Iranian authorities have erected high concrete walls around a cemetery near the capital Tehran where hundreds of victims of 1988 prison executions are buried. A group of victims’ families called on the authorities to immediately stop restricting access and to refrain from imposing additional roadblocks
New documentation posted on social media last Friday shows that high concrete walls and columns with security cameras are placed around the Hawaran cemetery, southeast of Tehran.
Iranian authorities have erected high concrete walls around a cemetery where hundreds of victims of 1988 prison executions are buried.
In a statement last Friday, a group of families of victims buried at the site, called on authorities to immediately stop placing additional roadblocks near the resting places of their loved ones, and said they would launch an international campaign. Make their voices heard by the international community. This was reported by the television channel Iran International.
Islamic Republic for fear of movement # دادخاحی And out of fear, the determination of the families to achieve justice and litigation has made Khavaran a wall and a camera installed. # خاوران_حافزه_تاریخی Is and can not be destroyed. @IranCfppi pic.twitter.com/KXD3s8q6fA
— Shiva Mahbobi (@shivamahbobi) May 28, 2022
Documentation of the wall erected
In 1988, an unknown number of executed prisoners were buried in mass graves in Hawaran that had previously been used for the burial of non-Muslims including Armenian Christians, Hindus and members of the persecuted Baha’i religion in Iran. Authorities have never revealed the number of executions in prisons across the country from August 1988 to February 1989. But it is estimated that between 4,500 and 10,000 prisoners were killed. Almost all the victims ran prison sentences when the ayatollahs decided to eliminate them.
In another attempt to cover up the crime of massacre 67, the authorities of the Islamic Republic of Iran have started to build concrete walls and install CCTV cameras around Khavaran Cemetery. میانجامد. / ۱@Barbad_Golshiri pic.twitter.com/JqztCEnNEo
— Justice for Iran (@Justice4Iran) May 27, 2022
The walls and cameras that were erected
Most of the victims were members or supporters of anti-regime organizations, other members of the groups killed, belonged to various left-wing organizations. A justice organization for Iran, an Iranian rights organization based in London, announced in a tweet on Saturday that restricting access to a mass grave site allows the Islamic Republic to destroy more evidence of the crimes it has committed. “Mass graves are crime scenes and must remain intact until they can be investigated independently, in order to identify the remains of the victims and the sequence of events at the time the crimes took place,” the human rights organization said.
An old photo of the Huwaran burial site in Iran where countless political prisoners were buried in 1988. Photo: Iran international