“I told them that I would rather die in Iran than live abroad because it’s my homeland”.

The book “Kriskan Evenings” is the late Amir Saeedzadeh’s memories from his pre-revolutionary activities, memories from the years of holy defense, and the captivity in Komala and Democratic prisons.it is written by Kianoush Golzar Ragheb and published by Soore Mehr.

Also, Amir Saeedzadeh, the main character of this story, passed away on the morning of Wednesday, January 20, at Sasan Hospital in Tehran.

“Although I have seen and known the Kurdish forces myself, what the book says about their sacrifices is completely new and surprising to me. The courage of the main character, his family, and the role of the mother and wife are distinguished; besides, the cruel behavior of those who lied about Kurdish people is also described very well” said Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei.

In a chapter, he says that the place where he was imprisoned was called “Kriskan”, a wide valley with a seasonal river. 

“I got captured by the Iraqi Kurdistan Democratic Party. The reason I chose this name was that in the evenings, they opened the prison’s door to call one or more people to execute and I didn’t want to forget the name of those people” Amir Saeedzadeh said. 

According to him, the first time he got captured was in 1980 by Komala Kurdistan's Organization. “They called us betrayers and supporters of the Islamic revolution and took me to their main prison where I met the writer of this book, Kianoush Golzar, for the first time,” he said.

“I was sure that my sentence was death, so I made an escape plan and told Mr. Golzar about it but, he wanted to stay and resist because he thought his brother, who also got captured, was still alive however he wasn’t” he added.

He continued that the second captivity coincided with the Mursad operation, after the resolution. He said he had no doubt that he would be captured or killed this time, and he got captured by the Democrats of Sulaymaniyah in Iraq.

“It was the last few days of my captivity when they offered me not to return to Iran and keep working with them and they would send me wherever I wanted to so I told them that I would rather die in Iran than live abroad because it’s my hometown” Amir Saeedzadeh said. 

Worse than the hardships and tortures of captivity was him being separated from his family and not being able to provide their needs, and according to what he said, he realized it when he came back it saw her wife had spent such difficult days, however, in her letters, she had always lied that everything was fine.