Prison Memoirs of Azam Haj Heydari from the Book The Price of Being Human — Part Six
In this installment of the prison memoirs of Azam Haj Heydari, published in The Price of Being Human, she recounts how she met Atiyeh Moharrer Khansari and shares her memories of her and of Dr. Masoumeh Karimian.
At the time, Azam was a young schoolteacher in her early twenties who had joined the struggle for freedom. She spent five years imprisoned in the Judiciary Detention Center, Evin Prison, Qezel Hesar Prison, and Gohardasht Prison, where she endured brutal torture at the hands of the Revolutionary Guards.
A Soul Too Beautiful for Their Prison
It was in September 1981, while I was being held in the old Ward 240 of Evin Prison. I had only recently arrived and still did not know many of the women there.
Suddenly the ward door opened and a tall girl of sixteen or seventeen entered. She had a strikingly beautiful and gentle face, yet there were also an unmistakable dignity and determination about her. Despite her youth, her bearing was so poised and self-assured that everyone was instinctively drawn to her.
I watched her for a few moments, then stood up and introduced myself.
“What is your name?” I asked.
With a warm smile, she answered softly, “Atiyeh Moharrer Khansari.”
“Is Tahereh your sister?”
“Yes.”
I remembered having seen her once or twice with her sister, Tahereh Moharrer Khansari, though at the time she had seemed much younger.
“Why were you arrested?” I asked.
“For loving freedom,” she replied.
I laughed and said, “That is something you and I have in common.”
She gestured toward the other women in the ward and said, “It is what all of us have in common.”
I was struck by her quick wit.
“How were you arrested?” I asked.
She sighed and said, “By my father. When I came home, he handed me over to the Guards.”
I said, “Then we share another thing in common—and a bitter one at that. My own brother was the one who turned me in.”
That was how my friendship with Atiyeh began.
I felt deeply connected to her—not only because of our shared experience of betrayal by our families, but because of her extraordinary character and inner strength. Atiyeh was truly exceptional. Her kindness, compassion, and selflessness made her, despite her young age, a source of support for many of the prisoners.
The ward where we were held had only three rooms. One, near the entrance, was reserved for monarchists, whom the Guards did not allow to interact with us. The remaining political prisoners—about 150 women in all—were crammed into the other two rooms.
Under such conditions, every aspect of daily life—from washing our faces to using the toilet to finding a place to sleep—became a challenge. Situations like these reveal a person’s true character. They demand the ability to put another’s needs before one’s own.
That was exactly what made the calm, patient, and steadfast character of this seventeen-year-old girl so remarkable. At the same time, her fierce anger towards the Guards, collaborators, and informers, and her unwavering commitment to the struggle, were awe-inspiring.
Atiyeh cared for her fellow prisoners like a loving mother. She met both their emotional and practical needs. She helped those who were elderly or physically weak, often setting aside her own needs to care for others. Those who felt lonely found comfort in her embrace and affection. In every way, she seemed far older and wiser than her years.
When prisoners from the Judiciary Prison, including me, were transferred to Evin, the horrific sanitary conditions there brought lice and skin diseases into the prison.
Atiyeh patiently helped the women who were suffering. She would say, “It gives me joy to do something for my friends.”
Sometimes she would spend an entire morning picking lice, one by one, from the hair of other prisoners—lice that were themselves a product of the regime’s prison conditions. As she worked, she would kiss their heads and say, “These are the sweetest moments of my life.”
She loved the women around her with all her heart.
Atiyeh would be taken to interrogation and return with astonishing calm. Like a seasoned fighter, she never complained about what had happened to her. On the contrary, she seemed to come back even more vibrant and full of life.
There was a serenity about her that gave me strength whenever I looked at her face. Her dignity and courage filled me with pride and joy.
She was very much like her sister, Tahereh Moharrer Khansari, who had been wounded when the Guards opened fire on her in the streets during the first weeks after June 20, 1981, and who later died under torture in Evin Prison.
Atiyeh embodied discipline, tenderness, and love for others. She was a center of compassion and strength.
Some realities are almost impossible to accept.
Atiyeh’s execution[1] was one of them. All of us in that ward searched for reasons not to believe it.
It couldn’t be true.
She was so young. She had done nothing. There was nothing in her case file. Only a few days had passed since her arrest.
But at midnight on September 15, 1981, they called Atiyeh’s name for interrogation.
My heart nearly stopped.
What if they were taking her to be executed?
In an instant, the ward fell silent, though everyone tried to convince themselves it was only another interrogation.
From the moment she walked out, my heart beat wildly. I stared at the door, leaping to my feet each time it opened.
I counted every second and prayed that the door would open and Atiyeh would appear in the doorway.
But she did not return.
At four in the morning, the deafening sound of machine-gun fire shattered the silence of Evin. It felt as though the bullets were being fired directly into my heart.
The entire ward was plunged into mourning.
We did not know how many had been taken before the firing squads that night.
Silence filled the air.
My heart seemed to rise into my throat.
We waited for the final shots.
When they began, each of us counted inwardly, tears caught in our throats.
One… two… three…
The single shots continued.
That night they reached sixty.
Then silence returned.
Was one of those bullets fired into the head of my beloved Atiyeh?
I cried out inwardly:
God, what was her crime?
Was it simply that she loved freedom?
For those bloodthirsty men, that alone was enough.
I remembered what Atiyeh had said.
Yes, the common bond among those sixty and among the hundreds executed on other nights was that they loved freedom—so deeply that they were willing to pay for it with their lives.
Then, from somewhere in the ward, the crushing silence was broken by the anthem of the Mojahedin.
At once, everyone joined in:
Mojahed! Mojahed!
Mojahed, by the command of your God.
Mojahed, remain faithful to your pledge.
You are the focus of the people’s hopes,
You are the flame lighting their tomorrow…
When the song ended, we embraced one another, kissed, and swallowed our tears.
But I remained awake until dawn.
I lay in my place, unable to sleep. A faint hope still flickered inside me that Atiyeh might somehow return.
Suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder.
It was Shouri,[2] who slept beside me.
“Azam, are you awake?” she whispered.
“I’m waiting for Atiyeh,” I said. “She still hasn’t come back.”
Shouri and I stayed awake until six in the morning, our eyes fixed on the door.
But there was no sign of Atiyeh.
Then, suddenly, the door opened.
For a moment I thought it was her.
I jumped up and ran toward the entrance in joy.
But it was not Atiyeh.
It was her niece, who had been taken away with her.
At that moment I knew with certainty that Atiyeh had been one of the sixty executed that night.
Even so, I asked, “Where is Atiyeh?”
She was silent for a moment, staring into the distance.
Then she said:
“Atiyeh sang the Mojahedin anthem—and went to her death.”
[1] Atiyeh Moharrer Khansari was born in 1963 in Isfahan and was 18 years old when she was executed. Another political prisoner wrote about the night of her execution: “When they called her name, I knew she would never return. As she was leaving, she said, ‘Forgive me.’ I told her, ‘Don’t say that. You’ll come back.’ She replied, ‘I don’t think so.’”
In her final moments, she told the executioner Mohammad Mohammadi Gilani: “I haven’t even been tried yet. I can’t believe you are going to execute me.” Gilani replied, “In two hours, you will believe it.”
[2] Martyred Mojahed Dr. Masoumeh Karimian, known to many prisoners as Shourangiz, or simply Shouri, was one of the great symbols of resistance in Khomeini’s prisons, according to dozens of eyewitness accounts.
She was born in Karbala and reportedly completed her studies in orthopedic medicine in Germany. She worked for the Iranian Red Crescent Society and was imprisoned from 1981 until the 1988 massacre of political prisoners.
She was executed at the age of 30 as one of the 30,000 Mojahedin prisoners killed during the 1988 massacre.
