Now its is confirmed that Ayatollah Khameneh'i issued
killing orders
By Safa Haeri, Editor
Iran Press Service
PARIS 5TH JAN. (IPS) It is now almost certain that the recent killings
of dissident politicians and intellectuals in Iran have been ordered by
the ayatollah Ali Khameneh'i and carried out by the Special Operations
Committee (SOC) made of special units of the Information (Intelligence)
Ministry and the Pasdaran (the Islamic Revolution's Guards). In an unprecedented
article, the daily pro-Khatami "Salam" revealed Tuesday that
the recent murders, including the savage assassination of Mr. Dariush Foruhar,
the 70 year-old leader of Iranian People's Party (IPP) and his wife Parvaneh
and 4 other intellectuals are the work of "elements inside the regime".
"Anyone who has cared for this regime and this revolution can not
imagine that some persons inside the power have reached that such a degree
of deviation to regard as legitimate that kind of crimes and think that
by committing such crimes one can serve Islam and the Islamic regime",
observed "Salam".
That sharply contradicts declarations by conservative establishment,
including the ayatollah Khameneh'i, the leader of the Islamic regime, the
ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani, the former president as well as the commander
of the Pasdaran, all blaming foreign agents for the killings.
Two clerics who have defected, one to Germany and the other to the president's
camp, have both disclosed that the fatwas authorising the assassination
of Mr. and Mrs Foruhar had been issued by the ayatollah Khameneh'i.
In a communiqué issued Monday from his office in Versailles,
near Paris, Mr. Abolhasan Banisadr, the first president of the Islamic
Republic revealed, quoting a certain hojatoleslam Parvazi, that the order
for the assassinations are signed by Mr. Khameneh'i and carried out by
general Mohammad Baqer Zolqadr, the Deputy Commander of the mollahs Praetorian
Guards.
Mr. Banisadr's communiqué confirms the information published
in exclusivity a day before by the Iran Press Service concerning the arrest,
at the Frankfurt airport, of an Iranian cleric who offered the German security
authorities a list of 179 persons who are "scrutinised" by the
SOC and liable to be eliminated.
Both Mr. Mehdi Khanbaba Tehrani, a prominent, Frankfurt-based Iranian
dissident who had access to the case and Mr. Banisadr confirmed that information,
adding that the cleric Mr. Banisadr names as Mohammad Ja'far Amerian, had
defected to Germany in the middle of December, applying for political asylum.
According to Mr. Tehrani, all senior staff of the banned newspaper "Toos",
the "Iran e Farda" publication, some members of the Iran Freedom
Movement like Mr. Ebrahim Yazdi, it's present leader, several nationalist
and liberal personalities, many female journalist and intellectuals as
well as some members of the Centre of Iranian Writers in Exile, journalists
and dissident politicians outside Iran are on the list presented to German
authorities by Mr. Baqrian.
The leader's orders are executed by a team made of general Zolqadr,
his deputy Hossein Abdollahi, commander of the Sarallah patrol troopers
and the sons of Assadollah Lajevardi, "The Butcher of Evin" assassinated
some months ago in Tehran and Hossein Shariatmadari, the leader appointed
executive Editor of the Keyhan newspaper that reflects the views of the
Information Ministry.
The SOC is under the direction of hojatoleslam Ali Fallahian, the former
Information Minister who, after the victory of the ayatollah Mohammad Khatami
in presidential elections of 1997, was named as the leader's special adviser
for intelligence and security affairs and hojatoleslam Hasan Akhtari, a
former Ambassador to Damascus who is now the adviser of Mr. Khameneh'i
for Arab and Palestinian affairs. Iranian analysts speculated that the
paper's unequivocal accusations may come from the findings of a report
that had been submitted to the president last Thursday by the Special Investigation
Committee he created at the Interior Ministry days after the murder of
the Foruhars.
According to informed sources, that report has concluded that "the
highest authority" of the Islamic regime had ordered the murders.
"Unfortunately and as sad as it is, highly confirmed information
indicates that deviated mind persons inside the country and even sadder,
persons among those who are supposed to safeguard and guarantee the security
of the nation are involved in these crimes", Salam pointed out, calling
indirectly for the punishment of the Information Minister, the hojatoleslam
Dorri Naajaf- Abadi.
"This is exactly what the hojatoleslam Parvazi has told the president.
Those charges are very serious. It seems that influential and powerful
forces are preventing the report to become public, for, if published, not
only it will badly harm the position and the person of Mr. Khameneh'i but
may as well lead to a fatal show down between the leader and the president",
one senior political analyst told the IPS. Sa'id Leylaz, an independent
journalist in Tehran said the political consequences of what is happening
right now in Iran is unprecedented in the past 20 years and certainly constitutes
the most dramatic, important and far reaching of all the crisis the regime
has had to confront.
"If it is confirmed that the recent murders that has shocked and
overwhelmed the Iranians are the work of sections inside the intelligence
services or of people that act like autonomous killing brigades without
the knowledge of the authorities, that proves one needs more effective,
heavy handed control and surveillance over the security agencies",
Mr Leylaz observed during an interview with the Persian service of the
BBC.
As the article of Salam was widely commented by Iranians inside and
outside the country, it was announced that hojatoleslam Ali Razini, the
head of the Tehran Justice Department had escaped from an assassination
attempt on his life. Mr. Razini reached the fame when prosecuting Mr.
Qolam Hossein Karbaschi, the popular Mayor of Tehran sentenced to 5 years
behind the bar and ten years of interdiction from all public activities.
But sources in Tehran wondered that in the present climate when the credibility
of the leader and the powerful conservative establishment is being seriously
challenged, the failed assassination of Mr. Razini has not been arranged
to divert the public opinion.
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