City of Lies: Love, Sex, Death and the Search for Truth in Tehran Read online

  The gun-runner raced through the backstreets and disappeared into a concrete block of flats. Dariush followed him to the third floor and into a messy living room with black eighties furniture and brown velvet curtains.

  ‘I can get you an AK-47, but that’s about it at the moment.’

  ‘Well I’ll take it then. Are you with the sazman?’

  ‘No fucking way!’ The gun-runner was laughing. ‘Listen, I’ve dealt with quite a few of your lot. You all come here thinking we’re all waiting to be saved by you. The truth is that we can’t stand you. Nothing personal. But I bet you 1,000 US dollars that in one month, you won’t find one Tehrani here who supports you. Better the devil you know, mate. The sister will sort you out,’ he said, nodding towards a voluptuous redhead in a pink velour tracksuit. And the gun-runner was gone.

  The woman lit a cigarette and stared at Dariush. Everything about him was attractive: he was tall and broad with thick hair, but his boyish features gave him a clean-cut, unassuming appearance. The woman disappeared into the corridor, talking into her mobile. She returned holding a shiny new AK-47 and a bag full of bullets. Dariush tried to make small talk as he handed over the cash, but she ignored him.

  ‘If you make it out alive, tell your people to leave Iran alone,’ she said, slamming the door shut.

  To outsiders, the Mojahedin-e Khalq is an enigma. Their largest base is in Paris, where they work under the banner of their political wing, the National Resistance Council of Iran. Even some members struggle clearly to define the Group’s principles and politics: a mixture of Marxism, Islam and nationalism. It has been led by Maryam Rajavi ever since her husband, Massoud, mysteriously disappeared out of public view in 2003. Maryam and Massoud are worshipped by their supporters and revered as gurus. Maryam, green-eyed, middle-aged with a make-up-less face and perfectly plucked eyebrows – a prerequisite for any respectable Iranian female regardless of attempts at modesty – wears a headscarf pulled down past her hairline. She looks more like a suburban, conservative housewife than a leader of Iran’s biggest dissident group. In her soothing, nasal voice she successfully lobbies European and American politicians for support in fighting the Iranian regime, and speaks movingly of a free Iran.

  The MEK spends millions on getting Western governments on side, often paying handsomely for endorsements and speeches by politicians. It is gearing up for a revolution. Or for when the USA or Israel may attack. Or for the moment when they can seize power from the clerics and destroy the regime.

  The first MEK meeting Dariush attended was in a church hall. There were about fifty others there: middle-aged, friendly housewives, professionals, students and a few Americans. Only a handful were card-carrying members, the others called themselves ‘supporters’. The women wore red headscarves pulled down low over their foreheads. They called each other khaahar, sister, and baradar, brother.

  The Americans gushed about these brave ‘freedom fighters’. They gave updates on the latest senators who had agreed to campaign for the MEK (for a healthy fee). The revered leader of this local branch, Baradar Fereydoon, spoke of human rights abuses in Iran – people being imprisoned and tortured. Pictures of bodies hanging from cranes, lashed backs and prisoners with lifeless eyes flashed up on an overhead projector. Nearly all the victims were members of the Group. Dariush was outraged.

  Afterwards, they sat around tables eating zereshk polo ba morgh, barberry rice and chicken, chatting about their children and their jobs. It was more like the gathering of a town council than a rebel group. Dariush was astonished by the ordinariness of it all. Arezou was warm and open, unlike how she was in public. She was the happiest he had seen her.

  The meetings became a regular part of Dariush’s life. He found himself increasingly maddened by the atrocities meted out by the Islamic Republic towards members. Baradar Fereydoon singled out Dariush for special attention, spending time with him. He began confiding in him, explaining that the reason he walked with a limp was from an injury during a secret operation that had killed his comrade, now a war martyr. He entrusted Dariush with nuggets of top-level information and spoke of the Group’s spies on the inside, MEK members who had infiltrated the government and who were even working on nuclear sites. Soon Dariush was spending hours a day listening to taped messages from the leaders. It was impossible not to believe what they said. He fundraised for the Group and learnt about its main base in Camp Ashraf, where he hoped to be sent. The situation in his mother country was an emergency, and he had to act. Dariush began parroting Baradar Fereydoon’s lines: ‘Our people love us, they are waiting to be saved from hell.’

  BANG. It sounded like a bomb. Dariush instinctively dived under his bed. BANG BANG BANG. BOOM. Now he could hear whizzing. He had heard the sounds of all sorts of artillery during training but these were not noises he recognized. Then there was screaming, and what sounded like laughing. As he crept towards the window, he saw an explosion of white sparkles glittering in the sky like a flower. He had forgotten it was chaharshanbeh souri, the fire festival.

  The Group had sent him during norooz, New Year, which in Iran coincides with the first day of spring. The Group had said it was good cover, as it was when exiles returned to visit family. Dariush would just have to bide his time for a while. He read books that Kian had brought round for him, including one of his favourites, Marxism and Other Western Fallacies: An Islamic Critique by Ali Shariati.

  He took a walk. Hundreds of kids were in the streets, jumping over bonfires they had made in the middle of the road, chanting an ancient Zoroastrian mantra to burn away bad luck and ill health. Packs of boys and girls were playing chase, sparklers in their hands. On Vali Asr firecrackers hurtled up and down the road. The cars were at a standstill, music blasting, people hanging out of the windows. The government had tried to ban chaharshanbeh souri; it was a pagan remnant of Zoroastrianism and the regime had declared it un-Islamic. But norooz and all that came with it was as culturally important to Iranians as the Islamic festivals; try as the government might, this was one battle they could not win. He stared at the people in wonder, surprised they could be enjoying themselves under the circumstances. He could not understand why there were so many discrepancies between what the Group had been telling them and what was happening in the country. But it was still possible to read the situation through the Group’s prism: these kids were brave, for they were demonstrating audacious disobedience. He watched a group of teenagers down a side street start dancing and clapping; a few were on car bonnets singing and hip-swinging; one of the girls even whipped off her headscarf and waved it in the air as the crowd around her shrieked in appreciation. Dariush realized he was witnessing a mass act of rebellion.

  When Dariush was especially chosen for the mission, Arezou said she had never felt so proud. Senior members had recognized his dedication and seen that he was prepared to die in the fight against the Islamic Republic. It did not matter that he had only been a member for a short while, it did not work like that. There were some who had been with the Group for years, had given their money (which they were all expected to do), had offered their services, yet they never progressed up the ranks, never got near the inner sanctum. You had to be prepared to give all of yourself to the Group. It was about discipline, sacrifice and loyalty. The Group had sent Dariush from America to Paris, where he met even higher-ranking MEK members. Everybody was impressed by him. He had thrown himself into ideological training, submitting detailed reports on his feelings for the Rajavis and learning their speeches off by heart. That is when it was decided Dariush should be sent to Camp Ashraf in Iraq to prepare for a mission.

  Life at Camp Ashraf was strict. His training was intense: handling guns, using hand grenades, making bombs, stalking victims, using bugs and surveillance equipment, shooting targets. The sexes were segregated. Lustful thoughts were reported. Dariush attended obligatory group ‘confessional’ sessions to cleanse the mind; they made Dariush feel closer to his brothers and sisters. There were many like him, who had cut
ties with their families. They spoke continually about the wide support they had in the motherland. Nobody seemed to know how many active members were living in Iran, but they assured Dariush there was a big, active network and that once there he would have a dedicated team helping him.

  It was the day of the assassination. Dariush had started the morning doing breathing exercises to calm his nerves. It was all planned. He had been following the ex-police chief for weeks. The first morning after the public holidays, he had left the house at dawn, wearing tatty, ragged clothes and a pair of scuffed shoes. He arrived at the ex-police chief’s road just after five in the morning and squatted on the side. Nobody noticed him.

  Every day the ex-police chief would drive himself to a small office – unlike when he was the police chief and was driven in a bullet-proof car complete with a security convoy. Dariush thought the hit would be easy. He would strike as his target drove back home from work, in peak traffic.

  Kian had found a getaway driver, a young mechanic who was a new member, itching for word of his loyalty to reach the Rajavis. As they left the apartment, the getaway driver put his hand on Dariush’s shoulder, ‘I’m ready to die for the cause.’ Dariush squeezed his hand, ‘So am I.’

  On time, the ex-police chief stepped out of the building and into his car. They followed him. His car began to slow as it reached a pile of traffic ahead. Dariush tapped the driver on the back – their signal. He drove up behind the police chief’s car, up very close; Dariush could see the hairs on the police chief’s neck through the window. He shot. He saw glass shatter. He looked back, the AK-47 still in his hand. There was a splatter of blood. The chief was slumped forward. Was he still moving? Then Dariush was in the air. On the ground, with a thud. He could not breathe. Men were pushing down on him, pressing his head into the tar-soaked gravel of the road. His body throbbed. His vision was blurred. How long did it take for him to understand what had happened? A minute, two minutes, ten minutes? He could not say.

  He pieced it together: something had hit the motorbike and he had been catapulted in the air. Three police officers had jumped onto him. He had wet himself. He could not see his driver. When the cops made him stand on his feet, guns trained at his head, he knew it was over. The Group had told him: if they catch you, they will torture you mercilessly, perhaps for years. They will rape you. He remembered the photos. That is why he had the cyanide capsule in his mouth. It was still lodged there, despite the fall. He bit into the vial. A burst of liquid oozed out. Nine seconds. That is how long they told him it would take. Now it was at least fifteen seconds for sure, or does time slow when you die? Dariush squeezed his eyes tight to concentrate on death. But he was still very much alive. At least thirty seconds. Maybe the Group had been out by a few seconds; they seemed to be out about a lot of things.

  ‘I said get into the back of the van!’

  He opened his eyes. Still alive. Surely it was over a minute now. He took a tentative step forward.

  ‘He’s on drugs. Seriously, he’s a total freak.’

  He did not die on the way to the police station. Not only were their maps old and out of date; so was their cyanide. It must have degraded. Expired. Unlike him, who faced years of torture and rape.

  At the police station, they took his handcuffs off and locked him in a small room. Somehow the police had not even frisked him. At least he had gone back to the gun-runner and ordered a hand grenade. It was tucked into his trousers. The minute the officer shut the door on him, he pulled the pin out. Only it went off before he had time to raise it to his head. He saw his own hand fly across the room. And then he fainted.

  The judge looked weary. There was a time when he would send hundreds of these idiots to the firing squads or the noose; when the weight of his authority was encapsulated in four short, neat syllables: hokm-e edam, death penalty. He looked at Dariush standing in front of him. He was shaking with fear. He had a bandaged stump instead of a right hand. His lawyers said he had been brainwashed. He had repented. He had not killed anyone; the bullet had simply grazed the side of the ex-police chief’s neck. The judge fiddled with his biro as he delivered the verdict.

  Fatemi Street, midtown Tehran, several years later

  The halogen strip light buzzes overhead, bathing everyone in a vicious blue light that picks out the hollows of cheeks and darkens circles under eyes. Three families are sitting on plastic chairs in silence, in a shabby office block. Nobody has touched the small cups of tea laid out on the plastic table. Their eyes are fixed on the door. Dariush walks in, wearing jeans and a crisp white shirt. Three men, heads slightly bowed, eyes scanning the room, follow him. The sobbing begins. The three men are soon encircled. Mothers clutch their sons to their chests; one man sinks to his knees; a sister strokes her brother’s hair; a father simply buries his head in his hands, wrists wet with tears. One of the three men has been away for over twenty years. Over and over again he whispers one word: sorry.

  Dariush watches from the corner of the room, cradling a crude plastic hand that has been attached to his stump. He has witnessed many such reunions, but he still cries every time. The three men he led into the room are former members of the MEK; now they are deserters, like Dariush. The men begin to recount their time with the Group. As the stories of brainwashing and regret tumble, Dariush silently nods. He remembers the beatings and the public confessionals at Camp Ashraf; his comrade was forced to confess to masturbating, which was banned. He remembers the isolation, of not being allowed out of a small compound, and the strict segregation of the sexes – one of the returnees Dariush had helped had not been allowed to be with his wife for fifteen years, even though they were both at Camp Ashraf together. He remembers families of members turning up at the camp, begging to see their loved ones. He remembers being part of the MEK cult.

  After his botched assassination attempt, Dariush was sent to a military hospital, where doctors and nurses tended to him with care until he was healthy enough for prison. He had been given a life sentence. It was reduced to eight years. He spent just under four years in Evin prison. He was in the political wing and Dariush’s cellmates were dissidents and students. It was in prison that Dariush was de-programmed, and it was in prison where he learnt the truth about his country, and learnt the lies that the MEK had fed him. He claims that in prison he was never tortured.

  Nobody knows why the government did not kill Dariush, why he got such a light sentence. The most likely explanation is that he cut a deal: his freedom for his knowledge of the inner workings of the MEK. The lranian love for a conspiracy theory went into overdrive; some said that Dariush was a regime spy all along. Whatever the truth, it was a cunning move by the government; when the Islamic Republic announced an amnesty on all deserters, dozens returned to the motherland. After Saddam Hussein’s fall, the MEK was no longer welcome in Iraq and conditions in Camp Ashraf deteriorated. Dariush was paraded as a member who had been pardoned by the Islamic Republic of Iran and used as bait to lure others away, a perfect ploy to weaken the Group. As soon as Dariush was released from prison, he helped set up a government-backed charity rescuing MEK recruits and reuniting them with their families.

  Once the families leave the office, Dariush locks up and heads home. He is meeting his mother at Yekta on Vali Asr, a café where she used to have milkshakes and burgers in her youth. The place has hardly changed: the same yellow sign and seventies interior. She flew to Tehran after his release, and he persuaded her to stay.

  Arezou denounced him as a traitor, as did the rest of the Group. He tried to contact her, to convince her to leave them, but she never spoke to him again.

  two

  SOMAYEH

  Meydan-e Khorasan, south Tehran

  The day that Somayeh witnessed a miracle was the hottest day of the year. The shade under the sycamore trees on Vali Asr gave no sanctuary. The sun scorched the dark green leaves, burning the road below. The trees’ roots ached with thirst, the joobs running above them dusty and dry.

  Somayeh wiped
bubbles of sweat from her top lip that kept popping up despite the best efforts of the ancient, juddering air-conditioning unit. Her damp fingers fiddled with the combination lock on the briefcase. With six rows of numbers, this was an impossible mission, but she was stubborn. She cried to God and to her favourite imam for help.

  ‘Oh God, Oh Imam Zaman, I beg you to help me open this case, and I swear to you that I will sacrifice a lamb for the poor every year until I die,’ she said her nazr prayer out loud, bruising her fingertips against the metal digits. Somayeh’s nazr prayer was in keeping with tradition; she knew that for her wish to be granted she must vow to help those less well off than herself. She always channelled her prayers through Imam Zaman, even though so many believe that the patient and peaceful Abol Fazl, half-brother of Imam Hossein (the Prophet’s grandson), responds to requests the quickest.

  And then something extraordinary happened. At that precise moment the numbers snapped into alignment – a gentle click as the lock and God and Imam Zaman all acquiesced. The briefcase popped its mouth ajar.

  It was a miracle. Of that, there was no doubt.

  It had all started on an equally hot summer’s day a few years earlier. Somayeh was seventeen and in the neighbourhood of her birth, Meydan-e Khorasan, east of the bazaar in south Tehran and as old as the city itself. The day had begun like any other, at six in the morning with her daily prayers. She breakfasted with her beloved father, Haj Agha, sipping her tea as he read the conservative daily Kayhan newspaper that he bought on his way back from the baker’s. The sangak bread was still warm and pitted with crispy indents where the hot stones that lined the furnaces had cooked it; on it they slathered home-made cherry jam, sweet and sour and red as fresh blood. She then wrapped her black chador round her and walked to school with her younger brother, Mohammad-Reza.