The American magazine Newsweek (14 October 1974) wrote: *By almost any conceivable measure, the size and scope of SAVAK operations are absolutely staggering. Between 30,000 and 60,000 people work for SAVAK full-time, but they are only the skeleton of a much larger creature. According to some diplomats in Iran no fewer than 3 million Iranians — one out of every eight adult citizens - are occasionally SAVAK informers.
The present head of SAVAK is General Ne'matollah Nassiri, a veteran supporter of the present Shah and known to favour the most brutal methods of torture by SAVAK. The documents discovered in Geneva reveal that this tions. But he can no longer walk, only crawl on all fours."
was shot.
man sent a "Very Confidential" cable from Bristol (code word for SAVAK HQ in Tehran) to Simin (code word for Geneva SAVAK headquarters) asking for an investigation of the relationship between Iranian dissidents and two British MPs, Stan Newens and William After cautioning 'Clean Claws' (SAVAK field operatives) not to "He was slowly burned by means of an electric fire while his hands and legs were tied to a bed. He was so badly burned in the lower lumbar areas that it reached some of the vertebral bones and he fell into a coma. He was then untied and left with his wounds in a putrid state. So much so that the stink of his infested flesh filled our cells and nobody else would come near it. He was then transferred to prison hospital, where he underwent several operaThat was the ghastly fate of Iranian prisoner Asghar Badizadegan at the hands of SAVAK. It only became known because one of his fellow prisoners, Reza Rezai, escaped and told the Sunday Times (19 January 1975). Soon afterwards, Badizadega SAVAK's chief in Geneva, Colonel Ahmed Malek-Mahdavi, seen in his office. INSET: a captured document loiter for long outside their places of residence', Nassiti asked that be immediately transmitted to the can be taken on further measures to be adopted'.
was revealed in a press conference called last week by Stan Newens, who agreed that it raised the question of collaboration between SAVAK and other intelligence those fighting the dictatorship.