 5:00 pm I heard the news of the death Mohammad Taghi Abbassian, a resident of the camp who passed away due to illegal medical restrictions imposed against us by Iraqi forces in charge of the camp. By watching him on the bed of Iraqi clinic of the camp, once again the picture of my father lying dead on the bed in Camp Ashraf flashed back in my mind. An unbearable shock of pain overtook me and my breath came with difficulty. The same agonizing question again preoccupied me, why it is so?

Taghi Abbassian was the 21st victim of this inhumane medical siege in the Liberty prison, who passed away due to the silence and idleness of UNAMI and the U.S., and also due to the lack of access to the appropriate healing necessary for treatment, and due to the constant deterring and delays of Iraqi agents in transferring patients to hospitals outside the camp for treatment.

He was tortured slowly and subsequently died on the only bed in the only Iraqi clinic in the camp in the harsh struggle with his illness.

I imagined the innocent and pain-twisted face of Taghi, which I had seen when I was visiting him in the hospital, in my mind I recollected the words exchanged between us, and thought that I must witness the slow death of my dear colleagues with whom I’ve lived together for years.

I hadn’t been able to formulate the response to many questions that passed through my mind when I heard the news of death of the 22nd victim of the medical siege, Ms. Farideh Vanayee. Again, I was at a loss.

How many more will lose their lives to the medical siege? I asked myself. Really how far the silence and indifference of UNAMI and U.S. will continue?

Yes it is the psychological and physical torture which have been imposed on us by our enemies, but more painful is the negligence of UN and US embassy, who are in effect facilitating such criminal behavior with their silence and inaction.

Will anyone hear the cry of patients of Camp Liberty?

Will a day come when the beds would become the place of curing our patients instead of killing them?