SECOND TRIAL OF ISLAMIC REPUBLIC STARTED IN PARIS CRIMINAL COURT
By Iraj Fatemi
PARIS 25 June (IPS) The trial of Dr Cyrus Elahi, the deputy leader of the Derafsh Kaviani started Monday in a Paris criminal court, two days only after another similar stance had sentenced Mr. Ahmad Jeyhooni, an Iranian citizen living in Germany to 17 years jail for "association in the murder" of Dr. Reza Mazlooman, another opponent of the Islamic Republic.
Dr. Elahi was shot dead in his apartment in Paris on 23 October 1990.
Though the real murderer is at large, but all eyes during the first session of the trial were turned to Mr. Mojtaba Mash-hadi, summoned to the court as both witness and source of information.
In fact, the 43 years-old Mr. Mash-hadi, now a French citizen, married to a French woman and running a garage and a flower shop, was alleged to have given the Iranian secret service information about the daily routine of Cyrus Elahi.
Mash-hadi was arrested in 1993 in connection with the murder and was held in custody while investigations continued, but did not face trial.
In 1996, he was convicted and sentenced to seven years' in prison, this time on charges of "criminal collusion in a terrorist enterprise". That trial did not include the 1993 allegations of complicity to murder.
Mr. Mash-hadi was released days before the official visit of Iranian President Mohammad Khatami to Paris on 27 October 1999.
Named by associates as an agent of the Iranian Intelligence Ministry, Mr. Mashh-hadi was reported to have made frequent visits to Tehran, where he would meet with high-ranking Iranian agents and even Hojjatoleslam Ali Fallahian, the notorious Intelligence Minister as well as reporting directly to a special Committee supervising the elimination of Iranian dissidents, chaired by Ayatollah Ali Khamenehe'i, the leader of the Islamic Republic and Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani, the then President.
It was interesting to note that the man who brought most of the charges against Mr. mash-hadi, a certain Hoseyn Yazdan-setah, also jailed in the same case, was found dead in a hotel in Paris soon after his release from prison.
Before his death, Mr. Yazdan-setah had revealed the existence of a list, prepared by the "Terror Committee", containing the names of 12 Iranian leading dissidents to be eliminated in Europe.
The existence of this Committee was confirmed by Mr. Banisadr.
Islamic Iran’s first president Abolhasan Banisadr, Mr. Dariush Homayoon, a former Information Minister under the Shah and the leader of a pro-Monarchist organisation, Dr. Manoochehr Ganji, the leader of the US-funded, Paris-based "Derafsh Kaviani", Mr. Shoja’eddin Shafa, a prominent Iranian historian, researcher, writer and polemist and Princess Asharaf Pahlavi were among come of the personalities to be assassinated.
The murder of Dr Elahi had exactly the same trade-mark as that of Dr. Mazlooman, the one the court in the case of Mr. Jayhooni described as the "Trojan Horse", meaning the killer being introduced by a friend who, in fact, is no one else but an agent of the Iranian secret services who had won the friendship and the trust of the victim.
Besides Mr. Ganji and Mr. Banisadr who were present at the trial, the court received a letter from Mr. Farhad Mesbahi, alias "Witness C" who helped the Berlin High Court to rule in April 1997 that "all the highest ranking clerical leaders of the Islamic Republic, including Ayatollah Khamenehe'i and Ayatollah Hashemi-Rafsanjani are directly responsible for the assassination of Iranian dissidents abroad.
Like in the trial of Mr. Jayhooni, besides the family of Dr. Elahi and the Derafsh Kaviani organisation, two French groups, the SOS-Attentats and particularly the Reporters Without Borders are also present as complainants.
Asking 30 years for Mr. Jayhooni, a Prosecutor had warned the Islamic Republic that France can no more tolerate political assassination on its soil. ENDS ELAHI TRIAL 25601