The Mask of Monarchism on the Faces of Interrogators: From the 1988 Massacre to the Engineering of Protests in Mashhad

By: Ahmad (political activist and witness to the 1988 massacre). 22/12/2025

As someone who spent ten years of his youth in the corridors of death and was an eyewitness to the great crime of the 1988 massacre, and as a complainant and witness who cried out for justice in the Stockholm court for the conviction of Hamid Nouri, I consider it my duty to warn against repetitive and dangerous security scenarios.

The suspicious death of Khosrow Alikordi, a lawyer who courageously defended justice-seeking families and political prisoners, once again reopened the wounds of protesting families. The seventh-night memorial ceremony for this prominent lawyer at Ghadir Mosque in Mashhad was not a simple mourning gathering; rather, it turned into a scene of confrontation between the will of the people and the deception of the security apparatuses. While people, filled with anger and disgust, chanted fundamental slogans against the entire system and against Khamenei personally, a suspicious and infiltrated current attempted to divert the course of the protests by chanting “Long live the Shah.”

What is shocking is that these same individuals, who wore the mask of monarchism, immediately after creating division among the people, stood alongside security forces and plainclothes agents and took part in beating and arresting participants.

What happened in Mashhad proved that the “Monarchy” project is a scheme engineered by

the Ministry of Intelligence and the Ammar Base. This project is directed inside the country by Basij and IRGC forces, and outside the country by “security defectors”—the same pawns who, by pretending to have broken away from the system, have taken control of the monarchist current abroad as infiltrators in order to marginalize genuine alternatives.

The regime, fearful of popular unity and radical, system-challenging slogans, seeks to both discredit protests and identify and arrest real activists by creating a cover opposition.

This tactic is like “a wolf in sheep’s clothing” entering the flock—not to accompany it, but to scatter it so that the ferocious wolves can more easily hunt them one by one.

However, the regime has miscalculated. It is already far too late for these worn-out tricks, because Iranian society—especially Generation Z—has reached a level of awareness where it no longer falls for these security games. The strong reaction of the public on social media against this infiltrated current, and particularly the conscious response of young people in Tabriz and Urmia who, during sporting events, denounced these affiliated currents as dishonorable through their chants and clearly drew their line against all forms of dictatorship (whether clerical or monarchical), is testimony to this awakening.

The people of Iran have proven that they recognize the enemy in any disguise—whether in the garb of an interrogator of the 1980s or in the cover of today’s “Shah-worshipping” infiltrators. This awakening is the final blow to the projects of the Ministry of Intelligence, which sought to prolong the life of the regime by diverting slogans.

By: Ahmad (political activist and witness to the 1988 massacre)