روزنه rowzane خبری – تحلیلی
Following the hacking of CCTV cameras in Evin Prison by a group of hackers and the release of videos from inside the prison, the world has now obtained undeniable evidence of torture and inhuman and violent treatment of prisoners in the prisons of the Islamic regime. Mohammad Mehdi Haj Mohammadi, the head of the Prisons Organization in Iran, has not been able to resort to lies and denial in response to the release of these videos. He accepted responsibility for this inhumane behaviors and shamelessly apologized to the regime’s leader and the guards, not the prisoners! He apologized to the Supreme Leader and the prison guards, because this document exposes the criminal behavior of the government and the prison guards towards the prisoners, which has been going on for 40 years. We well remember the words of Ibrahim Ra’isi on February 17, 2017, how he hypocritically spoke of “kindness” in dealing with prisoners and boasted of the Islamic Republic’s readiness to open prisons to visit international institutions in Instead, he spoke about allowing the Islamic government to visit prisons in other countries.
Now that the CCTV cameras of Evin Prison have been hacked, the world has entered the prisons of the Islamic regime and can find out for themselves a part of the truth that we have been emphasizing for years. The scandal is so obvious that the head of the judiciary has ordered an investigation into the prison guards’ violent treatment of prisoners. Members of the Islamic Consultative Assembly have said that the “dignity of the system” has been called into question by the publication of these images!
In the published videos, we see scenes that break the heart of every human being. In one video, a person faints in what looks like a prison yard. After the prisoner, wearing a medical mask, fell to the ground, prison officials grabbed the person by the hands and dragged him to the ground. In the images taken from various cameras, it can be seen that this person is dragged on the ground for a while and is forcibly lifted up the stairs. In other images, a prisoner is also severely beaten by several police officers. In another video, a prisoner is beaten so badly that blood flows from his mouth. In another image, a prisoner commits suicide in protest of the harsh conditions of the prison. The scenes show even drug trafficking by prison officials …
For the people of Iran, who have touched the crimes of the Islamic Republic with their own flesh and blood for fourteen years, these images are by no means new. The importance of the published images is that it provides undeniable evidence to international institutions that can be used in prosecution of the Islamic Republic. It also provides the Iranian people and the families of prisoners with clear evidences to intensify struggles and efforts to secure the release of prisoners and to end criminal treatment of prisoners by the regime. The images published so far show the treatment of ordinary not political prisoners by the prison authorities of the Islamic regime. Dealing with political prisoners, labor activists, environmental activists, women and children’s rights activists, bloggers and protesters in the recent protests clearly are no better. Let us not forget that Sattar Beheshti, a worker and blogger, was tortured so much by the FATA police in November 2012 that he was killed due to bleeding from his lungs, liver, kidneys and cerebellum. At least five people were brutally tortured to death during the 2009 protests in Kahrizak Prison. A number of prisoners were also killed in prison due to intentional negligence in providing medical care for them, or were repeatedly beaten and tortured by evil individuals at the instigation of prison officials.In this last case, it is necessary to mention the brutal murder of Alireza Shirmohammad Ali, a 21-year-old political prisoner in Tehran’s Fashafoyeh prison, who was stabbed to death on June 10, 2009.
Niloufar Bayani, one of the detainees in the case of environmental defenders in Evin Prison, has already been exposed in several letters to various officials in the Islamic Republic and by testimony in court about “the most severe mental and psychological torture, threats of physical torture and sexual threats” during at least “1200 hours” interrogation by the interrogators of the Revolutionary Guards Intelligence Organization. There are many cases and the list is long.
Inhumane treatment of prisoners in the prisons of the Islamic regime is not accidental and is not limited to one or two people. We are facing systematic government violence in Iran that uses force and repression against citizens outside prisons and does not recognize any human rights for prisoners in prisons. It is clear how the government, which killed 1,500 people during the protests over the high price of gasoline in November 1998, will deal with those arrested during the same protests. Amnesty International has released a report on 1 September 2020 entitled “Trampling Humanity” documenting widespread detention, disappearances and torture following the November 1998 protests in Iran. That report sheds light on many aspects of reality about the prisons. A part of the Amnesty International report states: “Child detention, beatings, forced stripping, sexual insults, spraying pepper spray on the genital area and causing electric shock to the testicles, hanging and holding in painful positions, induction of sensation “Suffocation with water, the threat of death and dramatic execution, the forced injection or ingestion of chemicals are among the tortures perpetrated by Iranian military agents.”
Based on recently released videos, as well as dozens of other credible reports, we urge the international human rights organizations not to be indifferent to these reports and to use international law against the Islamic regime and the perpetrators of these acts.
These documents provide more than enough evidences for any decent persecutor that cares about human rights, to open a criminal case against the Islamic Republic and its prison guards. At the same time, we call on all social activists and the families of all political prisoners, all the families that seeking justice in Iran to take the initiative and file a criminal case against the Islamic regime and send it to international institutions against this unbridled crime in prisons and stand against these crimes.
While the trial of Hamid Nouri, one of the perpetrators of the horrific killings of political prisoners in the summer of 1988, is underway in Stockholm, the world is more prepared for international action against the Islamic regime, due to the exposure of regime’s severe and systematic human rights violations.
We must work hard and put more pressure on the Islamic Republic. At the same time, this is the only way to reduce the pressures on prisoners.
Campaign to Free Political Prisoners in Iran (CFPPI)
Free Them Now -Campaign to free jailed workers in Iran (FTN)
International Committee Against Execution (ICAE)
24 August 2021
