Assadollah Lajevardi's deputy, another torturer in the Prisons Organization, and an agent from the Ministry of Defense were among those killed in yesterday's clashes between the Mojahedin and Lajevardi's bodyguards. A number of other agents were wounded.

One of the dead, Asghar Re'is-Ismaeeli, was among leaders in the Islamic Association in the mullahs' Judiciary with a long record in torturing and executing political prisoners. Re'is-Ismaeeli had arrested a large number of Justice Department's personnel, including dissident judges and sent them before firing squads. When Lajevardi was the head of the country's Prisons Organization, Re'is Ismaeeli served as his deputy.

The state-controlled media acknowledged Re'is-Ismaeeli's death in yesterday's clashes. The other person killed was an agent from the Ministry of Defense whose name has not yet been announced.

The state radio and television have broadcast several programs extolling the "Butcher of Evin." In one such program last night on the state television, a regime's official acknowledged Lajevardi's crimes against dissidents and the Mojahedin. He said: "The Imam [Khomeini] appointed Lajevardi as the Revolutionary Prosecutor in Tehran in order to uproot the Mojahedin and the counterrevolutionaries."
 

Khatami Defends the "Butcher of Evin," Reveals Hollowness of "Rule of Law" and "Civil Society" Rhetoric, Iran Zamin News Agency, August 24

While reports from inside Iran indicate that the punishment of Evin's chief executioner, Assadollah Lajevardi, has been met with a wave of joy and enthusiasm by the Iranian people across the country, mullahs' President Khatami brazenly defended this infamous executioner who played a direct role in torturing and executing tens of thousands of political prisoners. Khatami described the bloodthirsty Lajevardi as "a servant of the people." In becomes clear, therefore, that for Khatami such killers as Lajevardi embody "rule of law" and "civil society."

In so doing, Khatami revealed his inhuman nature and complicity in the massacre of political prisoners, when as the Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance, he was assigned by Khomeini to the task of justifying and whitewashing these crimes.

Khatami called on the Revolutionary Guards and Intelligence Ministry agents to "quickly identify the perpetrators of this crime so that they are punished for their heinous conduct."

Lajevardi, carried out tens of thousands of political executions and more than 170 forms of physical and psychological tortures during the mullahs' rule and was among the most infamous criminals against humanity in the second half of the 20th century. Not only in Iran, but for all human rights activists and advocates across the world, Lajevardi's name has been synonymous with savage tortures, executions and human rights violations.

Other clerical leaders, including Hashemi Rafsanjani and Majlis Speaker Ali-Akbar Nateq-Nouri, described Lajevardi's death as "a major calamity" and "a great loss" for the regime, acknowledging the severity of the blow to the mullahs' regime.
 

"Butcher of Evin" to Receive Official Funeral, Agence France Presse, August 24

TEHRAN - Assadollah Lajeverdi, the former Iranian prison chief known by supporters as a "hero of the resistance" and by foes as the "Butcher of Tehran," will be given an official funeral outside parliament Tuesday.

Lajeverdi, gunned down at his tailor's shop in Tehran's Grand Bazaar Sunday by two assailants, was "one of the soldiers of the revolution and the people and the regime," President Mohammad Khatami said.

[IRNA, the mullahs' news agency, quoted Khatami as describing Lajevardi as "another soldier of the Islamic revolution and a faithful servant of the people and Islamic sovereignty."]

Lajevardi's funeral, originally scheduled for one of the largest mosques in the capital, will now be held outside parliament, state radio announced Monday.
 

Four Hanged in Tehran Prison, Agence France Presse, August 23

TEHRAN - Four young men, including an Iranian Armenian, were hanged in a Tehran prison after being convicted of murder, newspapers reported Saturday.

The four, aged between 19 to 27, had been convicted of armed robbery and murder.

They were executed Wednesday in front of the families of their victims.

 
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