Yousef Saanei

Yousef Saanei
یوسف صانعی
16 Oct 1937
Nikabad, Isfahan
Male
Seminary Eduacation
Yes
Died, 12 Sep 2020
7 Jul 2021
image/svg+xml ExpediencyDiscernmentCouncil SupremeLeader'sOffice GuardianCouncil Judiciary ExecutivePower Parliament Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran General Staff ofArmed Forces Army IRGC Police(NAJA) Assembly of Expertsfor Leadership Supreme NationalSecurity Council Supreme Councilfor Cyberspace Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution IRIB
  • Member of the Guardian Council (Mar 1980 - 9 Jan 1983)
  • Member the Assembly of Experts for Leadership, Tehran Province (10 Dec 1982 - 1990)
  • Attorney General (9 Jan 1983 - 7 Jul 1985)
    • Human Rights Violation: Execution, torture and persecution of political prisoners (9 Jan 1983 - 7 Jul 1985) read more
      Institution
      Attorney General
      Location
      (National)
      Rights Violated
      Right to a fair trial, Right to freedom from torture, Right to life
      Description

      As Attorney General, Yousef Sanei has been responsible for the unfair trials and executions of many political prisoners. He has also been directly involved in the deliberate and systematic persecution of political prisoners. In a speech in July 1983, Sanei stated his opposition to the release of political prisoners and said:

      "Today, when we are living in peace and the authorities who are safe today, those counter-revolutionary parents shouldn’t ask the authorities for the release of their children. Whenever we think of such issues, we should think of the party’s massacre. […]

      Their imprisonment is a divine pleasure. Let there be no move that we, God forbid, speak against the Revolutionary Court. Today, with the efforts of the brothers of the IRGC and the committees and the police and the revolutionary courts, we are here, otherwise they have no mercy.

      [They] are traitors to the country, and they do not have mercy on their own parents, and they must be punished. Here, as an official of the judiciary, I kiss the hands of those loved ones who captured the counterrevolutionaries and took them to court and punished them. Well done . Let us not be pessimistic about the revolutionary courts."

      In another speech in 1985, he explicitly endorsed and encouraged the harassment and torture of political prisoners:

       

      "The counter-revolutionaries’s hope in Evin must be cut off. Evin must be an environment of fear. Evin must be an environment of terror. It is wrong to say, no one should be afraid, no, sir! The counterrevolutionaries should be tremble with fear when they hear that they are going to Evin.”

      Sources

      Impunity: Torture and Sexual Violence Against Female Political Prisoners in the Islamic Republic First Report: 1960s, Shadi Amin Shadi Sadr, Justice for Iran Organization, p.17

      Yousef Sanei, Jomhuri Eslami newspaper, July 1983

      The position of the Iranian authorities at the time regarding the executions of the 1980s, BBC Farsi, September 12, 2013

      https://www.bbc.com/persian/iran/2013/09/130912_25_anniversary_authoriteis_speech_nm

       

  • Member of the Board of Trustees for overseeing the properties at the disposal of the Supreme Leader (6 May 1989 - 1994)
    • Human Rights Violation: Confiscating and selling property of religious minorities and political dissidents (6 May 1989 - 1994) read more
      Institution
      Executive Headquarters of Imam Khomeini's Order
      Location
      (National)
      Rights Violated
      Right to freedom of religion and belief, Right to non-discrimination, Right to property
      Description

      Yousef Saanei, as a member of the Board of Trustees for overseeing the properties at the disposal of the Supreme Leader and one of the founders of the Executive Headquarters of Imam Khomeini’s Order (EHIKO), has been responsible for confiscating and selling the property of the Iranian citizens especially religious minorities, and political opponents of the Islamic Republic, in an illegal and unjust process.

      On May 26, 1989, in a letter, Ruhollah Khomeini appointed Yousef Saanei along with Mehdi Karroubi and Habibollah Asgar Oladi, as his trustees regarding the implementation of Article 49 of the Constitution and was responsible for collecting and administering property at the disposal of the Supreme Leader, including confiscated property of Iranian citizens especially religious and ethnic minorities and political opponents.

      In a joint letter to Khomeini on May 10, 1989, Saanei asked him to appoint Hossein Ali Nairi as the religious judge to handle Article 49 cases, especially confiscated property, and to allow the case to be heard without due process and legal proceedings of a fair trial. He writes in this letter:

      "It is requested that in case of approval, in order to advance the affairs and not lose the rights of the poor and needy, you instruct the relevant judicial authorities to handle these cases outside the cumbersome rules of the courts according to the rules of Sharia."

      Saanei is also responsible for confiscating the property of the wife and children of Hussein Vahdat Hagh, a Baha'i citizen who was executed for his religious beliefs on March 30, 1981.

       

      Based on the verdict issued by the Third Branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Court of Tehran - Evin on May 19, 1991, the court, citing a decree dated September 7, 1989, in the case of the property of Vahid, Shahab and Ruhid Vahdat Hagh, sons of Hossein Vahdat Hagh Declaring these citizens "followers of the heretical Baha'i sect" and declaring their property "disrespectful", he voted to confiscate all the family's property. The document also states: "The returned property will be given to the esteemed representatives of the Supreme Leader, Messrs. Hojjat al-Islam and Muslims, Hajj Sheikh Mehdi Karroubi and Hajj Sheikh Hassan Saemi [meant Yusuf Saanei]."

      Sources

      Decree on appointing representatives of property at the disposal of the Supreme Leader,

      Sahifa Ruhollah Khomeini, Volume 21, p 365

       

      Image of the court ruling dated 28 May 1991, case file 524/61 / M / 22634

       

      Letter to the President of the Supreme Court, Sahifa Ruhollah Khomeini, Volume 21, p 304.

       

      Stolen Lands: Executive Headquarters of Imam Khomeini’s Order, Report by the Justice for

      Iran, 2021

       
These violations may only be part of the human rights violations that this person has been involved in. The investigation into this person's human rights record is ongoing.