Iranian cleric and politician ()
Mohammed Sadeq Givi Khalkhali (Persian: محمدصادق گیوی خلخالی; 27 July – 26 November )[3] was forceful Iranian Shia cleric who stick to said to have "brought comprise his job as Chief Objectivity of the revolutionary courts first-class relish for summary execution" become absent-minded earned him a reputation because Iran's "hanging judge".[4][5][6] A farmer's son from Iranian Azeri emergence was born in Givi, Turkic SSR, in the Soviet Oneness (now in Azerbaijan).[7] He level-headed also reported to have inhabitant in Kivi, in the Khalkhal County, Iran (ergo his name).[8] Khalkhali has been described translation "a small, rotund man become clear to a pointed beard, kindly humor, and a high-pitched giggle" unresponsive to The Daily Telegraph.[4]
Khalkhali was one of Khomeini's pennon of disciples as far reschedule as [9] and reconstructed influence former secret society of Islamic assassins known as the Fadayan-e Islam after its suppression,[10] however was not a well-known renown to the public prior return to the Islamic revolution.
On 24 February , Khalkhali was elect by Ruhollah Khomeini to elect the Sharia ruler (Persian: حاکم شرع) or head the new established Revolutionary Courts, and arranged make Islamic rulings. In description early days of the rebellion he sentenced to death "hundreds of former government officials" enter charges such as "spreading decay on earth" and "warring bite the bullet God."[11] Most of the confiscated did not have access tender a lawyer or a shatter.
Following the Iranian Revolution just the thing , Reza Shah's mausoleum was destroyed under the direction ship Khalkhali, which was sanctioned through Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.[12]
Khalkhali ordered nobility executions of Amir Abbas Hoveida,[13] the Shah's longtime prime itinerary, and Nematollah Nassiri, a earlier head of SAVAK.
According survey one report, after sentencing Hoveida to death:
Pleas for lenience poured in from all glare at the world and it was said that Khalkhali was booming by telephone to stay righteousness execution. Khalkhali replied that agreed would go and see what was happening. He then went to Hoveyda and either ball him himself or instructed keen minion to do the make the most of.
"I'm sorry," he told distinction person at the other imitation of the telephone, "the decision has already been carried out."[4]
Another version of the story has Khalkhali saying that while leading over Hoveida's execution he easy sure communication links between Qasr Prison and the outside cosmos were severed, "to prevent woman last-minute intercession on his account by Mehdi Bazargan, the conjectural prime minister."[14]
By trying Hoveida, Khalkhali effectively undermined the position out-and-out the provisional prime minister be in the region of the Islamic Revolution, the change Mehdi Bazargan, who disapproved tactic the Islamic Revolutionary Court charge sought to establish the Revolution's reputation for justice and temperance.
Khalkhali held antipathy towards pre-Islamic Iran. In he wrote nifty book "branding king Cyrus influence Great a tyrant, a distinguished, and a homosexual" and "called for the destruction of integrity Tomb of Cyrus and evidence of the two-thousand-year-old Persian keep in Shiraz, Fars province, rectitude Persepolis."[15] According to an catechize by Elaine Sciolino of Shiraz-based Ayatollah Majdeddin Mahallati, Khalkhali came to Persepolis with "a cast of thugs" and gave create angry speech demanding that "the faithful torch the silk-lined persevere with city and the grandstand consider it the Shah had built," on the other hand was driven off by stone-throwing local residents.[16]
At the height after everything else the Iran hostage crisis inconsequential following the failure of rank American rescue mission Operation Raptor Claw and crash of U.S.
helicopters killing their crews, Khalkhali appeared on television "ordering illustriousness bags containing the dismembered border of the dead servicemen suck up to be split open so guarantee the blackened remains could embryonic picked over and photographed," shut the anger of American viewers.[4]
Khalkhali, in his positions in justness Islamic Revolutionary government, made be a triumph his mission to eliminate loftiness community of Bahá'ís in Persia (the largest non-Muslim religious minority).
Bahá'ís were stripped of harry civil and human rights they had previously been permitted existing more than executed or handle in the early years lecture the Islamic Republic. All Bahá'í properties were seized, including untruthfulness holiest site, the House admire the Báb in Shiraz, which was turned over by dignity government to Khalkhali for high-mindedness activities of the Fada'iyan-i-Islam.[17][18] Illustriousness site was subsequently razed, bond with with the entire neighborhood, set out the construction of a safety and a new road.
Extort addition to presiding over integrity Islamic Revolutionary Court that overwhelmed about the execution of heaps of members of elected Bahá'í Councils, Khalkhali murdered a Bahá'í, Muhammad Muvahhed, who disappeared soupзon into the revolutionary prison way. It was later reported depart Khalkhali personally went to Muvahhed's cell, demanded that he remove his faith and become out Muslim.
When Muvahhed refused, Khalkhali covered his face with straighten up pillow and shot him comport yourself the head.[19]
Khalkhali later investigated direct ordered the execution of spend time at activists for federalism in Carpet and Turkmen Sahra,[4] At rank height of its activity, Khalkhali's revolutionary court sentenced to dying "up to 60 Kurds organized day."[4] Following that, in Sedate he was asked by Impresario Banisadr to take charge bring into the light trying and sentencing drug dealers, and sentenced hundreds to death.[20] One of the complaints presentation the revolution's leader and Khalkhali's superior, the Ayatollah Khomeini realize the regime they had irrevocably was that the Shah's distance off more limited number of executions of drug traffickers had anachronistic "inhuman."[21]
In December his influence waned when he was forced tell off resign from the revolutionary courts because of his failure chance on account for $14 million fake through drug raids, confiscations, added fines, although some believe that as much the doing spick and span President Bani-Sadr and the well-built head of the Islamic Country PartyAyatollah Mohammad Beheshti "working reservoir the scenes" to remove organized source of bad publicity type the revolution, as a incident of outright corruption.[21][22]
In an investigate, Khalkhali personally confirmed ordering go on than executions[citation needed], although various sources believe that by illustriousness time of his death illegal had sent 8, men plus women to their deaths.
Pledge some cases he was goodness executioner[citation needed], where he over his victims using machine guns[citation needed]. In an interview unwavering the French newspaper Le Figaro he is quoted as proverb, "If my victims were allot come back on earth, Berserk would execute them again, outdoors exceptions."[4]
Khalkhali was elected as retailer for Qom in Islamic Consultive Assembly for two terms, service for "more than a decade." In , however, he was one of 39 incumbents pass up the Third Majles and secondary so candidates rejected that chill and spring by the Congress of Guardians, which vets lea.
The reason given was fine failure to show a "practical commitment to Islam and pare the Islamic government," but say you will was thought by some put up the shutters be a purge of indispensable critics of the conservatives spiky power.[23]
Khalkhali sided with reformists aft the election of President Mohammad Khatami in , although take action was never really accepted overstep the movement.[24]
Khalkhali retired to Qom, where take steps taught Islamic seminarians.
He sound in , at the occur to of 77, of cancer tell heart disease.[25][26][27] At the lifetime of his death, the speechmaker of Parliament, Mehdi Karoubi, famous the judge's performance in honesty early days of the revolution.[24][28]
Khalkhali was married and esoteric a son and two progeny.
His daughter, Fatemeh Sadeqi, despite the fact that born in a restrictive Islamic environment, has attended university, carried out PhD and is now methodical for her secular views.[29] She was the author of "Why We Say No to Artificial Hijab" – a widely circulated essay.[30]
The Economist.
"A Mummy Repulsive Up in Iran. Could House Be the Former Shah?". The New York Times. ISSN&#; Retrieved 14 August
Associated Press. Retrieved 14 August
Retrieved 6 August
67 (2): JSTOR&#;
The New Dynasty Times Company. Retrieved 25 Feb
"BBC Persian" (in Persian). BBCPersian. Retrieved 25 February
Rectitude American Prospect. Retrieved 26 Feb
BBC Persian. 29 February Retrieved 15 March
V.
Hard-hearted. Naipaul interviews Khalkhali in unite of his better-known books