Majid Sharif was an Iranian writer and translator who disappeared in Tehran on November 19, 1998. His lifeless body was found on the streets six days later. Sharif also authored articles for the Iran-e Farda monthly magazine and was a member of the editorial office of the revolutionary and sociologist Ali Shariati’s written works.

In his younger years, Majid Sharif ranked first in mathematics across Iran’s high schools and learned to speak English and French fluently while still a high school student. Sharif went on to study German at the Goethe Institute and later became acquainted with Arabic and Russian. In 1968, he took Iran’s national university entrance exam and again came first in the country. He also later came first in the Central Bank Scholarship exams and later travelled to the United States for his university studies.

Sharif studied theoretical physics at the Sharif University of Technology in Tehran. He completed his studies and graduated with distinction. He then won a scholarship to study in the United States and, in 1973, he began studying for a doctorate in physics at the University of California, Los Angeles. He returned to Iran after the 1979 Islamic Revolution and taught physics at Bu-Ali Sina University in Hamadan.

Before leaving Iran in 1983 – and in addition to teaching at the university – Sharif was also engaged in a variety of intellectual and cultural work and was a published author. He went to France and studied political sociology after leaving Iran. He lived in France for 12 years and returned in 1995 to Iran.

Majid Sharif wrote many books during his short life, such as True Islam Is Born Again, Necessary Rethinking in Political Struggle and the Establishment of Democratic Institutions, Renewal of the Covenant with Sharia Law, A Journey to the Inner Domain, Critique of the Heart as a Test of Experience and Islam minus Democracy?

Sharif also translated a number of prominent books from English into Persian, including; The Will to Power by Friedrich Nietzsche, The Founding Myths of Israeli Politics: The History of an Apostasy by Roger Garaudy and The Prophet by Khalil Gibran.

Mahshid Sharif, Majid Sharif’s former wife, spoke about his decision to return to Iran, saying: “I think he called me from a telephone booth. It was sometime past eleven o'clock at night. Without any introduction, he said he wanted to read to me a few sentences from the announcement that he had prepared for his return to Iran. I listened but I didn’t hear what he was saying. My heart was pounding. That was until he read; ‘Regardless of death or prison, I have to return, it is my natural home…’” Sharif published the announcement and then returned to Iran. 

Two years after his return to Iran, on the morning of November 19, 1998, Majid Sharif left his mother’s house in the Yousefabad district of Tehran, wearing sportswear, and intending to go for a run. But he never returned home.

His lifeless body was found on the street six days later, Sharif’s relatives identified the body at the Forensic Medicine Offices of Tehran, on November 25, 1998. The autopsy carried out by the forensic medical examiner stated that the cause of Majid Sharif’s death was “unknown.”

The prominent intellectuals Dariush Forouhar, Parvaneh Eskandari, Mohammad Mokhtari and Mohammad Jafar Pooyandeh were the only ones initially and officially cited as being victims of the Chain Murders during trials that later took place. The Chain Murders were a series of killings of Iranian intellectuals and dissidents in the 1990s which were ordered by the country’s Ministry of Intelligence.

The Judiciary of the Islamic Republic did not initially consider Majid Sharif – and another individual, Pirooz Davani – as victims in the Chain Murders. But a few months later it was determined that Mehrdad Alikhani, codenamed “Sadegh” and an intelligence offcer at the Ministry of Intelligence, had been in charge of the operation to assassinate Majid Sharif. He was later arrested as one of the main perpetrators of the Chain Murders. The details of Majid Sharif’s abduction and murder were later disclosed as part of that trial.

Sharif’s abduction occurred while he was jogging. Intelligence officers forced him into a car and took him to a parking lot in the Yousefabad district of Tehran, where they removed his socks and injected him with a syringe of potassium chloride under his big toe.

Mehrdad Alikhani, who was later arrested as his killer, explained the details of Majid Sharif's murder: “We took him to the warehouse / resistance / anesthesia / laid him down / socks / injection / inside the taxi / under his left foot / normal / on the same road / we applied the handbrake and pulled over by the sidewalk / hands on his heart / we put his shoes and socks back on him / then we changed the taxi number …”

Abdullah Shahbazi, a writer, also quoted Mehrdad Alikhani as saying that Majid Sharif had been killed with an injection of potassium chloride. The drug is one of those used in lethal injections executions in the United States.