Sazeman-e Ettela'at va Amniyat-e Keshvar
SAVAK
Agency overview
Formed	1957
Preceding agency	name unknown
Dissolved	1979
Superseding agency	VEVAK
Headquarters	Tehran, Iran
Employees	60,000 at peak
Minister responsible	Intelligence
Agency executives	Teymur Bakhtiar, (First) Nasser Moghadam, (Last)

SAVAK (Persian: ساواک, short for سازِمانِ اطلاعات وَ امنیَتِ کِشوَر Sāzemān-e Ettelā'āt va Amniyat-e Keshvar, Organisation of Intelligence and National Security) was the secret police, domestic security and intelligence service established by Iran's Mohammad Reza Shah with the help of the United States' Central Intelligence Agency (the CIA).^[1] SAVAK operated from 1957 to 1979, when the Pahlavi dynasty was overthrown. SAVAK has been described as Iran's "most hated and feared institution" prior to the revolution of 1979 because of its practice of torturing and executing opponents of the Pahlavi regime.^[2][3] At its peak, the organization had as many as 60,000 agents serving in its ranks according to one source,^[4] although Gholam Reza Afkhami, whose work on the Shah has been described as a "sympathetic biography",^[5] estimates SAVAK staffing at between 4,000 and 6,000.^[6]

History[link]

1957-1970[link]

After removing the populist regime of Mohammad Mosaddeq (which was originally focused on nationalizing Iran's oil industry but also set out to weaken the Shah's power) from power on 19 August 1953, in a coup, the monarch, Mohammad Reza Shah, established an intelligence service with police powers. The Shah's goal was^[7] to strengthen his regime by placing political opponents under surveillance and repress dissident movements. According to Encyclopædia Iranica:

A U.S. Army colonel working for the CIA was sent to Persia in September 1953 to work with General Teymur Bakhtiar, who was appointed military governor of Tehran in December 1953 and immediately began to assemble the nucleus of a new intelligence organization. The U.S. Army colonel worked closely with Bakhtīār and his subordinates, commanding the new intelligence organization and training its members in basic intelligence techniques, such as surveillance and interrogation methods, the use of intelligence networks, and organizational security. This organization was the first modern, effective intelligence service to operate in Persia. Its main achievement occurred in September 1954, when it discovered and destroyed a large communist Tudeh Party network that had been established in the Persian armed forces^[8][9]

In March 1955, the Army colonel was "replaced with a more permanent team of five career CIA officers, including specialists in covert operations, intelligence analysis, and counterintelligence, including Major General Herbert Norman Schwarzkopf who "trained virtually all of the first generation of SAVAK personnel." In 1956 this agency was reorganized and given the name Sazeman-e Ettela'at va Amniyat-e Keshvar (SAVAK).^[9] These in turn were replaced by SAVAK’s own instructors in 1965.^[10][11] Chief CIA Iran analyst Jesse Leaf in an interview on 6th Jan. 1979 stated that the CIA taught Nazi torture techniques to SAVAK.^[12][13]

SAVAK had the power to censor the media, screen applicants for government jobs, "and according to reliable Western source,^[14] use all means necessary, including torture, to hunt down dissidents". ^[15] The CIA provided SAVAK with lists of Communists to torture and murder. These lists originated with KGB defectors working for the CIA.

After 1963, the Shah expanded his security organizations, including SAVAK, which grew to over 5300 full-time agents and a large but unknown number of part-time informers.^[15]

In 1961 the Iranian authorities dismissed the agency's first director, General Teymur Bakhtiar; he later became a political dissident. In 1970 SAVAK agents assassinated him, disguising the deed as an accident.

General Hassan Pakravan, Director of Savak from 1961–1965, had an almost benevolent reputation, for example dining with the Ayatollah Khomeini while Khomeini was under house arrest on a weekly basis, and later intervened to prevent Khomeini's execution, on the grounds it would "anger the common people of Iran".^[16] After the Iranian Revolution, however, Pakravan was among the first of the Shah's officials to be executed by the Khomeini regime.

Pakravan was replaced in 1965 by General Nematollah Nassiri, a close associate of the Shah, and the service was reorganized and became increasingly active in the face of rising Shia and communist militancy and political unrest.

Siahkal attack and after[link]

A turning point in SAVAK's reputation for ruthless brutality was reportedly an attack on a gendarmerie post in the Caspian village of Siahkal by a small band of armed Marxists in February 1971, although it is also reported to have tortured to death a Shia cleric, Ayatollah Muhammad Reza Sa'idi, in 1970.^[17] According to Iranian political historian Ervand Abrahamian, after this attack SAVAK interrogators were sent abroad for "scientific training to prevent unwanted deaths from 'brute force.' Brute force was supplemented with the bastinado; sleep deprivation; extensive solitary confinement; glaring searchlights; standing in one place for hours on end; nail extractions; snakes (favored for use with women); electrical shocks with cattle prods, often into the rectum; cigarette burns; sitting on hot grills; acid dripped into nostrils; near-drownings; mock executions; and an electric chair with a large metal mask to muffle screams while amplifying them for the victim. This latter contraption was dubbed the Apollo—an allusion to the American space capsules. Prisoners were also humiliated by being raped, urinated on, and forced to stand naked.^[18] Despite the new 'scientific' methods, the torture of choice remained the traditional bastinado used to beat soles of the feet. The "primary goal" of those using the bastinados "was to locate arms caches, safe houses and accomplices ..." ^[19]

Abrahamian estimates that SAVAK (and other police and military) killed 368 guerrillas between 1971–1977 and executed something less than 100 political prisoners between 1971 and 1979 - the most violent era of the SAVAK's existence.^[20]

One well known writer was arrested, tortured for months, and finally placed before television cameras to 'confess' that his works paid too much attention to social problems and not enough to the great achievements of the White Revolution. By the end of 1975, twenty-two prominent poets, novelist, professors, theater directors, and film makers were in jail for criticizing the regime. And many others had been physically attacked for refusing to cooperate with the authorities.^[21]

By 1976, this repression was softened considerably thanks to publicity and scrutiny by "numerous international organizations and foreign newspapers." In 1976, Jimmy Carter was elected President of the United States and he "raised the issue of human rights in Iran as well as in the Soviet Union. Overnight prison conditions changed. Inmates dubbed this the dawn of `jimmykrasy.` ^[22]

After the Iranian Revolution of 1979, former directors Pakravan, Nassiri, and Moghadam were tried by Revolutionary Courts and executed by the Revolutionary Guard.^{[citation needed]}

Operations[link]

During the height of its power, SAVAK had virtually unlimited powers. It operated its own detention centers, like Evin Prison. In addition to domestic security the service's tasks extended to the surveillance of Iranians abroad, notably in the United States, France, and the United Kingdom, and especially students on government stipends. The agency also closely collaborated with the American CIA by sending their agents to an air force base in New York to share and discuss interrogation tactics.^[23] The CIA used the SAVAK as its proxy^{[citation needed]}. Many of the SAVAK staff were paid off by the CIA to be brutal towards Communists^{[citation needed]}.

Teymur Bakhtiar was assassinated by SAVAK agents in 1970, and Mansur Rafizadeh, SAVAK's United States director during the 1970s, reported that General Nassiri's phone was tapped. Mansur Rafizadeh later published his life as a SAVAK man and detailed the human rights violations of the Shah in his book Witness: From the Shah to the Secret Arms Deal: An Insider's Account of U.S. Involvement in Iran. Mansur Rafizadeh was suspected to have been a double agent also working for the CIA.

According to Polish author Ryszard Kapuściński, SAVAK was responsible for

• Censorship of press, books and films.^[24]
• Interrogation and often torture of prisoners
• Surveillance of political opponents.

Victims[link]

Sources disagree over how many victims SAVAK had and how inhumane its techniques were. Writing at the time of the Shah's overthrow, TIME magazine described SAVAK as having "long been Iran's most hated and feared institution" which had "tortured and murdered thousands of the Shah's opponents."^[25] The Federation of American Scientists also found it guilty of "the torture and execution of thousands of political prisoners" and symbolizing "the Shah's rule from 1963-79." The FAS list of SAVAK torture methods included "electric shock, whipping, beating, inserting broken glass and pouring boiling water into the rectum, tying weights to the testicles, and the extraction of teeth and nails." ^[26] According to a former CIA analyst on Iran,^[27][28] Jesse J. Leaf, SAVAK was trained in torture techniques by the CIA.

Fardoust and security and intelligence after the revolution[link]

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (September 2008)

SAVAK was closed down shortly before the overthrow of the monarchy and the coming to power of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in the February 1979 Iranian Revolution. Following the departure of the Shah in January 1979, SAVAK's 3,000+ central staff and its agents were targeted for reprisals; almost all of them that were in Iran at the time of the Iranian Revolution were hunted down and executed, only a few who were on missions outside of Iran managed to survive.^{[citation needed]}

SAVAK was replaced by the "much larger"^[29] SAVAMA, Sazman-e Ettela'at va Amniat-e Melli-e Iran, also known as the Ministry of Intelligence and National Security of Iran.^[30]

According to author Charles Kurzman, SAVAK was never dismantled but rather changed its name and leadership and continued on with the same codes of operation, and a relatively unchanged "staff." ^[3][31]

Hossein Fardoust, a former classmate of the Shah, was a deputy director of SAVAK until he was appointed head of the Imperial Inspectorate, also known as the Special Intelligence Bureau, to watch over high-level government officials, including SAVAK directors. Fardust later is rumoured to have become director of SAVAMA, the post-revolution incarnation of the original SAVAK organization. (Robert Dreyfuss, Hostage to Khomeini 1981 and The Devils Game: How the United States Unleashed Fundamentalist Islam,2004)

After the victory of the Islamic revolution, a museum was opened in a former prison in central Tehran called "Ebrat". The museum displays and exhibits the documented atrocities of SAVAK.

See also[link]

Iran portal

• Mohammad Reza Pahlavi
• Ministry of Intelligence and National Security of Iran
• Iranian Revolution
• Human rights in Islamic Republic of Iran

References[link]

External links[link]

• Ministry of Intelligence and Security VEVAK - Iran Intelligence Agencies at website of Federation of American Scientists

Reza Allamehzadeh (Persian: رضا علامه‌زاده) is a Persian-born Dutch film-maker, film critic and writer who lives in the Netherlands. He is mostly famous because of his films about refugees, such as The Guests of Hotel Astoria (1988), and the documentary Holy Crime (1994), which is about the murder of opposition figures in Europe by the Islamic regime in Iran.

Allamehzadeh was born in 1943 in Sari, Mazandaran province. He studied film directing at “Tehran Academy of Film and Television” in 1966-1969. Alongside with filmmaking he is regularly writing and publishing children’s books, novels and short stories. He is giving film and TV courses in various universities around the world such as Hollins University in Virginia (US), Leeds Metropolitan University (UK) and International R/TV Training Center in the Netherlands, where he has been living since 1983.

Allamehzadeh has been one of the advocates of Kurdish cinema. He is native in Persian and fluent in English and to some extent Dutch and Spanish.

Films[link]

Some of his films are:

• The Trap (1973), awarded Grand Prix at 12th International film festival for Children and Youth in Gijon, Spain
• A Few Simple Sentences (1986), awarded as: best short Stockholm 1986, International Immigrant Film Festival; best children's film, Tomar 1987 International Festival of Cinema for Children and Youth; best children's film, the jury of the International Centre of Films for Children and Youth (CIFEJ), International Moscow Film Festival, 1987.
• The Guests of Hotel Astoria (1988), feature length, selected for the Venice, Moscow, Montreal and Chicago Film Festivals;
• Holy Crime, a controversial documentary on state terrorism of Islamic government of Iran in European countries.
• Iranian Taboo, a documentary on the Baha'i community in and outside Iran.

See also[link]

• Persian cinema

External links[link]

• Reza Alamehzadeh at the Internet Movie Database
• The Biography and Works of Reza Allamehzadeh
• Interview with Reza Allamehzadeh on the documentary 'Holy Crime' (Radio Zamaneh, in Persian)
• About the documentary 'Iranian Taboo' (Own homepage)

This article about an Iranian film director is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Prince Reza
Crown Prince of Iran
Head of House of Pahlavi
Period	27 July 1980 – present (&1000000000000003000000030 years, &10000000000000335000000335 days)
Predecessor	Mohammad Reza Pahlavi
Heir presumptive	Patrick Ali Pahlavi
Spouse	Yasmine Pahlavi
Issue
Princess Noor Princess Iman Princess Farah
Full name
English: Reza Persian: رضا‎
House	House of Pahlavi
Father	Mohammad Reza Pahlavi
Mother	Farah Diba
Born	(1960-10-31) October 31, 1960 (age 51) Tehran, Iran
Religion	Shia Islam

Prince Reza Pahlavi (Persian: رضا پهلوی‎, born 31 October 1960) is the last crown prince of the former Imperial State of Iran and current head of the House of Pahlavi. He is the older son of the late Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and his Shahbanou Farah Pahlavi. In 1979, Reza Pahlavi left Iran at the time of the Iranian Revolution.

Biography[link]

Reza Pahlavi in 1973 as Crown Prince of Iran

Reza Pahlavi was born in Tehran, Iran, as eldest son of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, the last Shah of Iran, and Empress Farah Pahlavi. Reza Pahlavi's siblings include his sister Princess Farahnaz Pahlavi (12 March 1963), brother Prince Ali-Reza Pahlavi (28 April 1966 – 4 January 2011), and sister Princess Leila Pahlavi (27 March 1970 – 10 June 2001), as well as a half-sister, Princess Shahnaz Pahlavi (27 October 1941).

He left Iran at the age of 17 for air force training. He spent a year at Williams College, but was forced to leave because of the turmoil in Iran. With the monarchy overthrown and an Islamic Republic established, Reza Pahlavi did not return to Iran. He received a BSc degree by correspondence in political science from the University of Southern California, because Williams did not offer that option.^[1] A jet fighter pilot, Reza Pahlavi completed the United States Air Force Training Program at the former Reese Air Force Base in Lubbock, Texas. In 1980, at the start of the Iran–Iraq War, Pahlavi, a highly-trained fighter pilot, wrote to General Valiollah Fallahi, Chief Commander of the Armed Forces of the Islamic Republic, offering to fight in the air force for Iran in the war. The offer was rebuffed.^[2]

With the death of his father on 27 July 1980, Reza Pahlavi became the Head of the House of Pahlavi.

Reza Pahlavi has written three books on the state of Iran.

According to Iranian writer Reza Bayegan, Prince Reza Pahlavi is deeply attached to his Shi'ite Muslim faith. He has named one of his daughters Iman (meaning faith in Arabic), and has performed the Hajj (pilgrimage) to Mecca.^[3]

Family[link]

Reza married Yasmine Etemad Amini on June 12, 1986. Yasmine, a graduate of the George Washington University School of Law, worked for ten years as a lawyer for the Children’s Law Center as a legal advocate for at-risk youth. Yasmine also founded the Foundation for the Children of Iran in 1991, a non-profit foundation that provides health care services to Iranian children or children of Iranian origin.

Reza Pahlavi and his wife Yasmine have three daughters: Noor (born April 3, 1992), Iman (born September 12, 1993), and Farah (born January 17, 2004).

In 2004, Reza Pahlavi was named as the "unofficial godfather"^[4] of Princess Louise of Belgium the eighth granddaughter of King Albert II of Belgium. The decision to choose him was criticized by the Foreign Ministry of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Politics[link]

Iranian Imperial Family

HIH The Crown Prince HIH The Crown Princess HIH Princess Noor HIH Princess Iman HIH Princess Farah HIM Empress Farah HIH Princess Shahnaz HIH Princess Farahnaz HIH Prince Ali-Reza† HIH Princess Iryana Extended imperial family HIH Princess Ashraf HIH Prince Ali Patrick HIH Princess Sonja HIH Prince Davoud HIH Princess Solvène HIH Prince Houd HIH Prince Yunes HIH Princess Iryana Leila HIH Prince Gholam Reza HIH Princess Manizheh HIH Prince Bahman HIH Princess Shohreh HIH Princess Nazbanoo HIH Princess Maryam HIH Princess Azardokht HIH Prince Bahram HIH Prince Kamyar HIH Princess Sarvnaz HIH Prince Shahrukh HIH Princess Shahlah HIH Prince Shahin HIH Prince Iskander HIH Prince Zachary HIH Prince Gregory HIH Princess Zara HIH Princess Shahrnaz HIH Princess Parinaz HIH Princess Niloufar HIH Princess Nazak HIH Prince Ja'afar v t e

Reza Pahlavi sworn in as Head of Pahlavi Dynasty in 1980.

Reza Pahlavi has used his high profile status as an Iranian abroad to campaign politically for human rights, democracy, and unity among Iranians in Iran and outside it.^[5] On his website he calls for a separation of religion and state in Iran and for free and fair elections "for all freedom-loving individuals and political ideologies". He exhorts all groups dedicated to a democratic agenda to work together for a democratic and secular Iranian government.^[6]

According to Reza Bayegan, Prince Pahlavi believes in the separation of religion from politics. However, Pahlavi avoids the "Islam bashing" that Bayegan writes occurs in some circles of the Iranian opposition. Rather, he believes that religion has a humanizing and ethical role in shaping individual character and infusing society with greater purpose.^[3]

Pahlavi wrote in his book, Winds of Change:^[7]

Pahlavi has used media appearances to urge Iran's theocratic government to accept a referendum that uses independently verifiable international standards and observation mechanisms.^[8][9][10] He has also urged Iranians to engage in a campaign of non-violent civil disobedience, starting with non-participation in elections of the Islamic republic (elections he views as undemocratic), followed by peaceful demonstrations and strikes. He is, however, an outspoken opponent of any foreign military intervention for regime change in Iran,^[11] believing that the people of Iran alone have the power to bring about change in their governmental system and society.

Human rights[link]

On March 27, 2010, Reza Pahlavi was invited by the International Society of Human Rights in Bonn, Germany, to speak on the challenge of implementing democracy and human rights in Iran; a sample excerpt from this speech follows:^[12]

Other samples of his speeches are in the External Links below.

2011 comments[link]

In February 2011, Pahlavi said after violence erupted in Tehran that Iran’s youth were determined to get rid of an authoritarian government tainted by corruption and misrule in the hope of installing a democracy. “Fundamental and necessary change is long overdue for our region and we have a whole generation of young Egyptian and Iranians not willing to take no for an answer,” Pahlavi told the Daily Telegraph. “Democratisation is now an imperative that cannot be denied. It is only a matter of time before the whole region can transform itself.^[13]

Monarchy[link]

Following in a line of Iranian monarchic dynasties stretching back 3000 years, the Pahlavi dynasty was founded early in the twentieth century. The revolution of 1979 led to the replacement of the Iranian constitutional monarchy (de facto absolute monarchy) with an Islamic republic. Although he currently lives in exile, Pahlavi is still regarded by some Iranians as the current Shah of Iran.^{[citation needed]} After the death of his father, Mohammad-Rezā Shāh Pahlavi, Pahlavi symbolically declared himself Shāhanshāh (Literally, King of Kings in Persian) at the age of 21, but now his press releases refer to him as either "Reza Pahlavi" or "the former Crown Prince of Iran".

Succession[link]

Succession is theoretical, as the Iranian monarchy was abolished with the Islamic Constitution in Iran in 1980. He is the current pretender in the succession line to his late father and Ali Patrick Pahlavi is the second in line.

Titles, styles and honours[link]

Standard of the Crown Prince

Styles of Crown Prince Reza of Iran
Reference style	His Imperial Highness
Spoken style	Your Imperial Highness
Alternative style	Sir

Titles and styles[link]

• His Imperial Highness The Crown Prince of Iran (1960–1979)
• His Imperial Highness Crown Prince Reza of Iran (pretender, 1979–present)
• Reza Pahlavi (commoner name, 1979–present)

Honours[link]

• Grand Collar of the Order of Pahlavi (26 September 1967, Iran)
• Mohammad Rezā Shāh Pahlavi Coronation medal (1967, Iran)
• Knight of the Order of the Seraphim (November 24, 1970, Sweden)
• 25th Anniversary medal (1971, Iran)
• Persepolis medal (1971, Iran)
• Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic (December 15, 1974, Italy)
• He was awarded the Royal Order of the Drum by King Kigeli V (Rwanda)

Publications[link]

• Reza Pahlavi, IRAN: L’Heure du Choix [IRAN: The Deciding Hour] (Denoël, 2009)^[14]
• Reza Pahlavi, Winds of Change: The Future of Democracy in Iran, Regnery Publishing Inc., 2002, ISBN 0-89526-191-X.
• Reza Pahlavi, Gozashteh va Ayandeh, London: Kayham Publishing, 2000.^[15]

See also[link]

	Iran portal
	Biography portal
	Politics portal

• Constitutionalist Party of Iran
• Shahriar Shafiq

Footnotes[link]

• "Keeping Up... With Youth". The Spokesman-Review. December 16, 1978. http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=oPdLAAAAIBAJ&sjid=Du4DAAAAIBAJ&pg=5459,523923&dq=cyrus-pahlavi&hl=en. Retrieved December 20, 2011. 
• Associated Press (September 13, 1980). "Iran Exiled Government Planned for Shah's Son". The Press-Courier. http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=-cA8AAAAIBAJ&sjid=QS4MAAAAIBAJ&pg=5058,3224862&dq=cyrus-pahlavi&hl=en. Retrieved December 20, 2011. 
• Bush, G.M. (February 14, 1983). "2,000 Marchers Seek Overthrow of Khomeini". Los Angeles Times. http://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/latimes/access/666654772.html?dids=666654772:666654772&FMT=ABS&FMTS=ABS:AI&type=historic&date=Feb+14%2C+1983&author=&pub=Los+Angeles+Times&desc=2%2C000+Marchers+Seek+Overthrow+of+Khomeini&pqatl=google. Retrieved December 20, 2011. 

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Mohammad Reza Pahlavi

• Reza Pahlavi's Official Website
• Pahlavi Dynasty's Website
• Shah's Son Killed himself BBC