In the last five issues of the monthly magazine “Khat-e-Solh”, we focused on interviews and memoirs of victims of torture in the 1950s and 1960s. Hossein Ghobrayi, Simin Dabiri, Faran Ferdousi, Javid Tahmasebi, and Manouchehr Kuhne were former prisoners who were featured in these issues, and their experiences of torture, especially white torture, were described.

In this issue of the monthly magazine and considering the course of history, we went to the 1970s and Behrouz Javid Tehrani.

Behrouz Javid Tehrani was born on January 25, 1979. His father’s name is Parviz and he was born in Tehran. He and his family relocated to the northern part of the country during the war and missile attacks, and returned to Tehran after the war ended.

I ask from the person who has a record of multiple arrests and imprisonment in the decades of the 70s and 80s, and is considered one of the detainees of the events of July 9, 1999, how did the motivation for political activism arise in him: “In 1997, there was a lot of hope for Khatami and a wave had formed. Of course, I was very young at that time and I was following the current events in the country through free newspapers. My father, who had a political background before the revolution and had a large library in our house, also had an influence on shaping my thoughts.”

I ask Behrouz to describe how he was arrested in 1378: “On the fourth of Khordad in 1378, I went with some of my friends to a speech by Hashemollah Tabarzadi. During the speech, we got into a fight with the anti-riot guards and plainclothes forces and were attacked. After the fight and being beaten, we left the park and I was arrested by plainclothes forces on Keshavarz Boulevard. I was alone at the time of my arrest, having been separated from my friends for a while. I was then handed over to the security forces and taken to the Palestine Square police station, but that same night, after a lot of delay, I was released with my phone number and address taken and a promise to appear.”

“After being detained for several hours, I was arrested following the events of July 9th. I joined the crowded and student protests on Sunday, July 10th. On July 12th, when I left my house and went towards Vali Asr Square, I had to go down Zartosht Street because the main streets were closed. There, a confrontation occurred which resulted in me getting injured in the face. I immediately took refuge in a restaurant to clean my wound and wash my face. When I came back up the stairs of the restaurant, two officers from the police force saw me, but I didn’t pay attention and just put the scarf I had with me and my Kurdish headband around my neck and started walking. When I reached the intersection of Keshavarz Boulevard, someone from behind me called out to me, and at first I thought it was one of my friends joking with me. When I turned around and looked behind me, I saw a few plain

He continues like this: “We went to the artillery field and they blindfolded me, maybe as revenge for my escape. When I was going down the stairs, they didn’t guide me so I fell down several steps and then they took me to a room and started beating me. Then they took me to a solitary cell and after 30 minutes or an hour, they took me to the upper floor and into a big room that was very cold. It sounded like a management room and there were three or four people sitting there. They started asking me questions like, ‘What do you do and why did you have a Kurdish scarf?’ After that, they asked me to sit-stand up, which was very difficult for me because of my height. After I refused, they made me undress. After I was undressed, they suspected the scar on my body from my childhood was a bullet wound. Then they forced me to swim, which was even more difficult for me. While

Mr. Javid Tehrani says: “After that, they put me in a cell for a few hours. There was also a pilot there who had been arrested for defending a girl against Basij forces. He had been severely beaten and injured. We slept for a while until 1 am when they took us all in a minibus and brought us to Evin Prison. From the intersection of Park Way onwards, they blindfolded us and we couldn’t see anything. Only when we entered the prison, I lifted my blindfold a little and saw that we were in a place that had “Women’s Tailoring” written on top. I was the first one to enter there. They took off my blindfold and took a photo of my face and then said, “From now on, your number is one, you have no father or mother!” They took me to corridor 209 and pushed me against the wall. Every time someone passed by, they would ask, “

I asked him when he was transferred to the cell: “It was 3 am when they threw me into a very dirty cell. The cells had just been sprayed and were full of dead cockroaches and half-dead bugs. The cell had a piece of blue carpet with a large blood stain in the middle, and all the notes on the wall were from the 60s. One of the guards told me that this place had been abandoned since 1970 and you are the first group of prisoners to be brought back here. With this information, I realized that they had put up the women’s tailoring sign during this time. My number, which was “one”, indicated that I was actually the first person to return to 209 after several years. Also, we were not given any food during the first 24 hours…”

This former political prisoner recounts his interrogations as follows: “At the beginning of the interrogations, they first accused us and said we were charged with “actions against national security” and issued a detention order for us. After that, the interrogations began. The first interrogator, in my opinion, was a new person who had no specific information and even had the questions written down for him. I did not reveal my real name. Before and after the interrogations, they kept us standing in the hallway for hours and if we sat down, they would kick and curse at us. They wouldn’t let us go to the bathroom. They would also play the sound of other people crying and sometimes play Quran recordings. They even brought a few people to interrogate me face to face to identify me. On Thursday, they played the famous speech of Mr. Khamenei about the events of July 9th at a loud volume for us. This move was threatening and they wanted to

”

Behrouz Javid Tehrani says that if bad luck doesn’t come, he would be released: “After about a week, they came and told me to inform my family to come and bail me out. During the delivery of my belongings, they became suspicious of my previously unchecked wallet and when they found the phone number of one of our relatives who was abroad, their opinion suddenly changed and they said we had to go and search your house at night. During the search of my house, which they had taken me with them, they found a fax machine and some papers, etc. and realized that I was active and for this reason, I was not released and we returned to prison again.”

Just one week after my arrest, Band 209, which was actually abandoned, had become so crowded that not a single cell was left empty and many were sleeping in the corridors. As a result, I was transferred to 240 by force. There, not only in the corridors but even on the stairs between floors, people were sleeping. The next morning, we were taken to the famous Evin Hosseiniyeh. They had put up pictures all around the walls and were asking, “Do you know any of these people?” After looking for an hour, I said I didn’t know anyone. That same day, they took me out of Evin and transferred me to another location. Because they forced me to sleep on the floor of the car, I didn’t realize where we were going; although later I found out it was Tohid Prison.

Mr. Javid Tehrani describes Tohid Prison as follows: “Tohid had a terrifying atmosphere. I can say that it truly resembled a white torture chamber. The silence was overwhelming and no one had the right to make any noise. If someone even cried, they would do something to make them regret it. Sometimes, a bell-like sound, similar to a church bell, would ring and I don’t know what the reason was. Even worse, there were screams and the sound of whipping, which I believe was a recording, although I’m not sure. In any case, the atmosphere was so heavy that I didn’t even have the courage to make any noise, let alone do anything else! In that place, the cells didn’t have toilets and we had to use paper for that purpose. We were taken to the toilet three times a day, and if we had any other problems, there was no access to the toilet. They didn’t allow us to have any books or

Regarding interrogations, I can say that all stages of it were accompanied by insults, beatings, and humiliation. I remember in one of the interrogations, the interrogator told me, “Because your mother gave you money to do these things, we have arrested her,” and other similar statements about arresting my family, etc. We were also constantly threatened with execution. Another very painful issue was that in the beginning, I was kept in isolation for 10 days without anyone coming to see me. It was a very frustrating situation; being locked in a cell for 10 days with nothing to do and not knowing what was going to happen to me. It was a form of psychological torture, and even when the interrogator asked me a question and I didn’t answer, they would threaten me by saying they would keep me in isolation for another 10 days. The interrogation questions were all repetitive and not relevant to me. Apart from political interrogations, I was also subjected to religious interrogations

This arrest is related to the events of July 9, 1999 and adds: “After the end of this period, because I was under 25 years old, at the order of the judge in court, I was transferred to the Evin Youth Ward. There was a special room for political prisoners called Room 5, and 45 of the July 18th youth were sent there. The room was very dirty and full of lice. About 20 of us had to sleep on the floor. Due to the high population, we were constantly sent to forced ventilation. In my opinion, the worst torture that affects prisoners in the public ward is overcrowding and environmental pollution… 6 months later, I was sentenced to 8 years in prison and exile to Rajai Shahr prison in Karaj; 2 years for insulting the leadership and another 6 years for alleged connections with anti-government groups. This sentence was finalized after that year’s Eid. Of course, in

Behrouz Javid Tehrani, talks about the effects of psychological torture: “Stress is the worst effect of prison. Throughout this time, both during the time I served and during my subsequent detention in 1984, stress was something that tortured me. There was not a day that I was in prison without stress and nightmares, and this state continued in a different form outside. When I was released, I felt like I was being followed and watched. In this regard, my sleep became very light and I would constantly wake up, feeling like at any moment, the authorities could storm into my house. These issues still haunt me.”