Leading figures in the Catholic Church and Italian diplomacy have come out to condemn the 1988 Iranian Massacre and call for the prosecution of those responsible.
The papal legate and the Secretary of the conferences in the Marche region of Italy issued a statement, which read: “Many of those executed have been sentenced to imprisonment previously and they have been serving their time or have already served. Lots of those executed were the prisoners who were to be released or they were the family members of the people of Mujahedin that Khomeini ordered to arrest them. In Tehran and provincial capitals and many cities (a total of more than 70 cities) the death delegations were formed.”
It cited the recent leak of an audio file in which one of the Death Commissions was caught on tape confessing to the massacre and its extent; three of the four Death Commission members heard on tape, still hold high-ranking positions within the Iranian Government including Mostafa Pourmohammadi, the Minister of Justice, along with Iran’s president of the court of judges, and Iran’s former Attorney-General.
They also quote the former Deputy Minister of Information in Iran’s regime who has admitted that nearly 34,000 people died during those few months.
The young Archbishop issued a statement that called the Iranian massacre a crime against humanity.
He wrote: “Silence against such terrible massacre and the impunity of the perpetrators, in fact, encourages them to continue their crime. These perpetrators currently own the highest political, security and judicial positions in the country.”
The Mayor of Urbino, wrote: “The massacre of 1988 was carried out with Khomeini’s Fatwa. In his Fatwa, he said that all those prisoners across the country who continue to support the People of Mujahedin will be condemned to death penalty.”
They asked the Italian government to condemn the massacre and halt relations with Iran unless they put an end to executions and pleaded with the UN to launch an investigation into the topic.
