In March, in what seems to be a joint effort by Belgium, France, and possibly other European powers, a treaty was agreed with Iran that would allow for the transfer of convicted persons, without excluding persons convicted for terrorism crimes. The treaty paves the way for the transfer of Assadollah Assadi, the convicted terrorist diplomat who is in a Belgian prison currently.
Assadi, who served as the third consular of the Iranian embassy in Vienna and headed the Iranian intelligence unit for Europe, transferred an explosive device from Tehran on a passenger plane, and transported it by car to Luxembourg, where he handed it over to his accomplices to bomb the Free Iran gathering of tens of thousands in Villepinte, France, in 2018, which was organized by the opposition National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI). The gathering was attended by opposition leader Maryam Rajavi and the US, European, and Middle Eastern dignitaries and former government officials. Experts testified that had the bomb exploded in the gathering, scores would have died, and hundreds would have been injured. Assadi and his accomplices were tried and convicted for their crimes to 20 years and 18 years in prison respectively by a Belgian court.
On June 30 the Belgian government presented the until-now secret treaty to Parliament for urgent ratification. This has led to an uproar Internationally, in Europe, the United States, Canada, and Australia.
In a letter to Éliane Tillieux, the President of the Belgian Chamber of Representatives, John Bercow, the Speaker of the British Parliament until 2019, wrote, “I find it inconceivable that Belgium, considered by many the capital of Europe, and a beacon of democracy and human rights, would even entertain entering into such a treaty with a regime universally recognized as the world’s leading human rights abuser and the most active state sponsor of terror. Here, we are not talking about a trustworthy actor with whom we should sign treaties of the kind customarily tabled before the Parliament. Rather, we are talking about a rogue state whose egregious abuse of human rights is reviled around the world.”
Ingrid Betancourt, former Presidential candidate in Columbia also expressed outrage. She wrote, “The idea that Assadi and his accomplices would serve the rest of their sentence in an Iranian
prison is not realistic. The Iranian regime has put all its diplomatic pressure to avoid these
agents from facing Belgian Justice. It will never imprison the very agents it had sent to
carry out the terrorist bombing in Paris. According to the documents during the four-year trial,
this plot was planned and ordered at the highest level of the Iranian regime and its Intelligence
Ministry, for which reason, the EU, including Belgium, sanctioned several of the Ministry’s
senior officials. Moreover, the treaty has a provision granting grace and amnesty (art 13) to the
sentenced prisoners, revealing the real intention of this piece of legislation.”
In a session of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Belgian Parliament today, MPs excruciated the government minister on the subject and questioned him on the need for the urgency, the reason for bundling treaties with India, UAE, and Iran together, and how he can guarantee that Assadi is not being set free.
In letters of condemnation US members of Congress, senior former US officials, international legal experts, and thousands of Iranians have condemned the move and asked Belgium to call it off. The Belgian government has responded evasively to sharp protests against this treaty by saying the bill is not intended for a specific person. Yet the government did not deny it could end in repatriating the convicted former diplomat to Iran where he will most probably go free.
The international outrage against this deal is growing. Here is just a handful of those protesting this move:
- S. Congressman RANDY K. WEBER
- S. Congressman BRIAN FITZPATRICK
- S. Congressman LOUIE GOHMERT
- Former Director of FBI in the US, Louis Freeh
- Former National Security Advisor James L. Jones
- Former Speaker of the UK House of Commons, John Bercow
- Former Presidential Candidate in Colombia, Ingrid Betancourt
- Eric David – Member of the UN-affiliated International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission (2006-2016); International Public Law Professor. Em., Université Libre de Bruxelles – (Belgium)
- Stefan Trechsel – President of the European Commission of Human Rights (1995–1999); Judge, UN International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) (2006-2013) – (Switzerland)
- Valeriu M. Ciucă – Judge, General Court of the European Union (2007-2010) – (Romania)
- Giovanni Grasso – Former International Judge of the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina; former Judge of the Human Rights Chamber for Bosnia and Herzegovina – (Italy)
- Claude Nicati – Deputy Prosecutor General of Switzerland (2001-2009); former President of the Government of the State of Neuchâtel (Switzerland); former investigating judge, Neuchâtel; Member of the List of Counsel for the International Criminal Court (ICC) – (Switzerland)
- Dainius Pūras – UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Physical and Mental Health (2014-2020); Chairman of the Coordination Committee of the Special Procedures of the UN Human Rights Council (2018-2019) – (Lithuania)
- Tahar Boumedra – Former Chief of UNAMI Human Rights Office and Representative of the HCHR in Iraq – (United Kingdom)
- THE BRITISH COMMITTEE FOR IRAN FREEDOM
- In Search of Justice (ISJ)
- Justice for the Victims of the 1988 Massacre in Iran (JVMI) – (United Kingdom)
