Iranian freedom fighter Koorosh Afshar informed me of his latest article in Iran va Jahan. It's an open letter to President Khatami from a certain "A. Hedayat" describing the price Hedayat paid for the so-called insolence of free will. A horrifying account, abduction and torture failed to do anything more than simply strengthen his resolve. A few excerpts (grammar correction my own):
I am Ali Hedayat, a journalist who was captured and, after being beaten, got transferred to the Police Intelligence prison on 16th June by the vigilantes of Tabriz. Seventeen members of the vigilantes were involved in this process; they punched and kicked me for more than 300 times. They cursed me, my mother and my wife with very obscene words for hundreds of times which I will have to mention exactly in the following without any consideration and euphemism.Also you will find out in this report that by "Plain clothes of Tabriz" I do not only refer to the Basiji forces or the forces of the so-called Mosque Bases. 90 percent of those people were the official personnel of the police (disciplinary forces of the Islamic Republic "NAJA"), the intelligence office of the disciplinary forces, the anti-narcotics office of the disciplinary forces and public places supervision office. The remaining 10 percent were members of the Guards of Revolution Army (Sepaah-e-Paasdaaraan) and Basiji forces of the factories and official organizations.
Your Excellency!
The blows that the trained members of the disciplinary forces inflicted on people were much more painful than those of the Basiji's and the members of the revolutionary guards (they need to be trained and practice more!) since the latter left bruises and wounds and inflammations unlike the former, who were trained and knew how to do their job without leaving an evidence.
Your Excellency!
Before I get to the point let me inform you that none of the judges or the interrogators of our trials ever bothered to ask us why our eyes, foreheads, chins and whole bodies were inflamed and bruised. They didn't bother to ask us who had attacked us so savagely and ruthlessly. They didn't bother to ask whether we wanted to see a doctor or to be sent to a medical examiner. They didn't bother to ask us whether we had any complaints or not.
They did not even suspect that these ruthless vigilantes arrested people and beat them to death, and after discovering that they were innocent kept them in prison for some time until their wounds [were] cured, so that nobody would detect the truth.
I take witness the primary verdicts made by the judges of the revolutionary courts who had ordered (after the interrogations) that many of the young prisoners had to be released on the 20th and 21st of June in case their families could afford to pay a five-million-toman security. On the contrary, they were kept for more than three more weeks so that their wounds wouldn't be left as evidence against the vigilantes.
Your Excellency!
I apologize if (in some sentences) my pen is fouled with swear words and obscenity. For if you had also received knee-kicks in your testicles and could have also been able to feel the killing pain you would definitely stop smiling and sitting calmly in rest posing as a reformist. You would have definitely started the never-put-into-practice reforms in the Executive. In spite of the fact that 17 people had mistaken me for a punching bag, all my emphasis on being sent by the judge to a medical examiner was in vain.
Hedayat goes on to describe his ordeal. It's graphic, not to mention heartwrenching:
After some time one of [my captors] said "Handcuff him and hold his hands up so that everybody [who] would see him wouldn't kill him!" This was the first time that I felt the cold steel handcuffs on my wrists. As my nose, my mouth, [and] my teeth were bleeding, and there was a lot of blood on my clothes, we left the room and, passing though these people, each one of them took advantage of the time once again and kicked me. After a short while they changed their minds and decided not to walk. They stopped a car and we three people sat in the back seat.The driver was astonished, therefore he asked "what has this poor guy done?"
One of the vigilantes answered: "This motherf*cker is a journalist for VOA and BBC and Radio Farda. He informs that bitch, Maryam Rajavi. He is a spy. He is a traitor. And…etc."
They asked what he thought so he turned back and cursed me, but I could read it in his eyes that he was afraid and was begging me with them.
I forgave him there.
This is not a story of student protest: this is an entire nation at the brink of open revolt, and all for the desire to live freely. Hedayat's cuts and bruises can likely be matched by thousands of others - those who have been left alive. Read the article. We each owe it to ourselves as people who daily enjoy the security and bounty afforded under the rule of law.