By Alliance Against Islamic Regime of Iran Apologists (AAIRIA)
July 14, 2022 is a historic day for the world’s Justice Seeking Movement, especially for the Iranian people. Today, Hamid Nouri, one of the perpetrators of the 1988 Massacre of the political prisoners in Iran, was sentenced to a life sentence in a Swedish District Court in Stockholm. The verdict was issued in the trial against Hamid Nouri for allegations of war crimes and murder committed concerning the killing of 1000s in Iran’s jails in 1988 under the universal jurisdiction.
This is the first-ever trial against an individual for core international crimes committed by representatives of the Islamic Regime of Iran. The court lasted for nine months, and in its 92 sessions, 58 former political prisoners and family members of the 1988 Massacre victims testified against Nouri. This verdict opens the door for the families of the victims of the 1988 Massacre to seek justice in the western countries’ courts against other perpetrators of this crime against humanity, such as Mohammad Jafar Mahallati, the so-called peace professor at Oberlin College. In his interview with Masih Alinejad on Voice of America, Mahallati repeated his false claims that the massacre was a secret. The findings of Swedish court and the articles from different US and British newspapers show that the massacre was not a secret and the world knew about it as it was happening.
Since October 2020, our campaign against Mahallati has demanded Oberlin College to “fire Mahallati, apologize to the family members of the 1988 Massacre for hiring Mahallati, and review the process by which Mahallati was hired at Oberlin and the process by which he was granted tenure. We must know what due diligence was conducted on Mr. Mahallati before his hiring, whether human rights organizations were ever consulted on the role Iran’s former representative to the UN may have played in that country’s human rights crisis, and whether such widely available information was ignored.” We also like to know the connection between Mrs. Nancy Dye, Oberlin College’s President trip to Iran in 2004, and her decision to hire Mahallati. We, a group of former political prisoners in Iran, families of executed political prisoners, human rights activists who work for justice and accountability, and international jurists who have examined the record of Iran’s gross human rights abuses repeat our demands and hope that with this new verdict we can also continue our efforts against Mahallati in the courts of law.
For more information contact: Lawdan Bazargan (562) 212-9546 lawdanbazargan@gmail.com
