SAVAK

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SAVAK (Persian: ساواک, short for سازمان اطلاعات و امنیت کشور Sazeman-e Ettelaat va Amniyat-e Keshvar, Organization for Intelligence and National Security) was the domestic security and intelligence service of Iran from 1957–1979.

1 History
2 Operations
3 Post-Revolution
4 SAVAK Directors
5 See also
6 External links

[edit] History

SAVAK was founded in 1957 with the assistance of the United States' Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Its mission was to place opponents of the Shah's regime under surveillance and to repress dissident movements through intimidation, exile, imprisonment, assassination, and torture. Though estimates vary widely, it was likely responsible for thousands of deaths. Its first director was General Teymur Bakhtiar, who was assassinated by SAVAK agents and replaced by General Hassan Pakravan. Pakravan was replaced in 1965 by General Nematollah Nassiri, a close associate of the Shah, and the service was reorganized and became increasingly active in the face of rising (actual) Islamic and (feared) Communist militancy and political unrest. Former director Pakravan and Nasiri were eventually executed by the Revolutionary Guard after the Islamic Revolution.

[edit] Operations

SAVAK had virtually unlimited powers of arrest and detention. It operated its own detention centers, like Evin Prison. SAVAK had routinely subjected detainees to physical torture according to some sources. In addition to domestic security the service's tasks extended to the surveillance of Iranians (especially students on government stipends) abroad, notably in the United States, France, and the United Kingdom.

SAVAK agents often carried out operations against each other. Teymur Bakhtiar was assassinated by SAVAK agents in 1970, and Mansur Rafizadeh, SAVAK's United States director during the 1970s, reported that General Nassiri's phone was tapped. Hussein Fardust, a former classmate of the Shah, was a deputy director of SAVAK until he was appointed head of the Imperial Inspectorate, also known as the Special Intelligence Bureau, to watch over high-level government officials, including SAVAK directors. Fardust later became director of SAVAMA, the post-revolution carbon copy of the original SAVAK organization.

[edit] Post-Revolution

Following the departure of the Shah in January 1979, SAVAK's 3,000 central staff were targeted for reprisals; many of the senior officials were executed. However, the organization was closed down shortly before the end of the monarchy and the gain of power by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in February 1979.

SAVAK has been replaced by the SAVAMA, Sazman-e Ettela'at va Amniat-e Melli-e Iran, later renamed the Ministry of Intelligence. The latter is also referred to as VEVAK, Vezarat-e Ettela'at va Amniat-e Keshvar, though Iranians and the Iranian press never employ this term and use its official name as a Ministry. According to informed observers, the new organization is structurally identical to the old one and retains most of the same people. A few local chiefs have been replaced. The new director of SAVAMA was deputy director of SAVAK: he was an old friend of the late Shah.