Iranian dissidents during brutal repression by Tehran regime in 1988, a Swedish court said on Tuesday, August 10. Hamid Nuri, 60, appeared in the Stockholm District Court on war crimes and murder charges between July 30 and August 16, 1988, when he was an assistant deputy prosecutor at Gohardasht Prison in Karaji near Tehran.
Attorney Christina Lindhoff Carleson accused Nuri of “deliberately killing a large number of prisoners sympathetic to or belonging to the People's Mujahideen of Iran (MEK)” and other opponents of the “theocratic state of Iran.”
She read the names of 110 people whose executions Nuri are accused of helping the organization. According to the plaintiff, Nuri and others “organized and participated in the executions and selected which prisoners were to appear before a judicial commission, which would decide which prisoners were to be executed.”
Hundreds of MEK supporters demonstrated in court on Tuesday. Human rights groups estimate that 5,000 prisoners were killed in Iran at the behest of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini in retaliation for MEK attacks at the end of the Iran-Iraq War at the behest of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini.
In early In May, more than 150 world leaders, including Nobel laureates, former heads of state and former UN officials, called for executions to be investigated.
The Swedish principle of universal jurisdiction means that its courts can try a person with a serious charge regardless of where the alleged crimes were committed. Nuri was imprisoned in Sweden almost two years after being imprisoned by Iraj Mesdagi, a justice fighter and former political prisoner.
Mesdagi compiled “several thousand pages” of documentation on Nuri and then lured him to Sweden with the promise of a luxury cruise. Nuri was arrested upon arrival at Stockholm Airport. Nuri denies all charges. His trial is expected to last until April 2022.