An Iranian citizen was Thursday sentenced to life imprisonment by a Swedish court after being convicted of committing grave war crimes and murder in the 1980s.
The Stockholm District Court said that Hamid Noury, 61, took part in severe atrocities in July-August 1988 while working as an assistant to the deputy prosecutor at the Gohardasht prison outside the Iranian city of Karaj.
A life sentence in Sweden generally means a minimum of 20 to 25 years in prison, but it could be extended. If he is eventually released, Noury will be expelled from Sweden. Noury can appeal the verdict.
The court said Noury participated “in the executions of many political prisoners in Iran in the summer of 1988" and had “the role of assistant to the deputy prosecutor” at the prison "jointly and in collusion with others been involved in the executions."
The acts were deemed as a serious crime against international law, the court said. A second wave of executions was directed at left-wing sympathizers who were deemed to have renounced their Islamic faith, the court statement said, adding “these acts have been deemed as murder.”
They said Iran’s supreme leader at the time, Ayatollah Khomeini, had issued an execution order for all prisoners in the country who sympathized and remained loyal with the Iranian opposition group Mujahedeen-e-Khalq, known as MEK.
Due to that order, a large number of prisoners were executed in the Gohardasht prison between July 30 and Aug. 16, 1988, the Swedish prosecutors said.
Amnesty International has put the number executed on government orders at around 5,000, saying in a 2018 report that "the real number could be higher". Iran has never acknowledged the killings.
During the trial proceedings that ended May 4, Noury has denied wrongdoing.
Judge Tomas Zander said that Noury had claimed that the evidence against him had (been) fabricated” by the Mujahedin.
“However, nothing substantial has emerged which gives the court reason to question the investigation’s reliability and robustness,” Zander said.
“We are of course disappointed,” defense lawyers Thomas Söderqvist and Daniel Marcus told the Swedish news agency TT. They said they would appeal the verdict.
Balkees Jarrah, interim international justice director at Human Rights Watch, called it “a meaningful moment" for survivors and the family of the victims.
“The ruling sends a message to the most senior Iranian officials implicated in these crimes that they can’t remain beyond the reach of justice forever," she said in a statement.
