"More than 70 Mujahedeen who carry refugee cards from France, Germany, Canada and the United States are stranded in the no man's land two kilometers (one and a quarter miles) from Jordan's Al-Karama border post," the official said on condition of anonymity.

Among them is singer Ashraf Sadat Mortezai, 77, known by the stage name "Marieh," and Ali Mostashari, a political science professor at a Paris university, the official said.

Diplomatic sources meanwhile told AFP they were waiting for lists concerning these people.

"Twenty-eight of these Iranians claim to have French refugee documents but we are not sure that these documents are valid and we cannot verify them until the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) provides us with lists," one source told AFP.

"Sending them back to Iran is out of the question but unless we can verify the lists we cannot know whether or not they are political refugees in France," the source said.

The NGO official said many of the Iranians do not have valid documents.

On Sunday the UNHCR urged the Jordanian authorities to allow those blocked at the border to be transferred on a temporary basis to a refugee camp set up in Rweished, the Jordanian border town near Al-Karama.

A Jordanian official said Tuesday the authorities were first waiting for a commitment from the embassies concerned that they will take the necessary measures to repatriate these refugees, before allowing them into the country.

"Third country refugees must be repatriated to their host country or their country of origin in line with the agreements reached (with them)," said the Jordanian, who declined to be named.

He said contacts were established with the concerned embassies who were waiting for UNHCR lists in order to determine the status of these Iranians.

"Marzieh," as she has been known to Iranians for the past 50 years, is a legend in her lifetime, and the most prominent Iranian singer. She was born in Tehran in 1926 and is based in France.

She defected in 1994 and joined the People's Mujahedeen during a public rally in Paris and is also the artistic adviser to the group's leader, Maryam Rajavi.

In September 1994 Marzieh accepted an honorary membership of the National Council of Resistance of Iran, saying it was an honor to stand alongside the Iranian resistance.

A spokesman for the People's Mujahedeen, Ali Safavi, told AFP, "These are Iranian refugees who have gone to Iraq to visit their families and also the (Shiite) holy shrines at Najaf and Karbala.

"These refugees, who are supporters of the Mujahedeen and the Iranian resistance, have political refugee status in different European countries. They intended to return to their countries of residence before the outbreak of war but could not do so.

"The Iranian resistance calls on the government of Jordan and the UNHCR to make the necessary arrangements to facilitate the return of these individuals, most of whom are ill or elderly, to their respective countries."

The People's Mujahedeen took part in the 1979 overthrow of the Shah but later fell out with the Islamic regime, fighting a brutal civil war. During the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war, the group won recognition from Baghdad as the government of Iran and the use of bases in its western neighbour.

It has said it is neutral in the US-led war against Saddam Hussein's regime, which it denies assisting, and in recent days it claimed that its bases in Iraq had been attacked by Iranian forces coming over the border.

But the British embassy in Tehran said Tuesday that US-British coalition forces had struck the bases more than once.

The Mujahadeen "is not only a terrorist organisation according to Britain, but they were also part of the Iraqi armed forces" which constituted obstacles to the US-led operation in Iraq, spokesman Andrew Greenstock said.

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