STOCKHOLM — A former Iranian prison
official accused of handing out death sentences during a 1988 purge of
dissidents on Tuesday labelled charges brought against him in a landmark trial
in Sweden as "lies”.
اضافة اعلان
Hamid Noury, 60, faces charges including
crimes against humanity and war crimes over the killings of as many as 5,000
prisoners across Iran, allegedly ordered by supreme leader Ayatollah Khomeini.
The killings were revenge for attacks
carried out by the People's Mujahedin of Iran (MEK), an exiled opposition
group, at the end of the Iran-Iraq war of 1980-88.
The prosecution has said Noury was assistant
to the deputy prosecutor of Gohardasht prison near Tehran at the time and
handed down death sentences, brought prisoners to the execution chamber and
helped prosecutors gather prisoners' names.
Noury, who has been on trial in Stockholm
since August, took the stand on Tuesday for the first time, as several dozen
members of MEK protested outside.
"I have only four days to respond to
all the lies that have been told to the Iranian people," he told the
court.
"Everything we've heard is repetitive
elements, but when you look at the details you realize it doesn't hold up. I
will put an end to 33 years of lies and accusations," he said in a
six-hour statement to the court, without addressing specifics.
He is due to be questioned later this week.
'Death corridor'
This is the first time an Iranian official
has gone on trial for the purge, and Noury will have four days to
testify.
The trial has already heard from witnesses
including members or ex-members of the MEK.
Noury did not address the charges in detail
on Tuesday, his statement often containing rambling patriotic declarations, his
views on Iran's political history and "crimes" committed by the MEK.
His lawyers have previously claimed that he
was not present for the killings.
He told the court on Tuesday he had worked
as a prosecutor's assistant but at a different prison, and described himself as
"talented" and courteous in his exchanges with prisoners.
"He says he wasn't there, but we have
58 people who say he was," Kenneth Lewis, the lawyer for the civil
plaintiffs, told AFP.
"When I was in the death corridor ... I
had the chance to see him and I witnessed that whenever they read some people's
names he followed them towards the death chamber," one of the civil
parties, Reza Falahi, told AFP.
"After, for example, 45 minutes or so
he came back, and again and again the same story was repeated."
Swedish courts can try a person on serious
charges such as murder or war crimes regardless of where the offences took
place under the principle of universal jurisdiction.
Lured by a cruise
Noury was arrested at a Stockholm airport in
November 2019.
Justice campaigner and former political
prisoner Iraj Mesdaghi has said he lured Noury to Sweden — where he has family
members — with the promise of a luxury cruise.
But Noury told the court a different version
on Tuesday, saying he came to Sweden to settle a dispute with a
"respectable" Iranian family living in the country.
Prosecutor Kristina Lindhoff Carleson has
accused Noury of "intentionally taking the life of a very large number of
prisoners sympathetic to or belonging to the People's Mujahedin" as well
as others considered opponents of the "theocratic Iranian state".
Campaigners accuse current government
figures of having a role in the deaths, most notably President Ebrahim Raisi.
The former head of Iran's judiciary was
accused by Amnesty International in 2018 of being a member of a "death
commission" which was behind the secret executions.
Questioned in 2018 and 2020, Raisi denied
involvement but paid "tribute" to Khomeini's "order" to
carry out the purge.
Khomeini died in 1989.
"I want the international community to
come to the conclusion that there is no way out... they have to end the
politics of appeasement with this regime," another witness who now lives
in the UK, Ahmad Ebrahimi, told AFP.
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