While Iran’s regime has committed numerous human rights violations in its forty-year history, its mass killing of political prisoners in the summer of 1988 stands out for its depravity and cruelty. For three months, Iran’s regime, based on a Fatwa (Islamic Decree) issued by the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ruhollah Khomeini, subjected thousands of political prisoners across the country to minutes-long “re-trials” (which failed to meet all international standards of due process) presided over by what the prisoners came to call “Death Commissions.” Based on no more than a few questions about their political or religious beliefs, prisoners who had already faced (albeit inadequate) trials and sentencing, who had served several years in prison, and who had been subjected to gruesome torture were sent by the Death Commission to hang. Ayatollah Montazeri, the cleric who served as Iran’s second-in-command at the time, estimated that at least 3,800 prisoners were killed that summer. Others believe the number was considerably higher.
According to the detailed report of Amnesty International, the agency issued at least sixteen (16) Urgent Action notices between August and December 1988, mobilizing their activists to send letters to Iranian authorities to call for an end to the extrajudicial killings of political prisoners immediately (P.65). The first one of these Urgent Actions was issued on August 16, 1988, after the mass execution of supporters of a militant opposition group named the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI) and about eleven days before the mass execution of about one thousand leftist prisoners. Amnesty activists sent thousands of telegrams, telexes, and letters to the head of Iran’s Supreme Court, the Minister of Justice, and the diplomatic representatives of Iran in their respective countries urging “the condemnation of all outstanding death sentences and an end to executions in Iran.” As such, we submit that it would be impossible to believe that any senior leader in Iran, and certainly not its UN Ambassador, was unaware of the atrocity unfolding across that country.
Regrettably, the historic record shows that Mr. Mahallati did not use his unique position at the United Nations to draw public attention to these crimes, nor did he publicly implore Iran’s government to end this criminal activity. Instead, he issued statements and delivered speeches denying these crimes, refuting the extent of the executions, and disputing the validity of the names provided in the reports.