The last remaining members of a group of Iranian revolutionary exiles to have been living in Iraq for almost four decades have been resettled in Europe.

More than 280 members of Iranian opposition group the People's Mujahedin Organisation of Iran (PMOI/MEK) became the last to leave Baghdad's Camp Liberty on Friday (9 September), the group said in a statement.

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The group, which seeks the overthrow of Iran's clerical leadership, has been living in limbo in Iraq since it was exiled from Iran after the Islamic revolution in 1979.

Camp Liberty, a former US military base, has been its home since it disarmed and relocated from Camp Ashraf, north of Baghdad, in 2012 following the overthrow of Saddam Hussein after the 2003 invasion.

A deal brokered by the US and the United Nations refugee agency saw almost 2,000 dissident Iranians resettled in nearly a dozen European countries, including the UK, since the start of 2016.

The group's members were given safe-haven after complaints to the international community that inhabitants suffered poor living conditions in the camp and were victims of repeated attacks by hostile forces.

One 2011 "massacre" at Camp Ashraf left 36 dead and hundreds wounded, while in 2013, three separate attacks against Camp Liberty left 12 dead and more than 170 wounded. In 2015 another 20 residents of the camp were killed in a rocket attack.

Shahin Gobadi, spokesperson for PMOI/MEK, said the successful relocation of the group represented a "major blow to the clerical regime and a major victory for the Iranian Resistance".

He added: "One has to keep in mind that this happened despite all the conniving and conspiracy and obstructions by the clerical regime which sought to force the residents to either give up resistance and succumb or to be massacred."

He went on to accuse forces loyal to Tehran of repeated "massacres" and "rocket attacks" in the past.

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