Qualla: Kahrizak: The Detention Center That Broke Iran's Silence

Kahrizak: The Detention Center That Broke Iran's Silence: Introduction

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Mohsen Ruholamini was not a radical. He was the son of a conservative politician who had supported the pragmatic presidential candidate Mohsen Rezaee. After the disputed 2009 presidential election, he was swept up in mass arrests and delivered to the Kahrizak Detention Center, an underground facility south of Tehran with a nominal capacity of 50 prisoners. The medical report that would eventually document his death stated the cause as "physical stress, the effects of being held in bad conditions, multiple blows and severe injuries to the body." The physician who wrote that report, Ramin Pourandarjani, would soon die himself under mysterious circumstances at police headquarters. Kahrizak was not the only site of abuse during the 2009 crackdown, but it became the one whose horrors could not be denied, even by the system that created it.

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Kahrizak: The Detention Center That Broke Iran's Silence: Built for the Public Security Plan

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Authorities planned the Kahrizak detention center in 2001. Its cells were underground, built without adequate ventilation or toilet facilities. Under Tehran police chief Ahmad-Reza Radan, the facility became central to the "Public Security Plan," a campaign ostensibly targeting d...

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Kahrizak: The Detention Center That Broke Iran's Silence: The Green Movement's Prisoners

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

After Iran's disputed June 2009 presidential election, thousands of protesters and activists were arrested. Security chief Esmail Ahmadi-Moghaddam stated on state television that only the most dangerous offenders would be sent to Kahrizak, but he also admitted that many of the 14...

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Kahrizak: The Detention Center That Broke Iran's Silence: Deaths and a Doctor's Silence

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Released prisoners described cramped, squalid underground cells where guards routinely beat detainees. Some were beaten to death. Ahmad-Reza Radan was alleged to have personally participated in daily beatings, though the security chief denied these reports. Mohsen Ruholamini and ...

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Kahrizak: The Detention Center That Broke Iran's Silence: When Conservatives Broke Ranks

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The abuses at Kahrizak crossed a line that even parts of Iran's establishment could not tolerate. Grand Ayatollah Hossein-Ali Montazeri demanded prosecution of those responsible. "Can the government deceive people by closing a detention center and blaming all the faults on a buil...

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