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TEHRAN - Assadollah Lajevardi, Iran's former prison chief known as "The Butcher," was shot dead here Sunday in an attack claimed by the country's leading armed opposition group.
Dubbed a "hero of the resistance" by the Islamic regime and "the Butcher" by his enemies, Lajevardi was gunned down in his tailor's shop in Tehran's Grand Bazaar by two men armed with an Uzi submachine-gun.
The People's Mujahedeen, the main armed opposition group, claimed responsibility for the assassination in a telephone call to AFP in Nicosia, saying one of Lajevardi's bodyguards was also killed and several others wounded.
The Mujahedeen accused Lajevardi of being responsible for "tens of thousands" of deaths and said the attack occurred on the 10th anniversary of a notorious 1988 massacre of political prisoners.
After the Islamists came to power, a close follower of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Lajevardi served a stint as prosecutor general, a position which he used to wage a repressive and bloody campaign against "anti-revolutionaries," or former political and military officials.
Later he was placed at the head of Evin prison, where he was accused of overseeing widespread acts of torture and other human rights violations in the 1980s, when the regime waged a merciless campaign against opposition groups.
Lajevardi was promoted in 1989 to the post of director of the country's prison system, a position he held until February when he was quietly removed and replaced by Morteza Bakhtiari.
Butcher Of Evin, Killed In Mojahedin Operation, Iran Zamin News Agency, August 23
Today the Mojahedin Command Headquarters inside Iran issued a statement which said "Assadollah Lajevardi, the infamous 'Butcher of Evin,' who was accompanied by a special group of bodyguards made up of Revolutionary Guards and armed agents of the notorious secret police, the Ministry of Intelligence, was killed at midday today in an operation carried out by Mojahedin's Resistance units in Tehran."
The statemnt, in addition to providing details of the operation, numerated some of Lajevardi's crimes against humanity:
1. As the Revolutionary Prosecutor of Tehran and the governor of Evin prison, and acting on Khomeini's personal orders, Lajevardi was directly responsible for the execution of tens of thousands of political prisoners in the 1980s, mainly from the Mojahedin. On February 8, 1982, Lajevardi commanded the attack on the Mojahedin's central base in Tehran. He appeared on the state television that evening holding in his arms the infant son of Resistance Leader Massoud Rajavi and his wife, Ashraf, over the dead bodies of Ashraf and Moussa Khiabani, Mr. Rajavi's deputy in Iran.
2. In prison, Lajevardi raped or executed hundreds of women, who included teenage girls and elderly mothers.
3. He personally tortured political prisoners and fired coup de grace at executed prisoners.
4. Lajevardi personally tortured and executed Mrs. Sakineh Mohammadi Ardehali, 60, Mrs. Akram Islami, 70, Mrs. Malek-Taj Hakamian, 50, Mrs. Arasteh Qolivand, 57, Mrs. Rezvan Rafipour, and Mrs. Massoumeh Shadmani, Mrs. Massoumeh Azodanlou (younger sister of Iranian Resistance's President-elect Maryam Rajavi), Mrs. Zohreh Tabrizi, Mrs. Qodsi Mohammadi and Mrs. Shahla Hariri-Motlaq.
5. Lajevardi formed criminal gangs and death squads consisting of Revolutionary Guards and criminal agents in order to assault and assassinate Mojahedin activists and political prisoners after their release from jail.
6. He made it a common practice in prisons to torture prisoners in front of their parents, husbands or wives and children.
7. Lajevardi devised a plan to set up forced labor camps for political prisoners on a nation-wide scale.
Lajevardi continued his crimes under various covers and one of them was located in Tehran's Bazaar.
"Butcher of Evin" Dead, Reuters, August 23
DUBAI - An Iranian opposition group claimed responsibility for the assassination of the former head of Iran's prisons on Sunday.
"Around noon today (Sunday) operational units of the Mujahideen killed the 'Butcher of Evin (prison)' who was under the protection of a special unit of the Revolutionary Guards," Mujahideen Khalq spokesman Farid Soleymani told Reuters in Dubai.
"Our units were surrounded by the Revolutionary Guards after the operation in Tehran's bazaar, but were able to leave the area under the protection of the people after a fierce shootout," Soleymani said.
Soleymani said the attack marked the 10th anniversary of alleged mass executions of political prisoners in Iranian prisons.
He said one of Lajevardi's bodyguards had also been killed and another injured in the attack.
Iran's official news agency IRNA said Asadollah Lajevardi, who headed Tehran's Evin prison after the 1979 revolution and was later a prosecutor at Islamic revolutionary courts in the capital, was shot in an attack by two gunmen.
Lajevardi headed Iran's prisons until
a few months ago.