May 11, 2003	Sunday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 8, 1424

NORTHEASTERN IRAQ, May 10: US forces reached a disarmament deal here on Saturday with the Iraq-based Iranian armed opposition, the People’s Mujahedeen, a group designated as terrorist by Washington.

The group’s thousands of guerilla fighters are to assemble in camps in Iraq under the control of the US-led coalition, said General Ray Odierno, commander of the US Army’s Fourth Infantry Division.

“It is not a surrender. It is an agreement to disarm and consolidate,” Odierno said after winding up two days of talks with the group, which has been termed a terrorist organisation by both the United States and Iran.

“On the surface they appear to have some of the same goals the US has in forming democracy and fighting oppression,” he added. “They were very cooperative.”

Odierno said between 4,000 and 5,000 People’s Mujahedeen would gather at the camps and that their status would later be decided by Washington. A ceasefire deal was agreed last month.

The People’s Mujahedeen were supported by Saddam Hussein’s regime as a buffer against Iranian influence in Iraq, and could provide US forces with valuable information about the former Iraqi leadership and pro-Iran militia groups in the region.

US officers are concerned that if the group is rendered powerless, rival guerrillas from the Badr Brigade, the Iran-based military wing of the main Iraqi Shiite faction — the Supreme Assembly of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SAIRI) — will try to fill the vacuum.

But Tehran has dismissed US concerns that it intends to use the Badr Brigade as a vehicle to spread its influence in Iraq.—AFP