International Day in Support of Victims of Torture: A veteran torturer in Iran becomes president
28-June-2021
Category: executions، Freedom of Expression، Prisoners
June 27, 2021
Newsgroup: Freedom of Expression- Prisoners- Execution
Every Iranian with a history of even a day in detention is a victim of torture.
Breathing in Confinement: With the aim of vanishing all types of torture, the UN General Assembly has designated June 26 as the World Day in Support of Victims of Torture.
In Iran, however, despite the government’s accession to the Convention against Torture, Ebrahim Raisi, has been appointed as president.
Raisi has a horrible record of human rights violations. He for instance, has been one of the four judges of the “Death Delegate” in the massacre of political prisoners in 1988. He was also one of the torturer of the prisoners in Hamadan and Karaj.
In this report, referring to the use various forms of torture, some of which have been invented by the torturers in Iran, we call on all international organizations and Western governments to address the human rights situation in Iran and to support the victims of torture.
Breathing in Confinement, the news organ of the Prisoners’ Rights League in Iran, believes that any Iranian who, for whatever reason, has experienced even a day in detention by security, military, or police forces, is a victim of torture. This claim is based on the international definition of torture, according to which torture is not only a physical type of harassment, but any act resulting in physical or mental harm to the detainee is a form of torture. And everybody knows that in all of the prisons and detention centers in Iran, various types of physical and psychological torture are widely used in order to pressurize the detainees to confess.
Iran has signed the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which its Article 7 explicitly prohibits torture and any types of cruel or degrading punishments. Yet the prison officials use a variety of forms of torture, against almost all detainees.
Using solitary confinement and beating the prisoners are among the most common and inhumane forms of torture in Iran. Islamic Republic officials however, in their 43-year history of ruling, have used many other horrific types of torture some of which are as follows:
The 1980s’ political prisoners in Iran, have reported horrific forms of torture some of which were unprecedented in the world. In their dairy notes, these political prisoners have mentioned a type of torture named “cage” or “coffin”. Coffins were wooden boxes of the size of a grave in which the prisoners were being held for a long period of time, where they had to be seated all the time even during sleep. These prisoners were always under the supervision of a prison guard who would whipped them for the slightest violation of the principles, such as changing their positions.
Other types of torture, which are exclusively used in the Islamic Republic of Iran, include humiliating the ordinary prisoners by turning them around the streets while beating and flogging them in public. This type of torture leads to serious psychological damage not only to the prisoners but to the people who witness these scenes, which unfortunately, in many cases includes children. These acts could be considered as “torturing the whole society”, and the worst type of which is execution in public.
Contrary to the internationally accepted principles, a common rule in all of the detention centers in the Islamic Republic is that the detainees are guilty unless proven otherwise, and that they must be tortured to confesses!
Another widespread act of torture committed by the Islamic Republic officials is keeping the detainees in secret locations known as “informal detention centers”. Those who were arrested after the November 2019 protests, repeatedly reported to the Amnesty International that they were being kept in a complete unawareness, in secrete locations while being subjected to various forms of physical as well as psychological torture.
The other type of torture which is commonly used in prisons in Iran is the use of prisoners’ illnesses as a torture tool. The authorities of the Islamic Republic pressurize the prisoners by not providing them with medical care. The prisoners will be cared for only if they accept to do whatever the prosecutors want them. In recent years, many prisoners, including Behnam Mahjoubi, Mohsen Dogmehchi, and Sasan Niknfas, lost their lives as a result of being denied of medical care.
Another example is psychological torture, one type of which is forcing the prisoners to witness the torture of one of their acquaintances or relatives. The other form of psychological torture is giving false bad news to the prisoners who are not permitted to contact their family. The news like death or arrest of their relatives. Experience has shown that in most cases, the harm of this type of torture remains with the victims for the rest of their life, and they continue to suffer even after their release.
Ebrahim Raisi, who is currently the President of Islamic Republic, has been one of the torturers in various prisons in Iran, including Hamedan, Karaj and Tehran. In 1980s, Raisi was concurrently the prosecutor of Karaj and Hamedan. And in the 1988 massacre of political prisoners, he as a member of the “death delegate”, issued thousands of death sentences for the political prisoners.
Raisi’s presidency shows that despite the demands of the international community, the Iranian authorities are not willing to comply with the international conventions for the promotion of human rights in Iran. During the 43-year history of the Islamic Republic, torture has always been an integral part of its rule.
Amnesty International said in its recent statement: “Ebrahim Raisi has risen to the presidency instead of being investigated for the crimes against humanity.”
This must be urgently addressed by the international community as well as the Western governments. Deterrent measures should be taken to reduce the torture and killing of prisoners under any name in Iran.
“Breathing in Confinement” calls on all of the international entities, including the UN General Assembly and the Un Special Rapporteurs on human rights, to urge all of the governments to hold the Islamic Republic accountable for torturing its citizens.