Iran destroyed one of the last remaining watchtowers at Gohardasht Prison, also known as Raja’i Shahr Prison, on Saturday, according to footage of the demolition published by Persian-language media outlets, potentially destroying critical evidence of Iran’s crimes against humanity.
The prison was evacuated and closed in 2023. It had become notorious for decades of human-rights abuses against political prisoners since the Islamic Revolution in 1979.
“Prison authorities told the prisoners that the prison had been sold for 10,000 billion tomans [€200 million] without naming the buyer and would soon be evacuated,” a person familiar with the matter told Iran Human Rights at the time.
Thousands of political prisoners were executed at the prison during the 1980s and thereafter, including hundreds during the 1988 massacre of political prisoners under an order by former supreme leader Ruhollah Khomeini.
Rights groups warned prison demolition could erase evidence of atrocities
Until its closure, human-rights groups repeatedly documented torture and other abuses at the facility and warned that Tehran might demolish the site to destroy key evidence about the atrocities committed there.
The site was already at the core of a Swedish legal case against Hamid Nouri, who was sentenced to life for his role in the executions and abuses. He was returned to Iran in 2024 in a prisoner-exchange deal.
“Gohardasht Prison is the place where crimes against humanity were committed by those who currently hold key positions in the Islamic Republic,” Iran Human Rights Director Mahmood Amiry-Moghaddam said shortly after the sale. “We still don’t know the full scope of those crimes, and destroying the evidence is without doubt one of the key motivations behind its closure. The justice movement, Iranian civil society, and the international community must do everything in their power to prevent the prison’s demolition.”
Iran presents prison redevelopment as cultural project amid criticism
The Iranian regime has presented the prison’s redevelopment as an opportunity to provide cultural facilities, university space, and parks, according to Iranian media outlets.
The demolition “is another attempt to erase the geography of blood from one of the most horrific tragedies in Iran’s contemporary history,” Mehdi Aslani, a former political prisoner at the prison, told Iran International.
“Memory is more resilient than the corrosion of oblivion,” he said. “History has repeatedly proven this principle: Crimes against humanity cannot ultimately be erased from history. They say this is for urban redevelopment. They want to build a park and educational facilities on yesterday’s blood-soaked ground. And this is the bitter irony and injury of history.”