Tortured
dissident held for five years vows to continue his fight against Iranian regime
 |
| Former political prisoner Madadzadehs |
Sitting
on a concrete bollard outside a Paris conference hall, Farzad Madadsadeh, an
Iranian dissident and former prisoner of the Iranian regime, is a reserved
figure.
The
31-year-old former cab driver from Iran's East Azerbijan province scratches the
already flaking skin on his hands as he recounts the six-year story of his
imprisonment in the jails of the Islamic Republic's intelligence services, the
abuse he was subjected to and the deaths of his brother and sister in exile inIraq.
"Each night I didn't know
if tomorrow evening I would still be alive or if I would be dead. It is hard to
describe those conditions because you don't know what's going to become of
you," he says, eyes fixed firmly on the ground.
Farzad was arrested in Tehran by Iranian security services in 2009
for his links to the country's underground resistance and in particular for his
work with the People's Mohajideen Organisation of Iran (PMOI).
The PMOI, which first sought to overthrow the Shah of Iran in
the 1970s and now looks to topple the theocracy imposed by Ayatollah Khomeini
following the country's 1979 revolution, is a banned organisation in the
Islamic Republic. Links to the group can result in a death sentence in the
country's politicised courts.
For his work with the underground, passing on information from
Iran to the PMOI's leadershipexiled in France, Farzad was
bundled into a van at gunpoint to Ward 209 of Evin Prison. As far as the
Iranian government is concerned the facility, run by the Iranian secret service
agency, does not exist but it is infamous as a political prison where
dissidents are interrogated, tortured, held without charge and made to endure
long periods of solitary confinement.
Citation/
Maryam Rajavi In Iran of
tomorrow: We believe in the rule of law and justice. We want to set up a modern
legal system based on the principles of presumption of innocence, the right to
defense, effective judicial protection and the right to be tried in a public
court. We also seek the total independence of judges. The mullahs’ Sharia law
will be abolished.
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