A State of Fear

by Dr Reza Ghaffari

  That was not the only display. Late one hot summer night, I was taken to a room where around 70 to 80 corpses were packed with ice. Congealed blood mixed with melt water to create an ugly, foul-smelling liquid. Some prisoners fainted, others vomited.

  Prisoners were also forced to donate blood from time to time around this time. We would be led out of our cells to the infirmary to make ‘a voluntary contribution to our Islamic war heroes fighting American imperialism’. Each prisoner would have to give half a litre, a considerable ‘contribution’ considering that many of us were already extremely weak, undernourished and suffering from internal bleeding, asthma, TB and the like.

  Death could come at any time. In the toilet one morning I found the body of an old man, maybe 70 years old. Parchment white in death, he had obviously been squatting over the hole through which we defecated when life left him. He had collapsed back into the hole, so now the corpse was bent double: head, shoulders and legs splayed up and out, his backside and midriff lodged firmly in the hole, like a doll thrown into a bin. The corpse was locked in its undignified posture by rigor mortis. I fled from this macabre scene, shouting for help. A guard ordered me to return and pick up the body with another prisoner. I grasped the old man’s shoulders, the other man took his ankles and the body was unceremoniously bundled out of the block. I could feel the ebbing warmth of the body as I clutched it.

  ‘Just throw him outside the door’ the guard said, as if he’d been a rat.

  ‘Good,’ commented another, ‘one less mouth to feed.’

  On 30 August 1981, Iranian president Mohammad-Ali Rajai and prime minister Mohammad Javad Bahonar were attending a meeting of the Supreme Defence Council in Tehran. An aide entered, put down a briefcase between the two men and left. When it was opened it triggered an explosive device which left five people dead, including the president, prime minister and the chief of police in Tehran. That night the guards rampaged throughout Evin. Prisoners were pulled out of their cells and herded into the yard. Those with glasses, moustaches, or anything that was seen as a sign of education, were selected for slaughter. That night approximately 400 of my fellow inmates were killed in retribution.

  Mass executions again erupted less than a year after the assassinations. Night after night a noise would rumble across the surrounding valley like thunder. The first time I heard it I thought it was girders being unloaded for ongoing construction work. It didn’t take me too long to find out that the thunder came from barrels of the automatic weapons of the firing squad. Five thousand rounds were fired in each instance. These were always followed by a pistol shot to the head of each victim. All of Evin’s 10,000 inmates would sit and count the number of pistol shots: one, two, three… thirty, forty… the toll ran higher and higher. Our morbid arithmetic would tell us approximately how many of us had been shot at the back of the block that night. Some nights we would count up to 400 single shots. Still, we would hear on the prison broadcasting system’s Friday morning prayers, one of the deputies complaining, ‘We don’t hear the sounds of machine guns from Evin enough!’ In addition, the Hezbollah would chant ‘Death to the hypocrites and the godless’; the hypocrites being the Mojahedin, the godless those with any communist or socialist orientation.

  These mass executions went on every night for months, not only in Evin, but throughout all of the country’s prisons. The period of most intense slaughter ran from June 1982 to February 1983. Around 8,000 were massacred in Evin alone. Conditions for the surviving prisoners at this time were unbearable. Between 80 and 120 inmates were packed into cells that, during the Shah’s time, housed no more than ten. In the corner of every cell in the block there were single bunk beds stacked in threes and 12 people had to sleep in these three beds. As a result prisoners would occasionally fall out during their sleep, injuring both themselves and the unfortunate souls they landed on.

  There was only enough room to lie on one side at night. If you changed position, you would lose your place and be forced to stand in a corner for the rest of the night. Trips to the lavatory were regulated: three visits every 24 hours and no more than two minutes to go to the toilet and wash. Because of various injuries, many prisoners could not hold on that long and would have to piss in the bowls we used to drink out of and leave them in a corner of the room. Then, when they got to go to the bathroom, these bowls would be emptied and cleaned. Prisoners who complained were sometimes forced to drink the urine by the guards as punishment.

  Occasionally people would die of their injuries in these cells or individuals would be led away for ‘block 4 treatment’ – this was the area where the mass executions were carried out and we all knew those unfortunates were never coming back. Their places were quickly filled by new arrivals.

  Evin was split into a number of sections. Members of various organisations were kept separately. One section was given over to Saghari – prisoners under 15. All were forced to pray five times a day. There were six blocks, each of which contained between 1-2,000 prisoners. In total, there were 200 cells in all blocks.

  At night the guards descended upon the cells. They would look at each of the prisoners carefully, ask them a couple of questions about their activities outside prison, including what they were charged with. Then a handful would be picked out at random. Out in the corridor the Tavabs would write the name and date of birth on the inside of the right leg of the selected prisoner with large marker pens. None of these prisoners were ever seen again. All were shot. These were executions without even a show trial, in retaliation for the bombing campaign of the Mojahedin. During these raids, other prisoners were asked if they would participate in the execution of their comrades. Those who refused to do so often found themselves in front of the firing squad. The inmates who did assist were taken to the execution yard and told to shoot the wounded in the head. Others removed the bodies torn apart by machine gun and dumped them onto waiting trucks.

  Many younger prisoners, especially those with religious backgrounds, capitulated and became Tavabs. Mojahedin militia members, up to and including leaders, gave information which led to the arrest of hundreds of girls and boys. One informant was known as Vali 300 – ‘300’ because that was the number of people who were arrested as a result of the information he provided. The torturers in Evin and other prisons set comrade against comrade, children against parents, parents against children.

  Within Evin’s walls was a block that stood separate from the others. It was built by the prisoners themselves and called the ‘resting place’. A thousand cells contained the leadership of various oppositional left groups, those who were active in organising resistance in other prisons, those whose case notes were incomplete and could not yet be sent to court and those who were thought to be potential troublemakers within the prison system. Inmates were kept in the small cells for three or four years in solitary confinement. ‘Resting place’ to the prisoner meant that you stayed there until you rot.

  I came to know it from the inside in 1986. It all started when one of the guards came to the door of my block for me. ‘Get your essentials together, but be quick – and get your blindfold on. You are coming with me. Don’t try to talk to anyone.’

  Hastily, I gathered up my toothbrush, toothpaste, soap and several items of prison clothing and put them into a plastic bag. As he hadn’t told me to collect up all of my belongings, I felt fairly certain that I was off for just a short while. He stood over me as I grabbed my things to ensure that I made no verbal contact with any other prisoner. I followed him out of the block. He led me to a waiting vehicle. The guard helped me into the back of it, prodding my back to indicate that I should sit down on a bench inside. From behind my blindfold I could just see two guards, two women prisoners and three other male prisoners. Obviously, with these two guards looking over us, there was no way we could converse or try to establish our destination. The truck started up, and we drove off out of the prison perimeter.

  After about an hour-and-a-half of driving, I could tell that at least we were
not going to the prison of Gohardasht, as that was only 30 minutes’ drive away. The vehicle eventually drew to a stop and we were all led out into the open. We were handed over to a new set of guards and led into a second vehicle, this one more like a minibus. From behind my blindfold I could just about see through the large glass windows. We were back at Evin! The minibus drove us from Evin’s gates right into the prison complex.

  Several short stops were made. Each time, one prisoner was taken out, then the minibus drove on again. The fourth stop was my turn. Once out of the minibus, I was led into the resting place. Still blindfolded and with plastic bag in hand I was taken through a corridor to a large staircase and up to the fourth floor. My guard handed me over to another and as I was led down a passageway, I could just about see that there were small cells on each side of the corridor. It was clear to me that I was to be a new guest of honour here. A large, strong hand clamped itself onto my right shoulder and brought me to a halt. Someone whispered into my ear.

  ‘This is called the resting place. No one here makes a sound. You understand, yes?’

  ‘Yes, brother, I understand’, I replied, also in a whisper.

  The hand moved to grab my sleeve. I was gently tugged along, though I could not hear a sound, not even the sound of my guard’s shoes on the concrete floor. We stopped at the doorway to a cell. He asked me for my bag of belongings. He took it from me, sat down on the floor and started to rummage around inside it. I could see what he was doing as I was still standing and he had elected to squat just in front of me. He opened my medicine bottles to ensure I had nothing concealed in them. He looked carefully at my other items, even the toothpaste tube was ‘frisked’ and he searched through the few items of clothing I had managed to bring with me. He found nothing. He stood up and ordered me to remove my shoes and my clothing down to my underpants. He searched these items as well. Then he poked a finger inside the elastic of my pants and took a peek, front and back, then he let the elastic go with a snap. Once fully satisfied that I had nothing concealed anywhere, he opened the door of the cell in front of me.

  ‘Go in. I will get you some prison clothing shortly. You cannot take anything with you inside the cell.’

  ‘But what about my medicines? I need them to survive.’

  ‘Anytime you need them,’ he replied, ‘just push a little piece of paper under your door – a guard will attend to you.’

  The cell door was closed, and I turned to view my new home. En-suite facilities, I thought to myself upon seeing a grubby toilet and sink. Apart from that, there were four dirty, reeking blankets. This ‘resting place’ really was quiet. No one made a sound all day long. Obviously, I thought to myself, they use severe torture of some sort in order to ensure such quiet here. As a result of this absolute silence, it was very difficult to establish the number of other prisoners.

  Three times a day a food trolley would be wheeled down the corridor. It would stop outside each cell. Each door had two slots, one at eye level, the other at the floor. Through the slot at the bottom of the door, our food ration arrived; a guard would slide a small plastic plate of food to each prisoner. By counting the number of stops the food trolley made, and listening out for the number of plates pushed under each cell door, I estimated the number of inhabitants.

  Every week, we would be allowed one visit to the shower-room– a short ten minutes. Within these minutes you had to cram in not only a shower, but also a laundry service of your full wardrobe. Then, your time up, you would be whisked back to the cell and locked up safely again. Only then could another prisoner make his laundry visit. Once again, I used the sound of the activities to estimate the number of other prisoners. However, anyone who had not completed both the shower and laundry within his allotted ten minutes would be denied his visit the next week, so this second counting method proved not as accurate as the first. At least it helped me to pass away the long days of silence.

  I had to take doses of my medicines on three occasions each day. Each time I had to attract the attention of a guard to open up my cell door. He would allow me just enough time to open the appropriate bottle and grab the dosage. Then he would quickly lock my cell again. Each time I performed this ritual, I made an effort to catch a glimpse of the corridor. I quickly established that I was the proud resident of cell no. 487. Additionally, I discovered that the neighbour to my left, 486, also had a supply of medicine outside his room. Over a period of several days, I managed to read the name on his bottles and from that I was able to establish his identity. He was one of the founders of a guerrilla movement in the mid-1960s who served part of a life sentence under the Shah. Freed by mass action during the revolution in 1979, my fellow prisoner had been re-arrested by the Islamic regime in 1983 as one of the leaders of a group critical of the newly-formed Islamic regime. His arrest had been used for propaganda in the war being waged against ‘infidels’.

  This purging of opposition had been particularly intense between the summer of 1981 to the end of 1982, when the Islamic regime legitimised itself by ratifying its constitution in the Majles Khebragan (Parliament of Islamic Experts). It tried to eradicate the class struggle in the cities, factories and countryside, reversing the peasants’ seizure of land in Kurdistan, Baluchistan and Turkmenistan. All forms of working class organisation, including the workers’ councils and peasants’ councils, were viciously attacked by Islamic guards who carried a gun in one hand and the Koran in the other. Khomeini was intent on consolidating power. One such attack was organised in December 1981 against striking workers at the Iran National car assembly plant. Some 176 of the striking workers were arrested. A number of them were taken to Evin and put in front of the firing squad. Many revolutionaries were dragged out of factories, offices, schools and universities and killed on the spot, or beaten and then taken half dead to prisons, which ranged from government warehouses to unknown underground depots.

  The clergy were planning to establish a reign of terror – the absolute rule of the religious authorities. And at the top sat Khomeini.

  CHAPTER 6

  AN ARTIST’S IMPRESSION

  A middle-aged prisoner named Parvis was a professional artist with left sympathies. He would take the trouble to speak to most prisoners who were considered to be part of the opposition and he was scrupulously polite. He was even courteous to the Tavabs, though cautious of them too.

  During his torture, his interrogators learned of his artistic ability and in particular his painting skills. Parvis negotiated his way out of a quick execution by offering his services to ‘the Imam’s great revolution’. He agreed to paint a huge portrait of Khomeini in preparation for the anniversary of the Islamic seizure of power.

  The portrait was to be a massive one, around three metres wide and six metres high. A thick, wooden frame would be built for it. It would be one of the centrepieces of the celebrations. It would be paraded all around the centre of Tehran and would be seen by hundreds of thousands of people: a great icon of Khomeini.

  And so, the prison authorities rounded up the necessary materials so that Parvis could commence his great opus. Seemingly no expense was spared for this endeavour. First, a huge canvas was ordered, then paints, brushes and mixing pots. This project was seen as a great propaganda coup for the prison authorities. Khomeini often proclaimed the prisons in general and Evin in particular as the ‘universities of Islam’. The production of this picture would help the regime disseminate the myth that, in fact, the prisons did ‘cleanse’ the opponents of Islam, rather than just physically eliminate them.

  Parvis was given a large room in the block in which to produce this epic painting. Normally it would have held 60 or so prisoners, but for this project he had sole use of the room. It had even been cleaned spotlessly for him. The authorities kept it locked, but Parvis had his own key so no one else could get in.

  Every morning at eight, Parvis would gather his paints and brushes and lock himself in the room for a 12-hour session at his canvas. Week after week, month after month thi
s went on. After his ‘day at the office’ he would lock up, return to his cell for a meal, roll a cigarette and talk to one or two prisoners. Some would ask what he was doing all day long. All he would say was that he was keeping himself busy painting.

  After some six or seven weeks, one of the other prisoners managed to catch a glimpse of the inside of Parvis’ ‘studio’ as he locked up one night. All that was seen was the outline of a figure drawn roughly with charcoal. From then on, an attempt would be made to casually pass the door just as Parvis emerged each night. In this way, news emerged of the nature of his work.

  Some prisoners took a rather dim view of the whole affair to start with; after all, would you have been happy knowing a grand portrait of the country’s greatest hangman was being painted by one of your fellow inmates? So at the beginning he had quite some explaining to do, but after some weeks people generally left him alone to get on with it, though some leftists would mutter to themselves about him, belittling his personal character and mettle in resisting the regime.

  No one would say much openly. We were all aware of the pressure that the regime could exert if he refused point-blank to co-operate with them. In fact, after some time, a gentle air of respect arose for him as a recognition of Parvis’s dedication to his task. It was clear that the scale of the painting was so vast that it would take him almost a year to complete. But some of the Mojahedin’s sympathisers and some other leftists speculated that Parvis had become a Tavab. I was certain this was not the case. After all, the job of the Tavabs was not to lock themselves away from everyone else, but to keep an eye on as many prisoners as possible. After some time, this conception of Parvis lost its attraction and the notion was forgotten.