Former chief of hated Savak jailed in Iranian crack-down

Press, 9 November 1978, Page 8

Former chief of hated Savak jailed in Iranian crack-down

NZPA-Reuter Teheran Iran’s former secret police chief is behind bars after being arrested by generals who were once his close colleagues. More personalities were soon expected to join him and other prominent figures detained in the capital’s army barrack jails. General Nematollah Nassiri, for 13 years head of the hated Savak intelligence and security service, was detained by martia'-law authorities. He has been accused of ordering torture and illegal arrests. Six former Ministers and a former national police head were also among a dozen figures who were rounded up by the Shah’s new military Government. . An official announcement said that other personalities would be detained.

i| General Nassiri, who is: I 72, had come under intense: i public attack by dissidents.: r freed political prisoners, and' Opposition leaders. All those arrested in the; * crack-down have come under' fire in the revolt against the I: ; | Shah who has vowed to) J fight corruption, abuse of! 1 power, and other offences! s that fuelled a whirlwind, s popular uprising against the! monarch' that reached a peak! .- this week. | e General Nassiri was one! d of the Shah’s right-hand men - and he worked closely with v the armed forces chiefs who - were appointed this week as e Ministers in the military Government led by Genera! I Gholamreza Azhari. e In taking the important! a step of arresting the burly e general, the new Ministers s were clearly aiming to prove to a sceptical public that t they meant business. s “The Shah’s decision to permit his arrest must have

been one of the toughest of I his life,” a senior diplomat: commented. Under martial ilaw, General Nassiri, like all! !the other detainees, can be jheld indefinitely without I trial. It was General Nassiri, !who arrested the Prime Min-) lister, Mohammad Mossadegh,' (When the Shan was briefly! i in exile in 1953 in the) )monarch’s worst crisis until; (now. General Nassiri was dis-1 missed as head of Savak in; June when the Shah named: him as ambassador to Pakis-j tan. But the general resigned) his ambassadorship after a few weeks as allegations against him surfaced back home. Judicial authorities have been investigating formal complaints against him, including an accusation that he illegally amassed wealth through land-grabbing. Also among those held

: was former Information (Minister, Dariush Homayoun, who has been accused I by Opposition leaders of indirectly fomenting the wave :)of unrest. The Opposition leaders alleged he ordered a news-i paper to publish an article attacking the Shah's exiled , j chief religious opponent, (Ayatollah Rohollah JKhomeiny, which sparked a I; major outburst of violence I in the holy city of Qom. ; The Ayatollah, leader of II Iran’s 30 million Shi’ite 11 Muslims, has issued a state-! .ment from his home _ in : I France denouncing the formation of the military Gov-; : ernment in Teheran and call-. : ing on the Iranians to struggle on until the Shah was overthrown. The former director of; Iran’s national airline, Iran- : air, has died of gunshot . wounds in a Teheran hospital and there are conflicting reports whether

he committed suicide or was assassinated.

The retired Air Force general, Ali Mohammed Khademi, was shot on Sunday outside his home in a Teheran suburb. Government officials said they believe the wound was self-inflicted, but a member of the general’s family said he was attacked by* a gang of unidentified youths. Meanwhile, Iran’s oil exports ran at less than 20 per cent of normal on the ! seventh day running as a political strike by most of the industry’s 37.000 workers ended its first week.

The strike began last Tuesday when workers (walked out, demanding an ;end to martial law, freedom I for political prisoners, and | the expulsion of foreign oil i experts. ; The strike is estimated to have cost the country so far about SUS4OOM in lost production and exports.