Simultaneous with Hamid Noury’s trial in Stockholm, more than 100 Iranian athletes, including world champions, participants in the Olympics and national teams in football, wrestling, karate, judo, kung fu, taekwondo, gymnastics, sailing, weightlifting Basketball, marathon, athletics, boxing, volleyball, fencing, shooting, tennis and ping pong, signed a statement to the UN Secretary-General stating that the 1988 massacre in Iran, during which 30,000 political prisoners, 90% of them Mojahedin Khalq (MEK) members and supporters, were killed in a matter of weeks.
A copy of the book Crime Against Humanity, which contains the names of 5,015 prisoners executed in 1988, was attached to this letter to the Secretary-General.
November 29, 2021
The text of the statement is as follows:
Letter of Iranian Athletes to the UN Secretary General Regarding the Massacre of Iranian Prisoners in 1988
Call by athletes for holding Raisi to account and putting him and other officials of the clerical regime on trial for the 1988 massacre of political prisoners in Iran
Your Excellency António Guterres, Secretary-General of the United Nations,
Thirty-three years ago, in the summer of 1988, some 30,000 political prisoners were executed throughout Iran within a few weeks following brief interrogations that last a few minutes by 3-4 member commissions known as “Death Commissions”. This was pursuant to a fatwa by Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the ruling theocracy in Iran, who had hijacked the Iranian people’s revolution against the monarchy for democracy and freedom.
Many of the prisoners had served their sentences or were kept imprisoned after their sentences had finished, but Khomeini wrote in his fatwa with unparalleled cruelty: All prisoners who remained loyal to the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK), regardless of the stage of their imprisonment had to be executed. More than 90% of the victims of the 1988 massacre were members or supporters of the MEK.
Among the victims of this massacre were a number of athletes and members of Iran’s national teams. Forouzan Abdi, a member of the Iranian women’s national volleyball team, was one such victim who was executed after seven years in captivity. Among the 120,000 victims of political executions in the last 40 years, there were a number of sports champions, including Habib Khabiri, the captain of the Iranian national soccer team, and Navid Afkari, the wrestling champion, who were executed in 1984 and 2020 respectively.
Thirty-three years after the crime against humanity, which jurists consider as a genocide, most of the masterminds and perpetrators of this great crime still enjoy impunity and hold the most senior positions in the regime and continue to carry out executions. The killing of more than 1,500 protesters during the November 2019 uprising was carried out on the orders of the very same individuals who carried out the 1988 massacre. Ebrahim Raisi, the new president of the regime, was one of the key members of the Tehran Death Commission, who also has a dark record of execution and repression before and after the massacre. One of the henchmen involved in the 1988 massacre was arrested in Sweden in 2019, and his trial began in Stockholm in August 2021.
Various human rights bodies, including Amnesty International, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, and prominent international human rights experts have stressed the need to hold Ebrahim Raisi accountable for the 1988 massacre. Amnesty International’s secretary general said: “That Ebrahim Raisi has risen to the presidency instead of being investigated for the crimes against humanity of murder, enforced disappearance and torture, is a grim reminder that impunity reigns supreme in Iran.”
Silence and inaction in the face of genocide and crimes against humanity that took place at the end of the twentieth century is an encouragement to continue and intensify the crime. It is time for the UN Security Council, the Human Rights Council and other relevant UN bodies to take action. We call on the United Nations to immediately begin its investigation into the 1988 massacre, undoubtedly the largest political massacre since World War II, and to refer the case to the UN Security Council for holding its masterminds and perpetrators, including Raisi and Ali Khamenei to account and to put them on trial. Attached is a link to the copy of the book “Crime Against Humanity”, which contains names and details of 5,015 of the people who were executed in 1988. (https://we.tl/t-0Nr8OOB3Eg)
CC: Member states of the United Nations Security Council EU leaders
President, Vice President and Secretary of State of the United States
The signatories to the letter to the UN Secretary General:
- Soolmaz Abooali, world champion in karate
- Angelica Parvardeh, European Gymnastics runner-up from Sweden
- Mohammad Ghorbani, winner of the world wrestling gold medal
- Moslem Eskandar Filabi, wrestling champion of Iran and Asia – winner of 17 medals in international competitions
- Hassan Naeb Agha, a member of the Iranian national soccer team in the 1978 World Cup in Argentina
- Bahram Movadat, member of the Iranian national soccer team in the 1978 World Cup in Argentina
- Asghar Adibi, member of the Iranian national soccer team
- Manouchehr Arastopour, rowing champion of Iran and Sweden
- Abbas Novin Roozgar, member of the Iranian national soccer team
- Edwin Tehrani, won the gold medal in weightlifting in Sweden
- Ardeshir Asghari, world wrestling champion
- Afshin Shahverdi, world judo champion
- Reza Tahouni, Thai boxing world champion
- Maral Abooali, winner of silver medal in women’s karate in the world
- Firoozeh Ojaq, a member of the Iranian national basketball team
- Naser Gholi Ardalan, kung fu champion – Italy
- Kazem Gholami, Iranian national wrestler
- Mehdi Ghazal, member of the Iranian national soccer team
- Amir Hossein Eghbali, a player in the first division of Belgian basketball clubs
- Iraj Derakhshan Marathon Runner
- Haji Mohammad Azadan, member of Iran youth national soccer team
- Hassan Heidari, Asian Youth Weightlifting Champion, member and coach of the Dutch weightlifting team
- Dariush Abdul Maleki, Danish Judo Champion
- Saeed Ipakchi, Iranian track and field champion
- Ali Rahimi, wrestling champion in Norway
- Ali Sajjadi, member of Iran youth national soccer team
- Glayel Parvardeh, Gymnist – Sweden
- Majid Moshtari, member of Iran youth national soccer team
- Mohammad Reza Yousefali, member of Iran youth national soccer team
- Neda Amani, soccer goalkeeper and coach of Swiss women’s soccer clubs
- Farrokh Farrokhyar, volleyball
- Ali Zahedi, Soccer
- Nima Afshari, Ping pong
- Bahram Khatib-Shahidi, Soccer
- Sohrab Shirali, Wrestler ,referee and Coach of Wrestling
- Farzad, soccer
- Alireza-Sirousi, Referee & judge Boxing
- Fred Parsay, soccer
- Ahmad Moeinimanesh, Basketball
- Abbas Ameri, Chess
- Ali Asghar Vandaie, Chess, Soccer
- Mehran Ebrahimi, Kung Fu
- Mohammadreza Alizadeh, Soccer
- Toraj shahabi, Soccer
- Babak Dadvand, Marathon Runner
- Gholamhossein Bahadoor, wrestling
- Hassan Rezai, Soccer
- Khalil Khani, Wrestling, Track & Field
- Mohammad Sadeghpour, Soccer
- Masoud Sadeghpour, Wrestling
- Mirtaher Hassanyn, Volleyboll- Ping Pong
- Behrouz m, Soccer
- Omid, Taekwondo
- Nasser Abkari, Shooting
- Mosayyeb jalali, Wrestling
- Glayol, Soccer
- Sadollah Falahati, Wrestling
- Golpar Parvardeh, Gymnastics
- Gabriel Richards, Boxing
- S Zanjani, Aikido, soccer
- Khosrow Parvardeh, Soccer
- Mohammad Darafarin, soccer
- Aydin Arjang, Soccer
- Marjam Parvardeh, Basketball
- Hossein Yarandpour, Soccer
- Shahram Homayounfar, soccer
- Yousef Mahdavi, Soccer
- Roxana Sadeghpour, Soccer
- Samir Ghanai, Soccer & Karate
- Robin Tehrani, Soccer
- Behrang sarkhosh, Kyokushinkai
- Behzad Allahyari, Weightlifting
- Karim Akbari, weightlifting
- Siamak, Soccer
- Mohammad Behrouzi, Soccer Referee
- Touraj Mohammadi, Voetbal
- Omid Hatamian, wrestling
- Hossein Fadakar, Soccer
- Ben Janloo, soccer
- Sivan Barzegar, Taekwondo
- Ismail Pashapour Fencing
- Ismail Mohaddes, soccer
- Reza Mohammadi, soccer
- Khosrow Alikhani, soccer
- Jamshid Heydari, soccer
- Bahman Abedini Taekwondo
- Majid Rahimi Taekwondo
- Masoud Ipekchi Athletics
- Majid is a football customer
- Jamshid Azari, soccer
- Asghar Saadi, boxing
- Elias Khademi, soccer
- Christopher Kulp, Cross Fit; Olympic Weightlifting
- Jack Iacovangelo, Gymnastics
- Alex, Weightlifting
- Henrik Fjeldheim, Soccer
- Steve Parkinson, Judo
- Mike Caveney, Judo
- William Svensson, Gymnastics
- Madeleine Danielsson, Soccer
- Selina, Gymnastics
- Maria Alkhouri, Tennis
- Valentina Baldelli, Gymnastics