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Peace at any cost is a Prelude to War!
Khomeini fatwa 'led to killing of 30,000 in Iran'
By Christina Lamb, Diplomatic Correspondent
Presidency of the Islamic Republic of Iran
National Council of Resistance of Iran
Khomeini, Ayatollah Ruhollah - Infoplease
Revolution 1979-1999 - The Iranian
Iranian Human Rights Working Group
Imam Khomeini Homepage
Tehran Times
CHILDREN as young as 13 were hanged from cranes, six at a time, in a
barbaric two-month purge of Iran's prisons on the direct orders of Ayatollah
Khomeini, according to a new book by his former deputy.
More than 30,000 political prisoners were executed in the 1988 massacre - a
far larger number than previously suspected. Secret documents smuggled out of
Iran reveal that, because of the large numbers of necks to be broken,
prisoners were loaded onto forklift trucks in groups of six and hanged from
cranes in half-hourly intervals.
Gruesome details are contained in the memoirs of Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali
Montazeri, The Memoirs of Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, one of the
founders of the Islamic regime. He was once considered Khomeini's anointed
successor, but was deposed for his outspokenness, and is now under house
arrest in the holy city of Qom.
Published privately last month after attempts by the regime to suppress it,
the revelations have prompted demands from Iranian exiles for those involved
to be tried for crimes against humanity. The most damning of the letters and
documents published in the book is Khomeini's fatwa decree calling for all
Mojahedin (as opponents of the Iranian regime are known) to be killed.
Issued shortly after the end of the Iran-Iraq war in July 1988 and an
incursion into western Iran by the Iranian resistance, the fatwa reads: "It
is decreed that those who are in prisons throughout the country and remain
steadfast in their support for the Monafeqin (Mojahedin) are waging war on
God and are condemned to execution."
It goes on to entrust the decision to "death committees" - three-member
panels consisting of an Islamic judge, a representative of the Ministry of
Intelligence, and a state prosecutor. Prisoners were to be asked if they had
changed loyalties and, if not, were to be executed.
Montazeri, who states that 3,800 people had been killed by the end of the
first fortnight of executions, includes his own correspondence with Khomeini,
saying that the killings would be seen as "a vendetta" and would spark
opposition to the regime. He wrote: "The execution of several thousand
prisoners in a few days will not have positive repercussions and will not be
mistake-free."
The massacres, which came just before the Lockerbie bombing, were seen as a
sop to the hardliners at a time when Khomeini was already in failing health
and the battle for succession had begun between fundamentalists and
moderates. He died the following year.
According to testimony from prison officials - including Kamal Afkhami
Ardekani, who formerly worked at Evin prison - recently given to United
Nations human rights rapporteurs: "They would line up prisoners in a
14-by-five-metre hall in the central office building and then ask simply one
question, 'What is your political affiliation?' Those who said the Mojahedin
would be hanged from cranes in position in the car park behind the building."
He went on to describe how, every half an hour from 7.30am to 5pm, 33 people
were lifted on three forklift trucks to six cranes, each of which had five or
six ropes. He said: "The process went on and on without interruption." In two
weeks, 8,000 people were hanged. Similar carnage took place across the
country.
Many of those in the ruling council at the time of the 1988 massacre are
still in power, including President Mohammed Khatami, who was the Director of
Ideological and Cultural Affairs.
"The massacre may have happened 12 years ago, but the relevance is that these
atrocities are still happening", said Mohammad Mohaddessin, the chairman of
the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Iranian National Council of Resistance
(NCRI), the main opposition group, who was in London last week to present
evidence to MPs.
The NCRI has prepared files on 21 senior members of the regime whom it
alleges were "principal protagonists of the massacre", including Mr Khatami
and Ayatollah Ali Khameini, Iran's "Supreme Leader". Mr Mohaddessin will
travel to New York to present the files to the UN and call for a tribunal to
try them for crimes against humanity.
Mr Mohaddessin said human rights abuses were continuing in Iran despite the
election of Mr Khatami, who "presents himself as a reformist".
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