The Assassination of Abdurrahman Ghassemlou: No Friends but the Mullahs?

Sheri Laizer | Exclusive to iKurd.net

On the fourth anniversary of the assassination of IRGC chief, Qasem Soleimani [1], the Kurdistan Regional Government retains the closest of relations with Iran. These relations include with a top Iranian official implicated in the Vienna murder of Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou (the late KDPI leader), on July 13, 1989. He has been a protected visitor to Iraqi Kurdistan since the crime.

In a series of ‘negotiations’ between the Islamic Republic of Iran with the leader of the Kurdistan Democratic Party Iran in 1989, Mohammad Jafari Sahraroudi, says in one of these tape recordings made before the three Kurds were shot at close range: “Peace be with you! We agreed that these contacts should remain completely secret […] enemies […] do not want these problems to be solved. […]There are even people in the Iranian government who do not want contact; within the executive it is not possible to talk openly about this problem.” [2]

It was a lie. Ayatollah Khomeini had sentenced Ghassemlou to death a decade before because the Kurdish leader’s popularity undermined the ideology of the rule of the clerics. Khomeini’s word was not likely to be overturned.

Thirty-five years on, Iraq’s Kurdish leaders maintain an open door to at least one of Ghassemlou’s assassins and this is because they have been in partnership with the Mullahs as well as their proxy militias since the Iran-Iraq war.

An arrest warrant still exists for Mohamed Jafari Sahraroudi, former head “negotiator”, with Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou, who was promoted after the killing of the three Kurds in Vienna on July 13, 1989, and later became assistant, or advisor, to Iranian Parliament Speaker, Ali Larijani and Chief of Staff. [3] Born in Najaf, to Iranian parents Larijani had also been an IRGC commander.

Mohamed Jafari Sahraroudi, (AKA Rahimi), was head of the Kurdish Affairs section of the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence and assistant chief of external intelligence of the IRGC in Iranian Kurdistan, during the Iran-Iraq war. Between December 28-30 1988, Nasser Taghipour and an IRGC official names Ali Reza Asgari took part in the meetings with Ghassemlou. For the second round in July 1989 Sahraroudi was present. Sahraroudi was the “commander of the IRGC Ramazan Brigade in Kermanshah in charge of operations in Iraq through the Shi’a militia groups (like Badr and al-Da’wa [4]) active in an extensive intelligence network. This role was later taken over by the late Quds Force chief, Qasem Soleimani. [5]

Well known already to Jalal Talabani whose close relations with Iran dated to the collapse of his ceasefire talks with Baghdad at the beginning of 1985, were Sahraroudi, and Haji Mostafawi (AKA Djawadi or Ladjevardi/Lajeverdi) the head of the Iranian internal secret services for Iranian Kurdistan. Taghepour would later claim Mostafawi was respomsible for organising the operation. [6]

In the final round of ‘talks’ in July in Vienna, when Talabani was not present, a third player appeared at the apartment named Haj Ghafour Darjazi (AKA Amir Mansour Bozorgian-Assi). This man was a high-ranking member of the Special Operations forces of the IRGC tasked with missions against the Iranian Kurdish parties. Sahraroudi and Mostafawi used diplomatic passports to enter and depart from Austria but were not accredited.[7] Lieutenant Colonel Nasser Taghepour (Taghipoor) , head of the Quds Force Information office and Ali Reza Asgari from the QF Operations Department arrived in Vienna a week before the assassination via the Emirates on false European passports. [8] [9] Darjazi enters Austria from Switzerland by train via Feldkirchand moved into the Hotel Post at the Fleischmarkt on June 21, 1989 after Khomeini’s death on June 4th.

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini had passed away having already bequeathed his legacy message in December 1987 during a televised ceremony. After his decease, the internal power struggle had intensified. In 1988 waves of executions began. President of the League of Defense of Human Rights in Iran, Karim Lahijidi claimed more than 3000 political prisoners were executed between September-November 1988. [10]

Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani was elected president soon after on July 28, 1989. He was also the head of the Supreme National Security Council (SNSC). Although later tagged something of a moderate in the West after helping bring about the release of Western hostages held in Lebanon during the civil in the 1990s, he was instrumental along with Khomeini’s spiritual successor Ayatollah Ali Khameini, [11] of having ordered the assassinations of Ghassemlou in Vienna in July 1989 and just three years later of Ghassemlou’s successor, Sadegh Sharafkandi on September 17, 1992. at the Mykonos restaurant in Berlin. Rouhani was secretary of the SNSC at this time and said to be informed of the plot. [12]

Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou, in his 58th year of age, and two companions, KDPI European representative, Abdullah Ghaderi-Azar, and their Iraqi Kurd mediator, Fadil Rasul (‘Anwar’), were told on June 26, in the weeks before the finals meetings were to take place that secrecy was required and according to Austrian Green Party member, Peter Pilz “Ghassemlou will forego the protection of the negotiation venue by his people for the first time in favor of absolute secrecy.” The day after, the second team arrived in Vienna. Darjazi already present will lead both teams. Mohammed Ahmedinejad arrived on an Iranian diplomatic passport as a reserve from the Quds Operational Department, trained in Kemanshah. Witness D had said “The negotiating team entered officially on Iranian passports and had constant contact with the embassy.” [13]

After the first day of meeting, Sahraroudi moved to the Stieglbräu Hotel where Ajvadi is already booked in. Darjazi then also checks in there. All three are booked to stay until July 14 – the day after the hit. Pilz stated that Susanne Rockenschaub-Rasoul remembers that the Iranians wanted to report the results of the first round of talks to Tehran and announce Iran’s reaction to the second round of talks the following day. Rafsanjani…was personally informed. It later becomes clear why nothing happened at the first meeting: Fadil Rasoul was the only one who knew the meeting (place as the) apartment on Bahngasse. In order for the negotiating team to let the execution team in, the Iranian command first had to get to know the location.

On the evening of the 13th at around 7.20 pm, the three Kurds were shot at close range in the third floor apartment whose door had been secured open with pieces of paper. Ghassemlou was killed with three bullets to the head, Ghaderi-Azar with eleven, and Rasul with five. [14] Austrian police later found the three weapons and a blood-stained windbreaker and details of the sale of a Suzuki motorbike in Sahraroudi’s name.

Mohamed Jafari Sahraroudi himself was accidentally wounded in the assault in which the weapons were fired from a sitting position. Only the Iranians were seated there with the Kurds. Mostafawi disappeared from the crime scene. Photographs later showed him to have been sheltering in the Iranian Embassy located just 700 metres from the apartment. The Iranian authorities kept up the pretense of not knowing where he was, but Jalal Talabani claimed that Mostafawi could be seen walking about openly on the streets of Tehran. [16]

A grim photograph of the dead Kurds still in their original positions has since been circulated. [17] All three Kurds had received a final shot to the head to be sure. Abdullah Ghazar-Azad the KDPI’s representative in Austria was shot multiple times as if he had tried to escape as the shots began to be fired. Forensics later showed multiple shots to his neck, shoulder, his back and his right index finger.

It was the 40th day of national mourning in Iran for Ayatollah Khomeini. They were sacrificed.

When Sahraroudi returned to Tehran after the assassination, one of the Iraqi Kurdish leaders, bearing flowers went to visit him in hospital to express his sympathies, according to Viennese journalist, Sissy Danninger [18] [19] Talabani was given the lie by Rafsanjani that the Mujahiden-e Khalq were responsible. Had that been so they would also have killed the Iranians, their prime foes. Sahraroudi was celebrated and promoted.

Who was Sahraroudi’s “bodyguard”?

The “bodyguard’ codenamed Amir Mansur Buzorguian, was none other than Haj Ghafour Darjazi of the IRGC Quds Force, put in charge of the operation and masquerading as Sahraroudi’s simple guard for the “talks.”

Soon after the triple murder, although the Suzuki dealer had confirmed Sahraroudi’s identity as the purchaser of the getaway bike, Sahraroudi was aided to leave Austria through the complicity of the Austrian government. Haj Ghafour Darjazi /Buzorguian gave a fake alibi that he had left the scene and gone to a distant McDonalds to eat, abandoning his duty at the apartment and returning to the scene soon afterwards but he had made a frantic call from outside the murder scene and not from the apartment and was never seen at any McDonalds. The accounts of neither man fitted the crime scene. Haj Mostafawi had already slipped away from the crime scene altogether. A fourth man who had been recognized by Iranian dissidents in Vienna in the company of the three ‘negotiators’ was named as Mohammed Magaby (AKA Mazafar). At protests held at Vienna airport, Magaby20 was seen being aided to leave by Austrian police on the weekly Iran Air flight to Tehran on July 28, 1989. Two weeks after the crime the suspects/only witnesses had all been freed and allowed to return to Iran. [21]

Senior Austrian police and intelligence officials as well as the judge assigned to the case all helped to stall the investigation and subvert the enquiries, letting the chief suspects take shelter in the Iranian Embassy while other officials tampered with the evidence. That evidence included audio tapes that the Kurdish leader, Ghassemlou had been making of the ‘negotiations’ planning to take them back to the party’s mountain base thereafter. His voice can be heard on the tape recordings along with those of Sahararudi and Darjazi, and of Fadil Rasul, the host of the meetings, Fadhil Rasul, an ex PUK activist, turned Islamist and close to Tehran. The tapes were tampered with by persons with access to the crime scene and replaced in Ghassemlou’s briefcase after his murder. French journalist Chris Kutschera who knew Ghassemlou well, made a translation of the surviving tape as did Ghassemlou’s Czech widow, Helene Krulich. Gaps, interruptions and sounds of splicing were noted. [22] Chairs being moved and the floor creaking as well as several shots were recorded at the end. Who stopped the tape and why it was left at all remains a mystery.

Jalal Talabani – the PUK as mediator with the Islamic Republic of Iran

In the earlier rounds of “talks” between the KDPI and the Iranians, the PUK leader, Jalal Talabani, (an ally of Iran since the ceasefire with Baghdad collapsed [23], would subsequently claim that despite Ghassemlou’s good relations with Saddam since 1971, Ghassemlou had never harmed Iran.

In 1986 Rafsanjani’s assistant, Agha Mohammadi, had informed Talabani they wanted to negotiate with Ghassemlou and that the head of the Pasdaran, Commander Mohsen Rezai did also [24] on condition that KDPI peshmergas would fight with Tehran against Iraq as Talabani himself was doing by this time. Ghassemlou said it would not be possible for his group to fight with against Iraq but if the Iranians were sincere, they could send a delegation to negotiate at Talabani’s mountain base near that of the KDPI in the Kurdish border hinterland.

However, it was not until April 1987 that the Iranians said they agreed. Talabani then helped Iran capture a large area in Iraqi Kurdistan during ongoing fighting with Iraq. That collaboration led directly to the Iraqi assault on PUK/Iranian areas with conventional and chemical weapons.

When Talabani went back to Tehran at the end of that year ostensibly to travel outside the country they repeated their willingness. [25]

Talabani justified his alliance with Tehran to Ghassemlou’s Venezuelan biographer, Carol Prunhuber, stressing his standard political get out clause, “We Kurds have the right to benefit from the conflicts that exist between the states that divide and dominate us – as long as we maintain our independence and we do not fight against the Kurds of the other areas. [26]

Austrian historian, and Kurdish specialist, Ferdinand Hennerbichler who had interviewed Ghassemlou for a final time just months before the fatal talks recalled: In 1980, at the beginning of the …war the Iraqigovernment had encouraged Ghassemlou to proclaim a Kurdish state in Iran and hadoffered him money and weapons, Talabani disclosed. The Iraqi leadership would evenhave provided the budget for a future Kurdish Iranian government and would haveofficially recognized an independent Kurdistan in Iran. Ghassemlou, however,declined the offer.” [27]

Talking with the Mullahs’ regime

Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou had proposed meeting the Iranian ‘delegation’ in Paris because the KDPI had sound relations with the French government that was also a close friend of Iraq. Instead, the Iranians proposed Berlin, but Ghassemlou refused as the party had no backup there. He also ruled out Switzerland. Talabani had suggested Vienna saying the PUK had good relations with Austria as well as weapons there and that the Iranians also had good organisation in the Austrian capital. Just how close their economic relations actually were would become clear after the hit.

The PUK took charge of the first round of talks and Talabani is said to have asked the Austrian Ministry of Interior for bodyguards and for police backup. The first meetings then took place between December 30-31, 1988, and January 19-20, 1989.

By the time of the third round in July 1989, Haj Ghafour Darjazi had also appeared alongside Sahraroudi and Haji Mostafawi, acting under the alias of Amir Buzorguian, and claiming simply to be Sahraroudi’s bodyguard although of equal rank in Iran.

Ayatollah Khomeini’s health was in decline by this stage. It was already a decade into the Islamic revolution and one year after the ceasefire with Baghdad that had left at least 2 million dead.

By the time Jalal Talabani returned to Tehran, the regime claimed that the PUK had been talking too much about ‘negotiations’ and for that reason they were stopping the meetings. Ghassemlou had wanted to cement a deal before Iran and Iraq had made any peace agreement and had thought the time propitious for a break through. Once the PUK was excluded by Tehran he embarked afresh for the proposed meeting to be held in Vienna in July 1989 saying nothing much to anyone aside from to a few close friends in Europe and Helene, his former wife. He had neither arms nor bodyguards.

The commando team Sahraroudi had led in Vienna received their weapons for the operation via a diplomatic briefcase conveyed to Austria twenty days prior to conducting the assassination. One of the team members was already waiting in the Iranian embassy in Vienna. Future Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was also later reported to have assisted the hit team. A German arms dealer told Italian anti-Mafia police on April 6, 2006 that he had supplied Ahmadinejad with weapons in Vienna, shortly before Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou’s assassination. [28]

A company by the name of (Vnimax) was said also to have been used as a cover up, handled by an Iranian called Beheshti. The “Rahbar” Transportation Company in Salzburg, and “Haja” Company in Vienna were also utilized. [29]

After Austria aided Sahraroudi’s return to Iran he was appointed as the commander of the IRGC’s Ramadan headquarters, which is the main headquarters of the IRGC’s 1st Corps, affiliated with the Quds Force. The Ramadan headquarters are located in Tehran. Sahraroudi played a major role in suppressing student protests in July 1999 in Tehran, and served as the deputy of Ali Larijani, then Secretary-General of Supreme National Security Council, during former president Ahmadinejad’s tenure. Brigade Malik Ashtar acting under the command of the Quds Forces during the Iran-Iraq war came under the control of the Ramadan center under Shahrarudi and then under the leadership of the late Qasem Soleimani. Soleimani worked directly with the Iraqi Shi’a armed opposition, including SCIRI and its militant wing, Badr as well as the al-Da’wa party, with which the KDP and PUK allied themselves in the war against Iraq. The PUK ceased peace and further autonomy talks with Saddam in January 1985 and joined their rival in the new Kurdistan Front, armed by Iran, acting with the IRGC under Qasem Soleimani.

Ghafor Darjezi AKA Amir Mansour Bozorgian AKA Mostafa Modabar

Iran Probe has identified several key Iranian terror masters, including two from the Ghassemlou assassination, Sahraroudi and Darjezi: [30]

They state that Ghafor Darjezi, acting under the command of Hamid Aboutalebi (Iranian ambassador to Italy), would also later carry out the assassination of Mohammad Hossein Naqdi, the representative of the Iranian National Council of Resistance (INCR) in Italy. In two hearings, heard between 2005 to 2008, the Supreme Criminal Court of Rome investigated the assassination of Naqdi. “Amir Mansour Bozorgian” was the main defendant in the proceedings that took place at the request of the Rome Counter-Terrorism Prosecutor with the INCR as a private plaintiff.

After carrying out the assassination in Rome, Bozorgian returned to Tehran and served the clerical regime in various positions, including as the executive secretary of the Supreme Security Council, as well ashead of security for the state’s radio and television organisation, and head of the government’s Trade Union radio and television, as well as director general of parliament.

In June 2009, the more recent identity of Ghafor Darjezi was revealed during internal conflicts between the IRGC and the MOIS. Darjezi going under his new name of Mostafa Modabar, had become CEO of the Saipa Sports Club, as well as holding other senior administrative and economic positions. The Saipa Machine–Building Factory Complex is one of the factories owned by the IRGC.

Terror Diplomacy

Citing the Washington Institute in the period when PUK leader, Jalal Talabani, was gravely ill, sources claimed, “The extent of relations might still be as sensitive and secretive as once (they) were, though there have been more high-level, open diplomatic visits between Iran and the KRG, including the recent trip by Iran’s Islamic Consultative Assembly Speaker (Majlis), Ali Larijani to the KRG... The delegation landed in Sulaimaniya Airport where they were greeted by the …PUK) leadership…and later met the PUK’s ailing leader…Jalal Talabani. The delegation later met …leaders from the KDP including Masoud Barzani, Nechirvan Barzani, and…the Parliament Speaker from Gorran, among others…The Iranian delegation included a number of Majlis representatives and security officials who also accompanied Larijani in his tour of Lebanon, Syria and Iraq.  Despite, a number of Kurdish–speaking representatives in… the Majlis, Larijani’s delegation failed to include any …in his visit to Iraqi Kurdistan.  Instead, former IRGC commander, Mohammad Jafari Sahraroudi accompanied the delegation...” [31]

Testimony of IRGC Quds Forces General Nasser Taghepour (Taghipour)

Testimony obtained in evidence years after the Vienna assassination by former Iranian president in exile, Abdolhassan Bani– Sadr was brought to the attention of the Austrian parliament in 2005 by Green Party member, Peter Pilz. Fresh information had come to light through the confession of IRGC General, Nasser Taghepour [32], said to have been a member of the second assassination team, given as security to an Iranian journalist who fled to France. Taghepour died in 2002.

Nasser Taghepour claims to have headed one of two teams (see end of this article) sent to assassinate Ghassemlou and his aides along with someone he only identified as Bagheri. He believed that once the hit had been accomplished, he too would be liquidated. Bagheri was executed. Taghepour claimed that in a meeting held in Tehran back in 1988, President Rafsanjani had ordered the Quds Force of the IRGC to assassinate Ghassemlou.

Two teams had been tasked, he revealed – one team was to appear to negotiate with the Kurds and the second was to liquidate the Kurdish leade if required. Taghepour was said to have been a secret police agent of the Islamic Republic at the time.33 The so-called negotiators were joined by the Iranian governor of the Kurdistan province, Mostafa Ajoudi/Ajvadi. Final arrest warrants were not issued by the Austrian authorities until five months after the Iranians had been allowed to fly back to Iran.

Austrian complicity

Mohammad Jafari Sahraroudi, leading the team in Vienna was the head of Kurdish Affairs in the Ministry of Intelligence at the time. [34] Sahraroudi was helped to escape from Vienna soon after being discharged from hospital owing to the close relations Iran enjoyed with Austria – significantly in the arms trade and owing to high level threats. Although, as is frequent in such cases, Tehran denied involvement, Sahraroudi’s statement did not fit with either the forensic evidence from the crime scene, the ballistics, or witness evidence by Darjazi. Austria issued an arrest warrant for Sahraroudi three months after he was allowed to leave the country as a free man in November 1989. That warrant has never been acted upon.

In addition, the testimony of former Iranian president, Ahmed Bani Sadr, living in exile in Paris [35] and that of the former Algerian president, Ahmed Ben Bella, who had been close to the Iraqi Kurdish host of the talks in Vienna, Fadil Rasul had collaborated closely with Rasul on an Islamic journal, Al Hiwar. Rasul also lost his life that day and was found sprawled on his stomach facing towards the door of the apartment. [36] The cumulative evidence flies in the face of Tehran’s denial but no one hads been held accountable in the 35 years since the multiple murders. [37]

“No Friends but the Mullahs” – Sahararudi feted by the KDP and PUK despite his role in the 1989 assassination

In 1996, an “Iraqi Kurdish leader” would welcome Sahraroudi to Sulaimaniya to inaugurate a Shi’a mosque the regime had funded there.

After regime change in Iraq during the height of the sectarian violence peaking by 2007, US forces tried to capture Shararudi who was in Erbil in January 2007 along with four other Iranians. This was for their role in arming the pro-Iran Shi’a militias responsible for attacks against US targets. [38] An Austrian arrest warrant was still outstanding for Sahraroudi at the time. Viennese journalist, Sissy Danninger correctly claimed Sahraroudi was the guest of ‘another Kurdish leader’ in Erbil at the time. [39] She avoided naming the leader knowing the Iraqi Kurdish elite’s penchant for suing journalists and critics.

Another source provided further details of these collaborative visits saying: “As an expert in spreading terrorism, Sahraroudi, among others, continued his vicious attacks following the 2003 invasion of Iraq, this time against American forces. He was one of the regime’s main operatives responsible for criminal activities in Iraq, finally making him the target of an American attack on an Iranian regime’s liaison office in Erbil on January 11, 2007.” Alternative accounts claim this location to have been the Iranian Consulate in Erbil. It did not however have formal diplomatic status.

A Washington Post article published on January 12, 2007 described the raid in greater detail claiming it had led to six arrests but that the “two high level targets, General Manouchehr Forousandeh, head of the Revolutionary Guards Corps Information and Security, and Mohammad Jafari Sahraroudi escaped, apparently with help of Iraqi Kurdish leaders whom they had met earlier.” [40]

Once Mohammad Jafari had also become deputy head of Iran’s National Security Council, PBS interviewed him on August 2, 2007, without reference to the assassination but concerning his invitation by the Kurdish leadership to Erbil, inter alia:

…Tell the story of your trip to Erbil earlier this year [January 2007] and what happened, and what do you think the Americans were doing there? [41]

[Laughs.] It appears that all American journalists are interested in the “action” part.

It’s a good story.

It was not a big deal from our perspective. Mr. [Jalal] Talabani, as the president of Iraq, and Mr. [Massoud] Barzani, as the leader of the autonomous Kurdish region in Iraq, had invited us to go there. We went there, and our visit with Mr. Talabani and Mr. Barzani [was] broadcast on television. One night while we were in Erbil, the U.S. forces attacked the Iranian consulate in Erbil and arrested our officials. That’s the whole story.

And some of the reports were they were looking for you. Is that your understanding?

This is a claim that has been made. We don’t have any specific information on the issue.

Did you ever feel like they were about to capture you, and how did you then leave Iraq?

Our presence in Iraq was not a secret. We departed under ordinary circumstances; there was nothing extraordinary about it. Our presence in Iraq was quite obvious… [42]

Four months after the debacle at the Iranian “Consulate” in Erbil, Sahraroudi traveled as a member of Iran’s negotiating team on Iraq to Sharm el-Sheikh in Egypt. A two-day conference was held there to discuss “mechanisms for the stability and security of Iraq, in cooperation with neighboring countries and member states of the Security Council. U.S. Secretary of State…Condoleezza Rice sat down at the negotiating table with Iran’s then foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, and Sahraroudi. The PBS interview also raised the question. Sahraroudi just ducked it.

Sahraroudi continues to travel abroad, and …attended the International Security Conference in Munich, Germany. He also participated, along with Ali Larijani, in the Geneva talks between the Iranian regime and the five countries on Iran’s nuclear deal in 2013. [43] The following year he was back in Erbil.

Mohammad Jafari (Sahraroudi) was back in Kurdistan in December 2014 during the fight against ISIS. KDP media organ, Rudaw reported in an article softly headed, Is the Kurdistan region hosting an assassin from Iran? on New Year’s Eve 2014, the following details:

…Eastern Kurds (or Iranian Kurds) have raised their concerns on social media. Even members of Ghassemlou’s Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI) have raised questions about the silence of their leaders on the visit.

Sahraroudi, the office manager of Ali Larijani, the speaker of the Iranian parliament, is suspected of killing Ghassemlou during a meeting with Iranian officials in Vienna in 1989.

A KDPI leader has said that those concerns will be raised by the leadership of the Kurdistan Region…

Hama Nezif Qadiri, a member of the KDPI leadership, expressed his party’s strong objection to Sahraroudi presence in Kurdistan.  “That reception was unexpected,” Qadiri said.“For us he is a terrorist,” Qadiri said, likening him to one of Saddam Hussein’s henchmen. “It would be the same if we had received Ali Hasan Majid, [45]” he said, adding that receiving Sahraroudi was an insult to all Kurdish leaders struggling for the cause, in particular to Ghassemlou, who he said had dedicated all his life to serving Kurdistan.

Raza Kabi, deputy leader of the Kurdistan Toiler’s Movement, told Rudaw: “This kind of reception tarnishes Kurdistan’s reputation. Individuals like Sahraroudi visit Kurdistan for a purpose,” he added, stressing that Erbil should reevaluate such relations.

Journalist Saman Rasulpour believes that Kurdistan officials do not take the feelings of Iranian Kurds into consideration. “In such kind of diplomacy there is no sensitivity towards someone like Sahraroudi. Besides, political parties of the Kurdistan Region do not respect the feelings of the Eastern Kurds,” he said…[46]

Iran Roundtable also published a strongly worded critique of the Iraqi Kurds having “double standards on terrorism”.

Mohammad Jafari Sahraroudi may also have returned to Iraq in 2020 after the US assassination of his colleague, Qasem Soleimani, Abu Mahdi al-Muhendes and their aides outside Baghdad airport on the main highway, now named after al-Muhendes.

Shi’a takeover of Kirkuk and the Disputed Territories of 16 October 2017

The IRGC hasbeen acting in cohort with the two main Iraqi Kurdish parties since their leaders went over to Iran’s side in the Iran-Iraq war – a partnership entered into early on in the mullah’s brutal reign.

Qasem Soleimani demanded the handover of Kirkuk leading to the change of power on October 16, 2017, after secret negotiations with both main parties. Both already knew him very well and had collaborated in the past.

Summary of facts on Sahraroudi and Haj Darjazi’s role in the assassination of Abdul Rahman Qassemlou, Abdullah Ghaderi Azar and Fadil Rasul

1. Fatwa issued by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979 pronouncing the death sentence against Ghassemlou was not revoked.
2. Shi’a Islam allows believers to lie to save their skins.

Mohammad Jafari Sararudi was identified as the buyer of the Suzuki GSX500E motorcycle but the papers were signed by Ajvadi and found in the garbage. A submachine gun, a protective cover for a motorcycle helmet and a broken motorcycle rear-view mirror were found in another container. Ajvadi, Darjazi and Sahraroudi came to the crime scene together on foot. The motorcycle was observed getting away from three men by a witness. [47] The serial numbers and brands erased. Another of the weapons was found at a second site. [48] Ballistics concluded they were the weapons matching the shells found in the apartment where the three Kurds were killed. Although the signature was said not to be Sahraroudi’s the Austrian parliamentary inquiry stated: What speaks against Sahraroodi is that there were a particularly large number of cartridge cases lay next to the place where he sat. If he wasn’t the perpetrator, one of the shooters must have been standing right next to him. The gunshot residue test was negative, but this does not rule out (his being) the perpetrator (noted elsewhere – and being in hospital for urgent trearment his hands had already been washed). Sahraroodi was hit in the upper arm, the shot went through the armpit and penetrated the throat and became lodged ine his mouth. ” If the bullet had richocheted, as believed, Sahraroudi was either a victim of friendly fire or had misfired his own weapon. His account differe all along from that of Ajvadi/Mostafawi. Someone, or as in a local bystander witness account two men got away from the apartment on the bike probably with the weapons, and dumped them in two different garbabge bins.

3. Although married to Dr. Susanne Rockenshaub-Rasoul [49], as a Muslim convert , Fadil Rasoul was able to take more than one wife; his other ‘wife’ or mistress, Renate Faistauer, owned the Vienna apartment he used but was away in Cairo at the time. Had Sararudi not been wounded, the Iranians would have gotten away without implication as no one else knew that a further round of talks was being held there on two consecutive days between July 12-13, 1989. Ghassemlou made the error of going to the same location twice and without protection. The door had been taped open. The weapons can have already been put in place.

4. 

   On September 17, 1992, Ghassemlou’s successor, Sadegh Sharafkandi along with three aides and a translator were murdered by gunmen shouting in Persian. ‘You sons of whores’ as they were gunned down in the Mykonos restaurant in Berlin. Unlike their Austrian counterparts, the German police detained the suspects and followed through with prosecution. Kazem Darabi served 15 years imprisonment in Germany for his role in organising the murders. Back in Tehran after his release he published an alternative account claiming his innocence. Abbas Rhayel, was accused of firing the fatal shots and given a life sentence. The German prosecutors believed that Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and Iranian President Hashemi Rafsanjani had personally ordered the killings three years after the Ghassemlou assassination. Hamid Nouzari, a director for Iranian political refugees in Berlin, who attended the court sessions told Zamaneh that Darabi’s book is “full of lies”. Having followed the case closely he was involved in the publication of a book “There’s Still a Judge in Berlin: Mykonos Murder and Process”. In his opinion, Darabi’s book was published “with political motivations and could be a project directed by Iranian intelligence. “ [50]

5. Three of the former IRGC QF operatives accused of the crime in Vienna, Sararudi, Darjazi/ Buzorguian and Ajvadi/Mostafawi continued to enjoy high ranking status in Iran and remained at large. Mohammad Jafari (Sararudi) has been feted and protected by the KRG. Mostafawi was also seen in Sulaimaniya pursuing target there. The Iranian ambassador tried to shift the blame to MeK exonerating the three that were present:”In response to my question, the envoy stated firmly that Mohamed Djafari-Sahraroodi, Amir Mansour Bozorgian-Assl and Moustafa Ajvadi from the three branches of government of the Iranian Republic, namely the legislature, the executive and the judiciary, were authorized to take part in the talks in Vienna.“ This goes against Sahraroudi’s own assertion, recorded on tape, as to the talks‘ being secret and Ghassemlou respecting this confidentialty that cost him his life. Iran habitually blames Zionists, outside forces, and the opposition, for all of its problems. The Intelligence attaché from the Iranian Embassy arrived at the crime scene at the same time as the Austrian police. [51]
6. See details of the investigation, formal inquiries and arrest warrants in the Austrian reply to parliamentary questions, including the following:

The Head of the Anti-Terror Department, EBT, Oswald Kessler, stated that he viewed Iran’s representatives as the direct perpetrators, or as those involved in the crime, as can be concluded from the following circumstances:

i. The talks for the meeting in July 1989 were requested by the Iranian side.

ii. Only the Iranian delegation members knew the time and place of the meeting. Sahraroodi had found this out on July 12th.

iii. The Iranian side must have let the perpetrators in (tot he apartment) or carried out the crime itself, but with the involvement of another person who took the weapons away.

iv. The act only benefited the Iranians.

The public prosecutor filed an application against Sahraroodi in Vienna on November 28, 1989, immediately after the expert report became available. [52]

Identification

In 1991, former Iranian president, Abolhassan Bani-Sadr, reported from exile in France that Tehran had used various means of pressure over Vienna: Tehran also had documents that “proved illegal Austrian arms deliveries in the war between Iraq and Iran.” Austrians in Iran were also threatened.

According to the German judges’ findings in the Mykonos murder case, the Vienna murders were also said to have been ordered by the highest Iranian leadership. The “Mykonos” ruling caused EU states to temporarily withdraw their ambassadors from Tehran in 1997. There is an international arrest warrant for the suspected perpetrators of the Vienna murders. (red/APA)

The Iranian negotiating team in Vienna:

Hadji Ghafour Darjazi (code name Bozorgian-Assi)
Hadji Mostafavi (Mustafa Ajvadi)
M. JafariSsaharoudi (Sahraroudi)

The backup execution team:

Nasser Taghipoor

Ali Reza Asgari
Mahmood Ahmadi Nejad 53

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