Selected, Allegedly Iran-Sponsored Attempts to Kill Iranian Expatriates, 1979-2012
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Brigham Young University BYU ScholarsArchive Faculty Publications 2013-03-12 Appendix 1: Selected, allegedly Iran-sponsored attempts to kill Iranian expatriates, 1979-2012 Brian Champion [email protected] Lee Crowther [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/facpub Part of the Library and Information Science Commons, and the Near and Middle Eastern Studies Commons BYU ScholarsArchive Citation Champion, Brian and Crowther, Lee, "Appendix 1: Selected, allegedly Iran-sponsored attempts to kill Iranian expatriates, 1979-2012" (2013). Faculty Publications. 1570. https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/facpub/1570 This Supplementary Materials is brought to you for free and open access by BYU ScholarsArchive. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of BYU ScholarsArchive. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. Champion and Crowther 1 Appendix 1: Selected, allegedly Iran-sponsored attempts to kill Iranian expatriates, 1979-2012 By Brian Champion and Lee Crowther Published 12 March 2013 | Last revised 11 January 2017 ******************** Contents Introduction 2 Includes possibilities for future research Tables 1.1 4 In tables 1.1, we present details for 86 events that took place between 1979 and 2012. Margins and Discrepancies 38 This section includes table 1.2, which mentions events that didn’t quite fit the criteria for our survey; table 1.3, which touches on contradictions between sources; table 1.4, which lists alternate names for various groups; and tables 1.5, which list different renderings of target’s names. Table 1.6 63 Table 1.6 is an abridgement of tables 1.1. It is designed for readers who want a general overview or who want to look for trends. Bibliography 66 Champion and Crowther 2 I. Introduction Abstract In “Appendix 1,” we document attempted killings that meet the following criteria: (1) The attempt was made against one or more Iranians. (2) The attempt took place outside of Iran. (3) Some allegation was made that the state of Iran was at least partially responsible for the attempt. We are far from the first to document allegedly Iran-sponsored attempts to kill Iranian expatriates.1 However, we attempt to fill a gap in the literature by combining breadth, detail, and a thorough citation of sources consulted. Our survey begins with the 1979 assassination of Shahriar Shafigh in Paris and continues up to the 2012 murder of Gelareh Bagherzadeh in Houston. Although we have tried to be thorough, this appendix is not exhaustive. ******************** Context Of course, Iran is far from the only country alleged to target its own expatriates. In “Appendix 5,” we document allegations of other states’ attempts to kill their own expatriates. However, “Appendix 5” is far less comprehensive that this appendix. ******************** Methodology In the early stages of this project, we relied heavily on such sources as Pahlavi and the Foundation for Democracy in Iran. Rather than focus on one specific event, such sources allege and seek to document a pattern of Iran-sponsored attempted killings outside Iran since the Islamic Revolution. We came to refer to such sources as chronologies. Many chronologies consider scores, sometimes hundreds, of events taking place across several continents over the course of over fifteen years. Naturally, given the interest required to attempt a compilation of such breadth, most of the chronologies we looked at involved potential conflicts of interest. Consequently, we took their allegations as a skeleton from which to begin, but then sought to corroborate or correct their claims with more reliable sources. 1 See, for example, Bell | Chaddock | Curtiss, “Iran” | Engelberg | Federal Research Division | Foundation for Democracy in Iran | Hakakian | Iran-e-Azad | Kadivar | Pahlavi | PDK-Iran | Sahimi | Thompson and Akrami Champion and Crowther 3 Given the nature of the events that fall under our scope, we judged news articles to be an accessible and reasonably reliable kind of source with which to establish the details surrounding these events. Because most of the targets in our survey were not especially prominent outside their own circles, most of the events we document are not widely discussed in academic literature. Court records are often more reliable than news articles to establish who perpetrated a crime, but they also tend to be less accessible. We thus rely heavily on news articles. Even among news articles, however, our sources are disproportionately taken from English language newspapers for which we had access to archives. Possibilities for Future Research Given what we have outlined so far, we propose several possibilities for future research. For, while we do attempt to fill a gap in the literature, there remain gaps that we don’t fill. Subsequent researchers who wish to build on our work might consider the following projects: • Using local newspapers to corroborate or correct details we’ve given | Many of the events we document took place in countries from which we cite no news articles. Such countries include the Philippines, India, Pakistan, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, Cyprus, Sweden, and Romania. • Using court records to corroborate or correct details we’ve given • Compiling information on related phenomena more comprehensively than we do in companion appendices on state-sponsored extraterritorial killings, including those allegedly by Iran against non-Iranians, those allegedly by other states against their own expatriates, and those allegedly by other states against foreign nationals ******************** A Note on Sources As we indicated above, many of our sources are of questionable reliability. We document events for which some allegation was made that the state of Iran was at least partially responsible for the attempt. It is not the case that Iranian responsibility has been reliably established for every event we document. Some of our sources had strong incentives to oppose those in power in Iran.1 While we have tried to corroborate their claims with more reliable sources, in many cases we have failed to do so. In tables 1.1 (pp. 4 ff.), we attempt to indicate source reliability. Nonetheless, our inclusion of an event implies only the allegation of Iranian responsibility. For some events, Iranian responsibility is well-documented;2 for others, claims of Iranian responsibility may be more 1 For example, we cite Iranians disempowered by the Islamic Revolution, Iranian opposition groups and figures, political extremists, and research funded by states hostile to Iran. 2 Indeed, for events including but not limited to 1.1980-02 (Tabatabai), 1.1988-01 (Mojtahedzadeh), 1.1989-01 (Bayahmadi), 1.1990-03 (K. Rajavi), 1.1991-04 (Bakhtiar ’91), and 1.1992-08 (Sharafkandi)—it seems almost indefensible to assert that Iran had nothing to do with the attempt. Champion and Crowther 4 spurious. We invite the reader to consult our sources and to conduct further research to determine whether an allegation is well-founded. ******************** Event Numbering We have assigned each event a catalog number with the format A.yyyy-nn, where A stands for appendix number, y stands for year, and n stands for the chronological order of the event within that year. For example, an event number of 1.1990-03 indicates that the event pertains to “Appendix 1,” that it occurred in 1990, and that among the events we document in “Appendix 1,” it was the third to take place in 1990. II. Tables 1.1 Key In tables 1.1, we present details for 86 events that took place between 1979 and 2012. Each table is preceded by the relevant event catalog number along with a unique name by which to refer to the event—typically the surname of one of the victims. In these tables, we highlight the most basic data in bolded, twelve-point type. When we consider basic data to be less reliably established, we sometimes use bolded, ten-point type. The remaining details are rendered in unbolded, ten-point type. We indicate alternate identities in bold, italicized type, lest a skimming reader mistake the alternate identity for a separate individual. Unless specified otherwise, those numbered as casualties are identical to those named as targets. Rather than assign a specific table number to each of tables 1.2, we refer to these tables by the relevant event catalog number (see “Event Numbering,” above). Source Headings In tables 1.1, we cite the sources we consulted. In “A Note on Sources” (p. 3), we indicated that one might reasonably question the reliability of some of our sources, e.g., those authored by Iranian opposition groups. However, as we indicated in “Methodology” (p. 2), we are nonetheless indebted to such sources, as they have often provided a starting point from which to find additional information. To give the reader some sense of the reliability of our sources, we have heuristically placed our sources under three headings.1 Our criteria for this separation are not entirely formalized; however, loosely speaking, they are something like the following: 1 Of course, such a division is not flawless, for information published in outlets considered more reliable is often mistaken, and information published in outlets considered less reliable is often correct. Further, while an author’s partisanship may raise questions about a source’s reliability, one is not justified in assuming that such a source is necessarily unreliable. Champion and Crowther 5 - Sources A (more reliable) are often published by established news organizations or in academic journals.1 The former typically center on the event in question. - Sources B (reasonably reliable) are often published by established news organizations, but typically only allude to the event in question and thus are further removed from the event than are sources that center on it. - Sources C (less reliable) often involve potential conflicts of interest, as discussed in “A Note on Sources” (p.