Parviz Sabeti, the chief torturer of Shah’s SAVAK police, was responsible for the death of many opposition members.
On February 11, Parviz Sabeti, the former head of the Third Directorate of the SAVAK secret police, showed up at a rally in Los Angeles marking the 44th anniversary of Iran’s 1979 revolution. Reza Pahlavi, son of the deposed Shah, was also present at the rally, along with other exiles from the previous regime. The gathering prompted debate about Sabeti’s role and the role of SAVAK in torturing and murdering opposition members during the Shah era.
Sabeti had been in hiding after fleeing Iran before the overthrow of Shah’s regime. The remnants of the regime living abroad have been trying to whitewash Sabeti’s crimes and portray him as a hero, but many former political prisoners under Shah’s rule have spoken out against this narrative.
131 members of the MEK, who were political prisoners under Shah’s dictatorship, recently published an open letter in which they described Sabeti as a “despised ‘security official’ who defended Shah’s crimes on state television during the height of oppression and repression in the 1970s.” They accused Sabeti of directing the daily torture and slaughter of dissidents in Evin, the joint “anti-sabotage” committee, and other prisons throughout the country. Some former prisoners gave personal accounts of the torture by SAVAK and the direct role of Sabeti in these crimes.
Mohammad Hayati, a former MEK member and political prisoner, recounted how Sabeti’s torturers burned prisoners with a hot iron, pulled out their nails, flogged them with wires, and carried out all sorts of tortures. “These were the normal procedures of the Savak and the Police,” he said.
Abolghassem Rezai, another former political prisoner, also spoke out against Sabeti, stating that “all the torture teams of the police and the SAVAK were under his control. They all carried out his commands.”
“He personally oversaw the torture of all the important persons. My father shared a cell with Mehdi [Rezai] for some time. After his interrogation was finished, he said that [Sabeti] directly intervened in the interrogation, and at his order, the guards did some very ruthless things and tortured him to break his spirit and to force him to repent in court. My father saw him in the cell and saw the signs of torture on his body, and he saw that they had burned him with an electric iron,” He further explained.
The brutal methods of the SAVAK and Shah’s security apparatus led to the torture and murder of countless regime opponents during the Shah era. While the rally in Los Angeles aimed to support protests inside Iran, the promotion and defense of notorious torturers such as Sabeti by remnants of Shah’s regime can only serve to deepen divisions and prevent reconciliation between the Iranian people and their past.
MEK Iran (follow us on Twitter and Facebook), Maryam Rajavi’s on her site, Twitter & Facebook, NCRI (Twitter & Facebook), and People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran – MEK IRAN – YouTub