Swedish court convicts Iranian torturer
The Stockholm District Court on Thursday handed down a life sentence to Hamid N. after finding him guilty of crimes against international law and mass murders in the notorious Gohardasht prison near Tehran. The case dealt with acts he committed as a public prosecutor's official during the 1988 war between Iran and Iraq. Sweden's press celebrates the verdict saying it sends an important signal.
Hoping for more justice
Against the background of the Ukraine war, the verdict takes on additional weight, says Dagens Nyheter:
“The timing of the verdict against N. has a unique value. In the spring we received reports about heinous crimes committed by the Russian armed forces in Ukraine. The documentation of the crimes and the collection of evidence is already in full swing. They can never be undone. One day justice will be done.”
The moral universe is expanding
Sydsvenskan sees the verdict as a triumph of global criminal justice:
“At the end of June a 101-year-old man was convicted of aiding and abetting 3,518 murders in the German concentration camp Sachsenhausen. ... The Stockholm District Court on Thursday sentenced 61-year-old Iranian citizen Hamid N. to life imprisonment and deportation for serious violations of international law and murder. ... The American civil rights leader Martin Luther King once said that the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice. This time, the arc stretched from Iran to Sweden.”