Iran Probe
Friday, 15 July 2016
As the Iranian democratic opposition movement, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) held its massive annual rally in Paris on July 9th, twenty five decorated Nobel laureates issued a joint letter to the gathering in the French capital. The distinguished scholars wished the “best of success” for the Iranian people’s “great campaign in pursuit of democracy and human rights.”
Considering a recent rocket barrage targeting a camp of Iranian refugees in Baghdad on July 4th, the Nobel used this opportunity to convey their deepest worries about the safety and security of these individuals. Camp Liberty, a former U.S. military base located southwest of the Iraqi capital near Baghdad International Airport, has for over four years now been the home of thousands of Iranian dissidents, who have been exiled in Iraq for nearly three decades.
“Like you, we are extremely concerned about the appalling conditions of Iranian refugees in Camp Liberty. This is the 5th year that these individuals have been transferred from their home in Camp Ashraf [their previous home located northeast of Baghdad] to the prison-like conditions of Camp Liberty based on pledges of speedy resettlement. During this period they have been the target of four horrific rocket attacks launched by Iranian regime operatives in Iraq, leaving dozens killed and injured,” the signatories of this statement added.
Reiterating the international community’s distresses of increasing violence in Iraq, the Nobel laureates raised concerns over the “unstable conditions of Iraq” and how the “presence of militia groups linked to Iran’s Quds Force in this country redouble the threats facing the safety and security of these ‘People of Concern.’”
Seeking a solution on how to resolve the plight of these Iranian refugees in Iraq the Nobel laureates called upon the “international community, especially the United States and the United Nations, to carry out all possible measures to guarantee the security of these refugees in Iraq until the last individual is resettled in a third country.”
The signatories of this joint statement include:
Professor Arieh Warshel, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 2014, US
Professor Serge Haroche, Nobel Prize, Physics 2012, France
Professor David J. Wineland, Nobel Prize, Physics 2012, US
Professor Thomas A. Steitz, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 2009, US
Professor Gerhard Ertl, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 2007, Germany
Professor Eric Maskin, Nobel Prize, Economics 2007, US
Professor Roger D. Kornberg, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 2006, US
Professor John C. Mather, Nobel Prize, Physics 2006, US
Professor Robert Grubbs, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 2005, US
Professor John L. Hall, Nobel Prize, Physics 2005, US
Professor Thomas C. Schelling, Nobel Prize, Economics 2005, US
Professor Richard R. Schrock, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 2005, US
Professor Finn E. Kydland, Nobel Prize, Economics 2004, Norway
Professor Gunter Blobel, Nobel Prize, Medicine 1999, US
Professor Douglas D. Osheroff, Nobel Prize, Physics 1996, US
Sir Richard Roberts, Nobel Prize, Medicine 1993, US
Professor Edmund Fischer, Nobel Prize, Medicine 1992, US
Professor Elias J. Corey, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 1990, US
Professor Jerome I. Friedman, Nobel Prize, Physics 1990, US
Professor Jean-Marie Lehn, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 1990, France
Professor Jack Steinberger, Nobel Prize, Physics 1990, US
Professor Thomas R. Cech, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 1989, US
Professor Dudley Herschbach, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 1986, US
Professor John Polanyi, Nobel Prize, Chemistry 1986, Canada
Professor Sheldon Glashow, Nobel Prize, Physics 1979, US
