Friday, January 23, 2009

Khavaran Cemetery Must be Preserved

According to Amnesty International, between 4500 to 10000 Iranian political prisoners were massacred in 1988 over a period of just two months. The relatives of the victims were not allowed to have the bodies of their loved ones or hold a funeral, instead the bodies were taken in meat trucks and dumped in places like Khavaran or what the regime referred to as La'nat-Abad [The Damned Place], a cemetery used for burying non-Muslims.

The mass burial at Khavaran was only accidentally discovered by an Armenian priest who had become curious as to why stray dogs kept digging there for bones.

Although the useful idiots across the West, who are always ready to march in support of terrorists and brutal dictators, thought the massacre was not worthy of a protest, even the successor to Ayatollah Khomeini at the time, Ayatollah Montazeri, could not stay silent and wrote a protest letter, which promptly resulted in his removal from the position of successor to the Supreme Leader.

Now, twenty years later, the Islamic Republic can not tolerate families of those victims who come to Khavaran to console their sorrow. Mothers and fathers, brother and sisters, sons and daughters who just hold pictures of their loved ones and plant trees and flowers to say we have not forgotten our victims. But thats too much for the Islamic Republic authorities, they want to demolish Khavaran altogether.

Imagine, if the Israelis decided to mass execute the Palestinian prisoners they hold, 5000 to 10000 prisoners over two months, then dumped their bodies in meat trucks and buried them somewhere unknown. What would be the international outcry? Somehow the Iranian blood does not stir the same emotions and the pain of Iranian mothers and children does not count for much with these 'progressive peace activists'.

13 comments:

Winston said...

who knows how many more mass graves exist in Iran

Anonymous said...

One reason for 'Iranian blood does not seem to stir as much emotions' as you put it, is because a lot of Iranian ex-pats are busy fighting other people's causes rather than their own. Iranians are fashion victims, when it comes to backing causes they will get involved in fashionable causes only.
Take Barmakid who comments on your blog, as just one example.

Anonymous said...

Well, Israelis doing that to Palestinians isn't the same; they're not the same people. A better example would have been, "imagine the Burmese Junta killing thousands of monks and dumping them off in the jungle..." Oh wait, that really did happen.

And that was only covered for a week, tops, in the media. But somehow you expect an event that took place 20 yrs ago, with domestic implications (for Iran) to be covered internationally???

Maybe it would if Ahmadinejad stood in front of Khavaran and proclaimed the demise of Israel:))

You know, this event isn't "fashionable" enough for me to care about, but nonetheless, I'm glad Nader is reading my posts :))

Btw Nader, if I wanted to take up this cause, what should I do? I know, wave my Iranian flag from Texas!

barmakid

Azarmehr said...

Barmakid,

At least what the Burmese junta did to the monks did get one week's air time. The massacre of Iranian political prisoners went on for two months unreported with one exception. About thirty of us turned up outside the BBC shouting, 'Thousands murdered in Iran, Why is the BBC silent?' Until the BBC asked us to nominate two representatives to talk to them. This later resulted in a program called the Bandung file to cover what was happening. This was the time before videos were household devices. Few years ago I contacted the Bandung File but they hadn't kept their archive either. Any way I am digressing, the thing is 30 people managed to make a difference but imagine if more Iranian ex-pats had turned up and not just in Lonodn and not just outside the BBC, perhaps the publicity created and an international outcry would have saved many lives, but where were the Iranian ex-pats? They either didnt care or they were marching for Nicaragua and El-Salvador.

So ok not much can be done now and not by you, but had we cared more about our own causes may be we could have done something.

Anonymous said...

Its not true that not much can be done now.

Right now they want to bulldoze the Khavaran cemetery, and this time even Amnesty International has condemned such an act. So Iranians can mobilise the international public opinion against the destruction of Khavaran now.

Also we can still try to set up an international court to investigate the crimes against humanity carried out in Iran in 1988 and identify the culprits. Look at the Jews they persued the Nazi criminals right to the end. They didn't say oh the massacre was before I was born, I can't do anything about it or silly comments like 'what should I do?wave my Iranian flag from Texas!'

Sohrab said...

The Western powers and media are also to blame. For the past five/six years or so, when confronting the IRI, the only issue they bring up is the nuclear dossier, Natanz, etc.

Ahmadinejad has been particularly good too, at getting the media to conflate the Iranian people and the regime. It used to be, there was an awareness on the part of the media that the two are not the same, that their interests are perhaps mutually exclusive. Now a days, for the most part: Ahmadinejad = Iran = nation of fanatics and holocaust deniers.

Anonymous said...

Khavaran will be forgotten by the outside world and the US adminstartion. It looks liek we are back in teh dark days of teh sell out Jimmy Carter as Obamas takes teh first steps to see out the democratic moderates in Iran as part of his effort to appease Islamists.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/28/barack-obama-letter-to-iran

Obama and the Western world wil discover that if you stand for nothing no one will heed or follow you. The price of appeasement is always much higher than standing up for what you believe in.

Anonymous said...

Looks like Hossien Derakhshan's website is down. Good riddance. He was just another idiot like Barmakid who supported the Islamic dictatorship to the hilt. I shed no tears for him if he is in fact languishing in some Pasdar run jail. According to an interview he gave after the lkast time he was interrogated he only had good things to say about his interrogators so im certain he appreciates their company. An Islamic jail is a most fitting place for a traitor to Iran. In the end he was eaten by the ones he fed. Let him be a lesson to all those idiots who view the islamic dictatorship through rose tinted glasses.

Anonymous said...

potkin jan: MUST READ


http://www.mideasti.org/files/Iran_Final.pdf

let me know what you think.

serendip

Anonymous said...

Bonjorno, www.blogger.com!
[url=http://viagratetb.pun.pl/ ]Comprare viagra online[/url] [url=http://cialisiall.pun.pl/ ]Acquisto cialis generico[/url] [url=http://viagraradj.pun.pl/ ]Comprare viagra online[/url] [url=http://cialisantr.pun.pl/ ]Vendita cialis [/url] [url=http://viagrarier.pun.pl/ ]Vendita viagra generico[/url] [url=http://cialistagh.pun.pl/ ]Acquisto cialis generico[/url]

Anonymous said...

Bonjorno, www.blogger.com!
[url=http://viagraradf.pun.pl/ ]Compra viagra [/url] [url=http://viagraonline.pun.pl ]Comprare viagra online[/url] [url=http://viagracqui.pun.pl/ ]Compra viagra [/url] [url=http://cialisenta.pun.pl/ ]Acquistare cialis [/url] [url=http://viagrakhou.pun.pl/ ]Compra viagra [/url] [url=http://cialisashy.pun.pl/ ]Compra cialis [/url]

Anonymous said...

Bonjorno, www.blogger.com!
[url=http://viagraradj.pun.pl/ ]Acquisto viagra [/url] [url=http://cialisantr.pun.pl/ ]Compra cialis online[/url] [url=http://viagrarier.pun.pl/ ]Acquistare viagra online[/url] [url=http://cialistagh.pun.pl/ ]Acquisto cialis generico[/url] [url=http://viagraenat.pun.pl/ ]Vendita viagra online[/url] [url=http://cialisdkee.pun.pl/ ]Compra cialis online[/url]

Anonymous said...

Bonjorno, www.blogger.com!
[url=http://viagraonline.pun.pl ]Compra viagra [/url] [url=http://viagracqui.pun.pl/ ]Comprare viagra [/url] [url=http://cialisenta.pun.pl/ ]Compra cialis [/url] [url=http://viagrakhou.pun.pl/ ]Acquistare viagra in Italia[/url] [url=http://cialisashy.pun.pl/ ]Acquisto cialis online[/url] [url=http://viagraater.pun.pl/ ]Comprare viagra online[/url]