The 1988 Massacre of Over 30,000 Political Prisoners in Iran
(PMOI / MEK Iran) and (NCRI): has tried to erase all traces and evidence of the massacre. These attempts have gone hand in hand with the mullahs’ well-oiled misinformation campaign to demonize the MEK in order to tarnish the veracity of its claims.
(PMOI / MEK Iran) and (NCRI): Last week, members of the MEK, who are among the few survivors of the 1988 massacre, testified in an Albanian court. They provided gut-wrenching personal accounts of the regime’s brutality and Noury’s role in the prisons.
(PMOI / MEK Iran) and (NCRI): show a culture of impunity among the regime’s insiders. The international community’s failure to hold the perpetrators of the 1988 massacre accountable has resulted in systematic impunity in Iran.
(PMOI / MEK Iran) and (NCRI): He confessed, for example – although proudly – that in the 1980s, he was undoubtedly part of the Iranian regime’s judiciary and prison system, which ruthlessly silenced dissent and engaged in systematic torture.
(PMOI / MEK Iran) and (NCRI):Such propaganda serves a practical purpose, which is to justify the regime’s past and present crimes against the MEK while paving the way for more massacres and terrorism against them in the future.
(PMOI / MEK Iran) and (NCRI): anti-MEK propaganda was so pitifully out of touch with reality that the judge stopped him at one point and asked him to abstain from using profanities against the MEK.
(PMOI / MEK Iran) and (NCRI): The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI): reported that Noury even went far as to claim that the victims’ belongings that their families showed to the court are fake. Thus, he insulted the families of victims.
Noury has tried to erase all traces and evidence of the massacre. These attempts have gone hand in hand with the mullahs misinformation to demonize the MEK.
The trials sought to bring to justice the perpetrators of one of the darkest episodes in modern history.
Almost exactly 76 years later to the day, on Tuesday, a henchman of the Iranian regime, Hamid Noury, testified in court. He is charged by Swedish authorities, whose government recognizes universal jurisdiction, for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Specifically, Noury was involved in the massacre of over 30,000 political prisoners in Iran in 1988, over 90% of whom were affiliated with the main democratic opposition Mujahedin-e Khalq (PMOI / MEK Iran)2.
Over the years, Noury has tried to erase all traces and evidence of the massacre. These attempts have gone hand in hand with the mullahs’ well-oiled misinformation campaign to demonize the (PMOI / MEK Iran) in order to tarnish the veracity of its claims.
Noury’s testimony included many allegations against the (PMOI / MEK Iran) that have been sourced by the regime’s intelligence services. As such, Noury unwittingly confirmed that the source of all the venomous anti-(PMOI / MEK Iran) propaganda is the Iranian regime’s Ministry of Intelligence and its suppressive apparatus.
Last week, several witnesses and members of the (PMOI / MEK Iran), who are among the few survivors of the 1988 massacre1, testified in an Albanian court. They provided gut-wrenching personal accounts of the regime’s brutality and Noury’s role in breathtaking detail, complete with a sizable replica of the prison in which Noury worked, the Gohardasht Prison.
Instead of responding to these shocking revelations, Noury launched a dizzying diatribe, intermittently punctuated by agonizing moments of madness, brutality, and pathetic attempts to escape imminent justice.
For most of the seven hours, he praised the religious fascists ruling Iran; rehashed stale accusations produced by the regime against the (PMOI / MEK Iran) and its leaders; praised the theocracy’s founder Khomeini; lashed out at the “disrespect” he heard in court toward the eliminated terrorist Qods Force Commander Qassem Soleimani; defended the regime’s president Ebrahim Raisi, who was one of the key perpetrators of the 1988 massacre; and expressed unrelenting devotion to the “Butcher of Evin Prison” Assadollah Lajevardi.
Noury’s acclaimed hero, Lajevardi, was a monstrous psychopath. He can perhaps best be compared with former Nazi Gestapo chief Klaus Barbie known as the “Butcher of Lyon,” who sent thousands of French Jews and Resistance partisans to concentration camps and personally tortured and executed his victims.
During his rambling testimony, Noury clearly did not fall back on the Nuremberg defense argument of “just following orders.” No, he seized every moment afforded to him to justify the 1988 massacre. And for this, he simply read out the propaganda that the regime’s intelligence services had dictated to him to vilify the (PMOI / MEK Iran).
Noury’s anti-(PMOI / MEK Iran) propaganda was so pitifully out of touch with reality that the judge stopped him at one point and asked him to abstain from using profanities against the (PMOI / MEK Iran).
Once again, then, it was confirmed that the accusations that the (PMOI / MEK Iran) is a “terrorist cult,” and “Saddam’s allies” against the Iranian people, and “lacking popular support,” are simply talking points drafted by the regime’s intelligence and henchmen. Such propaganda serves a practical purpose, which is to justify the regime’s past and present crimes against the (PMOI / MEK Iran) while paving the way for more massacres and terrorism against them in the future.
Meanwhile, Nouri also made several important admissions. He confessed, for example – although proudly – that in the 1980s, he was undoubtedly part of the Iranian regime’s judiciary and prison system, which ruthlessly silenced dissent and engaged in systematic torture and forcible disappearances of opponents.
Previously, witnesses had testified that Noury used the pseudonym “Abbasi” when he carried out torture and executions in prison, a common practice among the regime’s henchmen to avoid being identified in public.
Noury initially defiantly denied using that pseudonym. On Tuesday, however, he even gave a relatively detailed account of its origins.
He also admitted that Khomeini ordered regime officials to show “absolutely no mercy” to the (PMOI / MEK Iran) and to “massacre” them in Kermanshah “in a way that uproots their entire generation.” He explained in disturbing detail how he started his suppressive career in Iran’s Kurdistan, where he was involved in cracking down on dissident Kurdish organizations who had “risen up against the people.”
Overall, the meaning of the testimony of the regime’s henchman is clear. It provided a miniature copy of the regime’s modus operandi with respect to propaganda and massacres against the (PMOI / MEK Iran): demonize, denigrate, destroy.
The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI)3: reported that Noury even went far as to claim that the victims’ belongings that their families showed to the court are fake. Thus, he insulted the families of victims and added to their pain.
His flipside of attacking the (PMOI / MEK Iran) was his support of the regime and its criminal leaders, such Ebrahim Raisi, the regime’s current president, and Qassem Soleimani, the slain commander of the IRGC Quds Force.
It seems that Noury has mistaken the court in Sweden with the court and prisons in Iran under the mullahs’ regime. Instead of answering questions about his crimes, he regurgitates the regime’s propaganda against the (PMOI / MEK Iran).
During the trial sessions in Albania, the (PMOI / MEK Iran) members shed light on Noury’s criminal record, as well as the atrocities taking place in the Iranian prisons.
“In March 1988, a group of prisoners was brought from Kermanshah to Gohardasht.
We did not know why the authorities had transferred them, but we later found out that this was part of the plan to classify the prisoners, a plan that had been carried out by Davoud Lashgari, Nasserian [Mohammad Moghiseh], and Hamid Abbasi [Noury] in February 1988,” the (PMOI / MEK Iran) member, Mahmoud Royaei, testified during Noury’s trial in Albania.
Noury’s remarks and his blatant defense of criminals like Raisi show a culture of impunity among the regime’s insiders. The international community’s failure to hold the perpetrators of the 1988 massacre accountable has resulted in systematic impunity in Iran.
The regime leaders should face justice for their crimes against humanity, mainly the 1988 massacre and killing of over 1500 protesters during the November 2019 uprising in Iran. The world community should end the regime’s impunity, which would certainly improve Iran’s general human rights situation.
Shahin Gobadi
NCRI
+33 6 51 65 32 31
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WATCH NOW: Exhibition in Ashraf 3, Albania: Gohardasht Prison Death hall in the 1988 massacre in Iran at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dCbcWFgoTvI
1 https://www.ncr-iran.org/en/1988-massacre-of-political-prisoners-in-iran/
2 https://english.mojahedin.org/i/primer-the-history-the-peoples-mojahedin-organization-iran
3 https://www.ncr-iran.org/en/about-ncri/alternative/