Human Rights Archives - IAC Virginia

Tehran’s Spy Arrested in Sweden: A Grim Reminder of Rooted Terrorism in Europe

Mon, 18 Oct 2021 21:41:45 +0000

NCRI | Mahmoud Hakamian | Sept. 25, 2021

Swedish newspapers, including Aftonbladet and Expressen, reported that a former Swedish security police chief had been arrested for spying on behalf of the Iranian regime between 2011 and 2015. His arrest once again highlights the need for a joint-European action to address the Iranian regime’s terrorism. As identified by local and Persian language websites, the arrested spy is Peyman Kia, 40 years old. He had obtained Swedish citizenship and worked as a director in the Swedish Security Police (SPO) and an analyst in a Swedish military organization while he was spying for Tehran.
Kia was arrested on Monday. On Thursday, the court decided to order detention for this person on charges of grossly and unlawfully abusing his position as someone with access to classified information and violating national security to avoid him destroying documents or escaping. The arrested person is accused of espionage for reasonable reasons, the Swedish Security Service said in a statement.
His arrest comes a month after the arrest of an Iranian couple, who had obtained refugee status in Sweden by presenting a false Afghan identity. They were the agents of the regime’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS).
In February 2021, a court in Antwerp, Belgium, condemned Assadollah Assadi and his three accomplices to nearly 70 years of prison for attempting to bomb the Iranian opposition’s rally in 2018 in France. Assadi was a Vienna-based diplomat-terrorist who had used his diplomatic privileges to smuggle 500 grams of the TATP explosives to Europe and handed over to his two operatives, Amir Sadouni and Nasimeh Na’ami. Sadoun and Na’ami, along with another operative, Mehrdad Arefani, had obtained Belgian citizenship and posed as supporters of the Iranian opposition movement.
Assadi’s trial and conviction once again highlighted what the Iranian Resistance had said for years: the regime’s embassies and diplomats are promoting terrorism and espionage. During Assadi’s trial, the authorities in Germany, where Assadi was arrested in 2018, opened another case about a network of terrorism and espionage he had managed across Europe. The German officials found a notebook in Assadi’s car with important information about the 2018 bomb plot, Assadi’s actions travel, and the amounts of money he had given to different operatives.

“The Iranian Resistance has specific information of the Iranian regime’s sleeper cells across Europe, which Assadi commanded. The Iranian regime’s MOIS has a network of agents in Europe supported by the regime’s embassies that misuse their diplomatic facilities. Assadollah Assadi was at the head of the Iranian regime’s intelligence network in Europe,” Mr. Javad Dabiran, the deputy director of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) representative office in Germany, told Al-Arabiya on January 22. “40% and specifically 144 out of 289 meetings of Assadi with his agents were held in Germany. This implies two things. First, a large part of [the regime’s] network is located in Germany, and Germany is the scene of the Iranian regime’s terrorist activities,” Mr. Dabiran added.
On the eve of Assadi’s conviction, another plot of the MOIS against the Iranian Resistance in Germany was revealed. The regime had tried to persuade Iranians residing in Germany to spy on the NCRI’s office in Germany and Javad Dabiran, then receive “good money.”
The recent arrest of another spy in Sweden, holding a top security position, is the most recent in chains to arresting the regime’s spies in Europe. It also implies how rooted the regime’s espionage network is in Europe, overshadowed by the European leader’s persistence on the failed appeasement policy toward Tehran.
In July 2017, Ali Fallahian, the former head of the MOIS, acknowledged in an interview how the regime’s agents work under many covers in Europe. “The ministry needs cover for its works to collect information both inside the country and outside. Obviously, we don’t send an agent to Germany or America and, for example, say, ok, I am an agent of the information ministry, and I am here to collect information, please give that to me. He would work under cover of business or other jobs, including reporters. You know many of our reporters are the MOIS agents,” Falahian said.

Arrested Iranian agent Kaveh Lotfolah Afrasiabi in U.S. is the tip of the iceberg
As revealed during Assadi’s trial, the Iranian regime is involved in terrorism at top levels. On April 28, 2021, the regime’s then-president Hassan Rouhani confirmed the regime’s Supreme National Security Council takes all decisions regarding Tehran’s malign activities.
“All the complex issues of foreign policy and the field of defense are discussed in the Supreme National Security Council, whether when we want to [carry out] a defensive operation and whether when we have to carry out an offensive operation somewhere or whether when we want to undertake an important political task,” Rouhani acknowledged.
Before Rouhani, his Foreign Minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, who oversaw the 2018 bombing plot led by Assadi in Europe, acknowledged how his Ministry is entirely involved in terrorism and espionage in a leaked audiotape.
What you should know about Iran’s network of terrorists and spies in EU

“Most of our Foreign Ministry ambassadors have a security structure. Our Ministry of Foreign Affairs has been facing security issues since it began operating. The Foreign Ministry’s agenda has been a political-security agenda since the beginning of the revolution. In the 1990s, they closed down the Ministry’s economic directorate and instead created regional directors whose tendencies were more political and security-related,” Zarif said. The European officials should take the recent arrest of another spy in Sweden seriously and consider it a mounting threat of terrorism from the regime.
Unfortunately, the European leaders are more concerned about keeping the dialogue with the Terrorist regime in Tehran. This comes when the regime’s new government does not have the “moderate” façade anymore. The new Foreign Minister, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, has been considered a “field agent” and is a known member of the terrorist “Quds Force.” Yet, the EU leaders, particularly Josep Borrell, the EU’s chief diplomat, did not lose the chance of meeting and praising Amir-Abdollahian and the terrorist regime he represents during the recent United Nations General Assembly.

The EU leaders should adopt a firm policy toward the regime. Appeasing this regime would only embolden it to continue its terrorist activities. As the Iranian Resistance has reiterated, the EU should close down the regime’s embassies and expel its agents operating in the European Union under various pretexts. This would certainly increase the security of the EU’s citizens.

https://www.ncr-iran.org/en/news/tehrans-spy-arrested-in-sweden-a-grim-reminder-of-rooted-terrorism-in-europe/

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High number of Iran executions in 2021 signals worsening rights condition

Sun, 10 Oct 2021 14:09:06 +0000

IRAN HRM | October 7, 2021

October 10 is World Day Against the Death Penalty. More than 140 countries have agreed to abolish the death penalty, according to Amnesty International. The Iranian regime, however, holds the world record for both executions of women and the highest per capita execution rate.

The death penalty is a violation of Articles 3 and 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which emphasize the right to life of every human being.It is also contrary to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.The Iranian regime continues to use the death penalty as a tool to intimidate and repress dissidents; And many regime officials also defend it.

In his first news conference after the June 2021 election, the regime’s president Ebrahim Raisi, who is responsible for the massacre of political prisoners in 1988 and other crimes against humanity, defends himself over the executions and said that he should be rewarded for defending people’s rights and security.

Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejei, the current head of the regime’s judiciary, who was appointed to the post by Khamenei on July 1, has also a dark record regarding the execution of dissidents in Iran.

According to statistics compiled by Iran Human Rights Monitor, at least 267 people were executed in Iran since the beginning of 2021.

This shows an increase over the last year, when 255 people were executed throughout 2020.

The actual number of executions is much higher. The clerical regime carries out most executions in secret and out of the public eye. No witnesses are present at the time of execution but those who carry them out.

At least 92 executions were carried out for drug-related offenses in 2021 and 130 were carried out for murder. Nine women, eight political prisoners and two child offenders are among those executed.

The high number of Iran executions in 2021 once again proved that the clerical regime uses the executions as a mean to its survival.

There is irrefutable evidence that torturing defendants for making false confessions against themselves is a common practice in Iran’s prisons.

On the World Day against the Death Penalty, Iran Human Rights Monitor once again calls on the UN Secretary-General, the Human Rights Council and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, as well as European countries, to take immediate action to save the lives of prisoners on death row in Iran. It is time for Iran’s human rights record to be referred to the UN Security Council.

Execution of juvenile offenders in 2021

Iranian authorities have continued to execute child offenders in violation of their international obligations. Since January, at least two child offenders were executed in Iran. Dozens of juvenile offenders in prisons are also currently at risk of execution.

UN rights chief Michelle Bachelet in June pointed to Iran’s “widespread use of the death penalty” and said that “over 80 child offenders are on death row, with at least four at risk of imminent execution”.

Responding to the criticism Majid Tafreshi a senior Iranian official said that the death penalty for crimes committed as minors does not mean it violates human rights. Tafreshi, the council’s deputy head of international affairs argued that executes convicts for crimes they committed while under-age “three to four times” a year.

Execution of women

At least nine women were executed in Iran since January 2021. The clerical regime in Iran is the world’s chief executioner of women. The regime frequently hands down the death penalty for women.

The international law recommends alternative punishments for the imprisonment of mothers who must take care of their children. In Iran, however, the regime imprisons mothers and hands down death sentences for them.

In an infamous example of the death penalty for women Zahra Esmaili, 42, who died of a heart attack while waiting to be executed was still hanged on February 17, 2021. She was sentenced to death for having claiming responsibility for the murder of her husband who was a senior official in the Ministry of Intelligence. She did so to save her teenage daughter, who had shot her father in the head. According to her lawyer, she was made to watch as 16 men were hanged in front of her while waiting her turn at Rajai Shahr Prison, west of the capital Tehran.

Execution of political prisoners

Since January 2021, at least nine political prisoners were executed in Iran.

Hassan Dehwari and Elias Ghalandarzehi, two Sunni Muslim Baluch political prisoners were executed in Sistan and Baluchistan Province on January 3, 2021, for the charge of armed attacks on police and collaborating with opposition groups. They were tortured to make confessions.

Javid Dehghan, 31, a member of Iran’s Baluchi ethnic minority, was hanged on January 30, 2021. He was sentenced to death for “enmity against God” (moharebeh) in May 2017 in connection with his alleged membership in an armed group. In convicting and sentencing him to death, the court relied on torture-tainted “confessions” and ignored the serious due process abuses committed by Revolutionary Guards agents and prosecution authorities during the investigation process.

Ahwazi Arab prisoner Ali Motairi was on hunger strike when he was executed on 28 January 2021. He was also sentenced to death despite serious due process violations, including allegations of torture and forced “confessions”.

Hossein Silawi, Ali Khasraji, Naser Khafajian and Jassem Heidari were executed in secret in Sepidar prison on 28 February 2021.

At the time they had sewn their lips together and been on hunger strike since January 23, 2021, in Sheiban prison in Ahvaz, “in protest at their prison conditions, denial of family visits, and the ongoing threat of execution.”

Their relatives who saw their bodies after execution said that bruising was visible on all four men, raising concerns that they had been tortured or otherwise ill-treated, and their lips had not healed from when they sowed them shut on hunger strike.

Iran executed another Arab political activist, Ali Motiri on January 28, 2021 who had been accused of killing two members of the IRGC’s Basij militia in 2018.

Executions on rape charges

At least nine prisoners were executed on rape charges since the beginning of 2021. Under international law, countries that still use the death penalty must limit its use to the most serious crimes, namely premeditated murder. With the execution of those accused of rape, the Iranian regime continues to brutally violate the right to life in violation of its international obligations.

On 29 September, despite domestic and international interventions, Iranian officials executed Farhad Salehi Jabehdar, a 30-year-old man sentenced to death for the rape of a child. He was sentenced to death by Criminal Court One of Alborz Province on 12 March 2019. The conviction and sentence were upheld by the Supreme Court.

The father of the child formally requested that the authorities not impose the death penalty on Farhad Salehi Jabehdar in November 2019. His lawyer appealed to President Ebrahim Raisi in his former capacity as head of the judiciary to stop the execution, and order a review of the case, but Ebrahim Raisi did not accept the request.

Executions on drug charges

The use of the death penalty for drug charges is prohibited under international law. However, the Iranian regime continues to execute drug offenders.

In 2021, the number of executions was much higher than the previous year.

In 2020, at least 26 people were executed in various Iranian prisons for drug offenses. This is while the figure reached 91 in the first 9 months of this year.

Executions for murder

At least 130 prisoners were executed on murder since January 2021 in Iran. Many of them were executed in an unfair trial in Iran on murder charges. On several occasions, these detainees have been reportedly denied the right to a lawyer during the trial or have been tortured for forced confessions.

Two prisoners were executed in September based on Qassameh. Qassameh, which means “sworn oath”, is described as a certain number of people swearing an oath on the Quran. It is used when the judge decides that there is not enough evidence of guilt to prove the crime but still thinks it is likely that the defender is guilty. The people who swear in Qassameh are not usually direct witnesses to the crime.

https://iran-hrm.com/2021/10/07/high-number-of-iran-executions-in-2021/

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The ‘Butcher of Tehran’ is Terrified of Stepping Foot in the West

Sun, 03 Oct 2021 20:19:44 +0000

Newsweek | Struan Stevenson | 10/1/21

Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi, dubbed the “butcher of Tehran” due to his involvement in murder, genocide and human rights violations, ducked out of attending the U.N. General Assembly in New York and instead sent a pre-recorded message. Raisi is on the U.S. sanctions list because of his leading role in the 1988 massacre of over 30,000 political prisoners in Iran. It seems likely he chose to stay in Tehran rather than risk causing outrage to tens of thousands of ex-pat Iranians, had he come in person to New York. His predecessors as presidents of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Hassan Rouhani, both attended the New York U.N. General Assembly meetings in person, but Raisi is clearly afraid of his murderous past catching up with him if he dares to set foot in the West.

Raisi has publicly admitted and even boasted about his involvement in the 1988 massacre, involving mostly members and supporters of the People’s Mojahedin of Iran / Mojahedin e-Khalq (PMOI/MEK), the main democratic opposition to the despotic mullahs. In fact, in 2009, following a nationwide uprising in protest at the rigged election of Ahmadinejad as president, Raisi said: “As long as the MEK leadership is alive, anyone who supports the group in any way deserves to be executed.” By this, he meant that extermination of the MEK members and supporters is a must without any legal basis, simply because they think differently from the mullahs and because their different approach is more appealing to ordinary Iranians, particularly young people, women and intellectuals. There can be no clearer indication of his involvement in the international crime of genocide.

Now, Agnès Callamard, the secretary general of Amnesty International, has called for Raisi to be investigated for crimes against humanity and for his involvement in murder, enforced disappearance and torture. The U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres has also issued a damning report on the grave human rights violations that have occurred in Iran. His report expressed concern at the inhumane treatment and torture of supporters of opposition groups and their arbitrary conviction by revolutionary courts for the alleged crime of moharebeh or waging war against God, which carries the automatic death penalty. The opposition groups referred to by Guterres are mainly the PMOI/MEK, again showing that the U.N. has recognized the crime of genocide. In his report, António Guterres also expresses his concern over impunity from past violations such as the 1988 massacre of political prisoners, accusing the Iranian regime of “destroying evidence of the execution of political dissidents and harassment and criminal prosecution of families of victims calling for truth and accountability.”

In his pre-recorded video speech, filled with lies, cynical abuse, insults, praise of terrorism and threats to global peace and security, Raisi accused the U.S. of using sanctions as an act of war against Iran. He falsely claimed that U.S. sanctions had prevented medicines and COVID-19 vaccines from reaching the Iranian people, despite the fact that sanctions have never affected food, medicines, agricultural items and humanitarian products. It is only the criminal incompetence of the mullahs who ruled against utilizing any COVID-19 vaccines from the West and then defaulted on payments for Sinopharm and Sputnik vaccines from China and Russia, that has led to the appalling tragedy of over 440,000 deaths from the virus in Iran.

Claiming to be keen to send a message of “rationality, justice and freedom” to the world, Raisi, the hanging prosecutor, whose hands are dripping with the blood of his murdered victims, carefully avoided any mention of the mullahs’ massive financial and military support for proxy wars across the Middle East. As the key sponsors of Bashar al-Assad in Syria, the Houthi rebels in Yemen, the brutal Shiite militias in Iraq, the terrorist Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza, the mullahs do nothing for rationality, justice and freedom. Raisi even heaped praise on the terrorist godfather Qasem Soleimani, killed by a U.S. drone strike.

Raisi predictably also called for all the signatories to the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear agreement, to uphold their obligations under the terms of the deal. He omitted to remind the U.N. how his regime has repeatedly boasted of their serial breach of the agreement as they accelerate their enrichment of uranium to weapons-grade status. Raisi demanded the lifting of U.S. sanctions as the only way of ensuring the Iranian regime’s return to the terms of the JCPOA, despite widespread intelligence that the mullahs’ adherence to the nuclear agreement was always a fraud and their race to develop a nuclear bomb never faltered.

Raisi, as a genocidal murderer, presides over a government of assassins, terrorists and thieves. He must never be allowed to set foot in the West and he should be prevented from addressing international conferences, even remotely. The U.N. Security Council must now facilitate the prosecution of Ebrahim Raisi and other officials responsible for decades of atrocities and human rights violations, particularly the genocidal massacre of political prisoners in 1988. There must be no impunity for mass murderers like Raisi. The recent news that the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague has launched a full probe into Rodrigo Duterte, president of the Philippines, for his involvement in crimes against humanity and murder will send shockwaves to Tehran. Duterte’s extra-judicial killings in his so-called war on drugs may now lead to his indictment, arrest and appearance in the ICC. Surely this must pave the way for a similar indictment against Raisi.
Today, we should send the clearest possible message to Ebrahim Raisi. His crimes will not be forgotten or forgiven. His victims and their families demand justice. He will be held to account for crimes against humanity, murder, human rights violation and genocide. There is a prison cell in The Hague waiting for him.

https://www.newsweek.com/butcher-tehran-terrified-stepping-foot-west-opinion-1633978

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Sweden: Iran War Crimes Trial Opens

Wed, 11 Aug 2021 04:17:06 +0000

Universal Jurisdiction Provides Opening for Justice for Long-Ignored Crimes

Human Rights Watch | Aug 9, 2021

(Stockholm) – The opening of a landmark trial in Sweden on August 10, 2021 of an Iranian citizen accused of participating in the mass execution of political prisoners is an important moment for victims long denied recognition and justice.

On July 27, Swedish prosecutors announced their decision to prosecute an Iranian citizen for “committing grave war crimes and murder in Iran during 1988.” Prosecutors did not reveal the identity of the suspect, who has been detained in Sweden since November 2019.

“This milestone trial in Sweden comes after decades of persistence by Iranian families and victims of the 1988 mass executions,” said Balkees Jarrah, associate International Justice director at Human Rights Watch. “This case moves victims closer to justice for the crimes committed more than 30 years ago.”

The trial in Sweden is possible because the country’s laws recognize universal jurisdiction over certain serious crimes under international law. This allows for the investigation and prosecution of these crimes no matter where they were committed and regardless of the nationality of the suspects or victims. Sweden has elements in place to allow for the successful prosecution of serious crimes, including comprehensive laws, well-functioning specialized war crimes units, and previous experience with such cases.

Swedish prosecutors clarified that “Swedish domestic legislation does not include crimes against humanity committed before 1 July 2014 and could not be relied on in this indictment as the alleged criminal acts took place before that date. Therefore, the indictment involves crimes against the international law i.e. war crimes as well as murder.”

On July 18, 1988, Iran accepted United Nations Security Council Resolution 598, calling for a ceasefire in the eight-year war between Iran and Iraq. On July 24, 1988 the largest armed Iranian opposition group, the Mojahedin-e Khalq Organization (MKO or MEK), which had been based in Iraq since 1986, opened an incursion into Iran.

The group’s armed force in Iraq, which was called the National Liberation Army, attempted to topple Iran’s government. Iranian forces repelled the offensive, and Iranian authorities subsequently executed many political opponents then in prison, including many MKO members who had been arrested and sentenced years earlier.

Following a religious edict by Ayatollah Khomeini establishing a committee to review the cases of thousands of political prisoners, the Iranian authorities in 1988 executed thousands of political prisoners held in Iranian jails. Iranian authorities have never officially provided any information about the number of prisoners executed. However, the late Ayatollah Hussein-Ali Montazeri, the former deputy supreme leader, estimated the number of victims to be between 2,800 and 3,800. Amnesty International has reported that the “Iranian Committee for the Defence of Human Rights in Iran, a human rights group outside Iran … has recorded the names of 4,672 individuals killed during the mass prisoner killings in 1988 who were affiliated with the… [MKO] or leftist or other political opposition groups.”

In August 2016, Montazeri’s family published an audio file, originally recorded in August 1988, in which he harshly criticized the executions in a conversation with the committee, calling it “the biggest crime in the Islamic Republic, for which history will condemn us.”

Iranian authorities have long sought to silence and prosecute those seeking justice for crimes committed in 1988. Following the release of the audio file, Iran’s Special Court of the Clergy sentenced Ahmad Montazeri, Ayatollah Montazeri’s son, to 21 years in prison in November 2016 on charges including “spreading propaganda against the system” and “revealing plans, secrets or decisions regarding the state’s domestic or foreign policies … in a manner amounting to espionage.” The sentence was later suspended.

Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and a group of UN human rights experts have all previously described the 1988 mass executions as a crime that constitutes or “may amount to” crimes against humanity, which are among the most odious crimes in international law. Those credibly implicated should be investigated and prosecuted for these crimes, Human Rights Watch said.

Iranian officials Morteza Eshraghi, Hossein Ali Nayeri, and Mustafa Pour-Mohammadi served as the members of the committee that decided the fate of the detainees in Iran. According to survivors, President Ibrahim Raeesi, then Tehran deputy prosecutor, also participated in the meetings. All four were sent letters from Ayatollah Montazeri discussing the mass executions, as well as a released audio file with their voices discussing the issue. Allegations of President Raeesi’s involvement in the 1988 mass executions do not appear to be part of this Swedish trial.

Universal jurisdiction cases are an increasingly important part of international efforts to hold those responsible for atrocities accountable, provide justice to victims who have nowhere else to turn, deter future crimes, and help ensure that countries do not become safe havens for human rights abusers, Human Rights Watch said.

“Universal jurisdiction laws are a key tool against impunity for heinous crimes, especially when no other viable justice option exists,” Jarrah said.

https://www.hrw.org/news/2021/08/09/sweden-iran-war-crimes-trial-opens#

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In Remembrance of 120,000 Fallen for Freedom, Iranian People Rising

Mon, 19 Oct 2020 06:31:18 +0000

Iranian Americans Hold Photo Exhibition and Rally Outside State Department, Call for Accountability

WASHINGTON, DC, October 21, 2020 – In an elaborate photo exhibition held by the Organization of Iranian American Communities (OIAC) outside the U.S. Department of State building in Washington, DC, prominent speakers and supporters of democratic opposition coalition, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), highlighted four decades of systemic arrests, torture and executions in Iran and called on the international community to hold perpetrators of these crimes accountable.

Prominent political personalities and former political prisoners spoke about the 1988 massacre of 30,000 political prisoners, majority of whom were members of Mujahedin-e-Khalgh (MEK), the November 2019 murder of 1,500 protesters, and the assassination of dozens of political dissidents abroad. Speakers included former U.S. Attorney General, Michael Mukasey, former Senator Robert Torricelli, as well as former State Department officials Ambassadors Mitchell Reiss and Marc Ginsberg. Former Congressman Ted Poe (R-TX) and former White House official Linda Chavez also addressed the rally.

Judge Mukasey reminded global leaders that, “this regime is not going to change. Rather, it has to be changed. The people who must do that are the Iranian people and it is our job to support them in any way that we can in this struggle.” Former Senator Robert Torricelli noted that, “the tactics of America of how to help the Iranian people to get to this in the future may or may not change, but the goal does not. The mullahs must fall, and freedom must return to the Iranian people in any form of government that they choose that defends basic liberties.” “As we look today at the faces of the martyrs,” Mr. Torricelli said, we are “remembering those who lost their lives either in the slaughter of 1988 or on the streets of Tehran and other cities around Iran.”

Ambassador Mitchell Reiss referenced the qualifications of the NCRI leadership and said, “Under the leadership of Madam Rajavi, the MEK offers the Iranian people and the world a different future. She offers a democratic alternative based on individual freedom and human dignity, a vision that could not be more different from the dictatorship that now controls Iran.”

Highlighting the necessity to hold Iranian regime officials accountable, Mrs. Linda Chavez said, “it’s important that the State Department focus on what is happening in Iran because this is something that needs to be brought to the international community’s attention. And the United States has the opportunity to go to the United Nations Security Council and to demand that

justice be brought in these horrendous killings.”

Former Congressman and Judge Ted Poe (R-TX) also lamented the notion that Iranian leaders are yet to face accountability for their crimes and added, “no one has been held accountable, not even the attacks and the plots, the plots of assassination in Albania, Paris and other places. Not even the assassination of Kazem Rajavi in Switzerland.”

Three former political prisoners, Mrs. Roya Johnson, Mrs. Shirin Nariman and renowned surgeon, Dr. Firouz Daneshgari, addressed the event and provided firsthand accounts of the human rights violations they were subjected to, and witnessed. In her remarks, Hannaneh Amanpour said, “I was only five years old when my father was killed by the Khomeini regime in 1988.” Roya Johnson, spoke about Navid Afkari, a wrestling champion who was executed in Iran on September 12, 2020 and added, “Navid is from the same city that I am from. Shiraz. He was held in the same prison where I was held for 2 years, the notorious prison of Adel Abad. He was probably tortured in the same torture chambers where I was tortured too.”

Event participants and speakers called for:

Urgent attention to the rising gross violations of human rights in Iran and ongoing crimes against the political prisoners and protesters.
Urgent call to implement further sanctions against the officials responsible for human rights violations in Iran.
Call for accountability for those involved in the torture and executions in Iran and terrorism abroad.

The exhibit displayed thousands of pictures killed in Iran since 1979, and called on the United Nations to move beyond the dozens of resolutions deploring the state of human rights, but to appoint a body to investigate its crimes, including the “ongoing crimes against humanity in Iran.”

By1988, Iran’s prisons were packed with thousands of political prisoners, mainly belonging to the main opposition, the MEK.

The UN peace accord, and the reluctancy of the masses to go to the Iran-Iraq war front line cornered Khomeini, the Supreme Leader at the time, forcing him to drink the “poison chalice” as he called it, and accept his inevitable warmongering defeat.

In order to prevent post war unrest and take revenge on the opposition, Khomeini issued a religious decree ordering the execution of any political prisoners who had not “repented” and who was not willing to collaborate utterly with the regime.

Suddenly, all family visitation to prisons were banned; kangaroo courts were held, and summary execution sentences were issued. Over 30,000 political prisoners who were serving their sentences, or even finished theirs, were executed in the summer of 1988. To this date, the Iranian regime has never officially admitted this massacre, and many victims’ family members who have questioned the massacre are sitting in prisons. Many previous or current senior officials from both sides of the regime, the so-called hardliners, and reformers, were directly involved in this massacre.

The most recent bloody uprising occurred in November 2019 when people poured to the streets to protest the multifold fuel price hike. Quickly, this unrest turned into an anti-government uprising and spread to more than 200 cities, and every single province in the country. The Iranian regime, in fear of being toppled by the people, shut down the internet for weeks and started a killing spree. Snipers were placed at roof tops and government security forces were shooting protesters from close range on the streets. In the matter of few days, the regime killed more than 1,500 protesters and arrested more than ten thousand.

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