Iran’s former diplomats have played a critical role in denying and disseminating misinformation about the prison massacres of 1988, as part of a global cover-up of the mass killings orchestrated by the Iranian authorities. This cover-up not only robbed those directly affected and society at large of the right to truth, but also contributed to entrenching impunity, compounding the suffering of survivors and relatives, and facilitating the ongoing commission of the crime against humanity of enforced disappearance and other crimes under international law.
This extended public statement builds on Amnesty International documentation of the issue of diplomatic cover-up in the organization’s 2018 report Blood-soaked secrets: Why Iran’s 1988 prison massacres are ongoing crimes against humanity (hereafter Blood-soaked Secrets), which documented the enforced disappearance and secret extrajudicial execution of thousands of imprisoned political dissidents in Iran between late July and early September 1988, and the decades-long plight of their families for truth, justice, and reparation.