Report: Iran destroys mass graves of those executed in 1988

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — A new report alleges Iran is destroying or redeveloping the sites of mass graves holding those executed in a 1988 purge that killed thousands. Iran is deliberately destroying or concealing mass graves of victims from a 1988 spate of extrajudicial executions of political detainees, according to a new report by the nongovernmental watchdog Amnesty International and the London-based Justice For Iran. The report focuses on seven sites for which the group says it has reliable testimony, photo and video evidence and satellite imagery. Justice for Iran alleges in the report that it has identified over 120 locations in the country it believes were used as mass graves then. Iran's mission to the United Nations did not respond to a request for comment on the report. The graves hold those killed in executions that came at the end of Iran's long war with Iraq, which began when Saddam Hussein invaded in 1980. When Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini accepted a UN-brokered cease-fire in July 1988, members of an Iranian opposition group called the Mujahedeen-e Khalq, which was based in Iraq and armed by Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, launched a surprise attack against Iran.
Amnesty International and Justice for Iran accuse Iran of building over at least seven mass graves in six provinces containing thousands of bodies from executions of suspected Mujahedeen-e Khalq towards the end of the 1980-88 war.