AN INCONVENIENT TRUTHYesterday another shocking revelation made my heart sink. The news made me think that the Iranian authorities who claim to be the global leaders of the spiritual path are in fact the most hypocritical religious authorities that the whole world has ever experienced. The defeated Iranian presidential candidate Mehdi Karroubi in an open letter to Rafsanjani made some distressing allegations. He claimed that some female detainees who were arrested during post-election protests were raped savagely inside the notorious Kahrizak detention center in the south of Tehran. He also mentioned in his letter that “The young boys are also suffering from depression, serious physical and psychological problems as a result of being sexually assaulted inside the prison.
Guantanamo Bay detention camp, Abu Guarib prison and now Kahrizak detention center, these are places where detainees faced terrible and horrific experiences which leave an indelible psychological scar on their soul. For many years the Iranian regime condemned the behavior of the American prison guards inside Guantanamo and Abu Guarib prisons towards so called competent enemies. However, now the regime itself is implicated in a similar situation. The center which was initially built to detain thugs and louts, now is the focus of appalling mistreatment of political dissident. Various news articles have reported on overcrowded cells where prisoners were verbally, physically and sexually assaulted by their guards on a daily basis. Mohsen Ruholamini and Amir Javadifar were two of the many prisoners reported to have died from torture at Kahrizak detention center.
Eventually after the regime had been forced to shut down the detention center, the Iran’s police chief admitted yesterday that the protestors who were arrested after June’s disputed election had been tortured while in custody. In a preposterous and absurd comment he denied any fatality as a result of the torture and claimed that an unspecified “viral illness” had caused the death of some of the prisoners.
These are the people who claim to have a solution for global problems. They claim to become the perfect symbol of the Islamic state for the Muslims around the world. These are the people who claim to have the immaculate religious authority. These people now must be held accountable for their savageness towards the children of this land.
Even if we could not cry out for justice, it would still be inconceivable that so many young Iranians had to die in order to awaken us to their sacrifice. The most precious lives of this land are being lost for the sake of the political and religious ideology of a few single minded demagogues.
This reminds me of the words of Malcolm X, “Nobody can give you freedom. Nobody can give you equality or justice or anything. If you are a man, you take it.”
Shahin M
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