Qualla: Gohardasht Prison https://qualla.com/gohardasht-prison en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:32 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/k/k/gohardasht-prison-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Gohardasht Prison https://qualla.com/gohardasht-prison Gohardasht Prison: Introduction https://qualla.com/gohardasht-prison/ Photo credit Ensie & Matthias, CC BY-SA 2.0. The name changes depending on who is speaking. Guards and officials call it Rajai Shahr. Human rights organizations call it Gohardasht. Amnesty International calls it one of Iran's most brutal detention facilities. Located on the northern outskirts of Karaj, approximately 20 kilometers west of Tehran, the prison holds both common criminals and political prisoners -- though it is the treatment of the latter that has made Gohardasht a name known far beyond Iran's borders. Ward 12 is where prisoners of conscience are typically sent, and it is from Ward 12 that the worst reports emerge.

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]]> Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/k/k/gohardasht-prison-wp/tnkk-gohardasht-prison-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Gohardasht Prison: After the Revolution https://qualla.com/gohardasht-prison/ Photo credit Ensie & Matthias, CC BY-SA 2.0. In the immediate aftermath of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, Gohardasht became a processing center for the old regime. Former members of the overthrown Pahlavi monarchy and military were brought here for interrogation and, in many cases, execution. The violence was systematic and s...

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]]> Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/k/k/gohardasht-prison-wp/tnkk-gohardasht-prison-after-the-revolution.mp3 0:06 2 full Gohardasht Prison: Summer of 1988 https://qualla.com/gohardasht-prison/ Photo credit Ensie & Matthias, CC BY-SA 2.0. The mass executions that took place in Iranian prisons during the summer of 1988 remain one of the darkest chapters in the country's modern history. Gohardasht, along with Evin Prison in Tehran, was a primary site of the killings. Political prisoners who had already been tried an...

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]]> Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/k/k/gohardasht-prison-wp/tnkk-gohardasht-prison-summer-of-1988.mp3 0:06 3 full Gohardasht Prison: Suffering Behind Walls https://qualla.com/gohardasht-prison/ Photo credit Ensie & Matthias, CC BY-SA 2.0. Reports from Gohardasht have continued to emerge in the decades since. In 2012, The Guardian described it as one of Iran's harshest prisons, citing documented cases of torture, rape, and murder. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps maintains solitary confinement cells within the...

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]]> Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/k/k/gohardasht-prison-wp/tnkk-gohardasht-prison-suffering-behind-walls.mp3 0:06 4 full Gohardasht Prison: Names and Silences https://qualla.com/gohardasht-prison/ Photo credit Ensie & Matthias, CC BY-SA 2.0. Gohardasht occupies a painful place in Iranian memory. It is both notorious and, within Iran itself, difficult to discuss openly. The prison's multiple names -- Gohardasht, Rajai Shahr, Rajaee Shahr, Karaj Prison -- reflect a bureaucratic instinct to obscure, to make the facility...

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]]> Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/t/n/k/k/gohardasht-prison-wp/tnkk-gohardasht-prison-names-and-silences.mp3 0:06 5 full