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Middle East News: Breaking news from Middle East - Iran
Lawyer hopeful Iran will acquit French academic
TEHRAN, Iran – A lawyer for a French academic charged with endangering Iran's security said Saturday he is hopeful she will be acquitted in a verdict expected within a week.
Clotilde Reiss, who worked for five months at the University of Isfahan in central Iran, was arrested in July at the height of the crackdown on opposition protesters who took to the streets after June's disputed presidential election.
The 24-year-old is charged with endangering national security and taking part in anti-government protests. A final hearing in her case was held Saturday in a Tehran court.
Her lawyer, Mohammad Ali Mahdavi Sabet, said a verdict is expected within a week.
"Reiss rejected all the charges against her and insisted that she had no bad intentions against Iran," Sabet told The Associated Press. "I'm hopeful she will be acquitted."
In Iran, money talks with protest slogans
:: By BRIAN MURPHY || Associated Press Writer :: DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - Facing hard-line forces on the streets, Iran's anti-government demonstrators have taken their protests to a new venue: writing "Death to the Dictator" and other opposition slogans on bank notes, while officials scramble to yank the bills from circulation.
There's no way to calculate how much Iranian currency has been scribbled on or stamped with dissident messages in recent months in response to efforts to halt public demonstrations or choke off the Internet and cell phone messaging.
But it's been enough to bring public denunciations from financial overseers as senior as the central bank governor. Another top regulator said banks will no longer accept defaced bills in an attempt to discourage merchants and others from taking the protest-tagged money.
"What did they die for?" asked one message on a bill, referring to the estimated dozens of demonstrators killed in the wake of vote-rigging allegations in last summer's re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Iran prosecutor urges no leniency for detainees
TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's top prosecutor has ordered his representative in Tehran not to show any leniency toward detained opposition protesters.
General prosecutor Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejehi has instructed Tehran Prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi in a statement posted on a judiciary Web site that he takes "strong action" against individuals blamed for "the recent sedition." That was a reference to protests last month in which at least eight protesters were killed.
The statement follows a call made last week by hard-liners for the execution of opposition leaders.
The opposition claims that hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-elected through massive vote fraud and that its leader Mir Hossein Mousavi was the true winner of the June election.
Iran diplomat quits over protests
By Wojciech Moskwa, Associated Press Writer
OSLO (Reuters) - A diplomat at the Iranian embassy in Norway told Norwegian television on Wednesday that he had resigned in protest over a crackdown on demonstrators in Iran but the government in Tehran denied the report.
"It was the Iranian authorities' treatment of demonstrators during the Christmas week that made me realize I couldn't continue," public broadcaster NRK quoted Mohammed Reza Heydari as saying.
NRK, which said it had spoken to Heydari, presented his quotes in text rather than audio or video form.
Heydari, who NRK said has served as a consul at the embassy for the last three years, was not reachable for comment.
A friend of Heydari who was contacted by Reuters in Oslo said the diplomat remains in Norway but was not willing to make further statements for the time being.
Tehran professors denounce violence on protesters
By ALI AKBAR DAREINI, Associated Press Writer
TEHRAN, Iran - Nearly 90 professors at Tehran University have told Iran's supreme leader that ongoing violence against protesters shows the weakness of the country's leadership, a pro-reform Web site reported Monday, reflecting a growing willingness to risk careers and studies to challenge the ruling clerics.
The current rumblings from universities highlight the evolution of the opposition movement. What began as raw and angry voter backlash after last June's disputed presidential election has moved to a possibly deeper and more ingrained fight against Iran's Islamic leaders.
The letter signed by the 88 instructors was issued as university students around Iran staged acts of defiance - including hunger strikes and exam boycotts - to protest reported arrests and intimidation by hard-line forces, according to witnesses and reformist Web sites.
British hostage held in Iran after Iraq kidnapping
By REBECCA SANTANA, Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD - A British computer programmer seized in Iraq was held in Iran for at least part of his captivity, the U.S. general who oversees the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan said on Friday.
Gen. David Petraeus said, however, that it was difficult to tell whether Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard or the Quds force - an arm of the Guard involved in foreign operations - had a role in Peter Moore's capture.
U.S. officials have accused Iran of funneling money and arms to Shiite militias in Iraq through the Quds force and of seeking to exert a negative influence over the neighboring country and its Shiite-dominated government.
Iran hard-liners back government in mass rallies
By ALI AKBAR DAREINI, Associated Press Writer
TEHRAN, Iran - Tens of thousands of hard-line government supporters turned out for state-sponsored rallies Wednesday, some of them calling for the execution of opposition leaders as Iran's police chief threatened to show "no mercy" in crushing any new protests by the pro-reform movement.
Amid the pro-government fervor, Iran's official news agency reported that the top two opposition leaders have fled the capital, Tehran. But a close relative of one of the men, Mahdi Karroubi, told The Associated Press the report by the IRNA news agency was wrong and that Karroubi and the other leader, Mir Hossein Mousavi, were both at their homes in Tehran.
The relative spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.
40 Iranian prisoners in Iraq launch hunger strike
By KATHARINE HOURELD, Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD - Around 40 Iranians held in an Iraqi prison are on a hunger strike to demand meetings with Iranian officials about their cases, an Iraqi government official said Monday.
Lawyer Mohammed Radhi said the strike has been peaceful since its start on Sunday. Radhi works for the state-run Human Rights Commission.
The prisoners are being held in Nasiriyah, about 200 miles (320 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad. A police official said the prisoners have not been allowed to talk to the Iranian Embassy.
The prisoners were convicted of illegally crossing the border to commit terrorist acts and were sentenced to between five and seven years behind bars, the police official said. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information.
Iranian forces, demonstrators clash
By SALAH NASRAWI, Associated Press Writer
TEHRAN, Iran - Iranian security forces beat protesters in central Tehran on Saturday, a sign of mounting tensions ahead of planned opposition rallies to mark a religious festival and the death of a dissident cleric a week ago, a reformist Web site said.
The Rah-e-Sabz site said forces, including the elite Revolutionary Guard and the paramilitary Basijis, used tear gas and pepper spray in an attempt to disperse demonstrators, and broke the windows of cars that were honking horns in protest.
It said protests occurred in at least three areas: Imam Hossein Square, Pol-e-Choobi and Ferdowsi Square.
The report could not be independently confirmed because the Iranian government has banned foreign media from covering opposition protests.
Bin Laden daughter hides in Saudi embassy in Iran
By SALAH NASRAWI, Associated Press Writer
CAIRO - A daughter of al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden has taken refuge in the Saudi Embassy in Tehran after eluding guards who have held her and five brothers under house arrest for eight years, a Saudi-owned newspaper reported Wednesday.
It has long been believed that Iran has held in custody a number of bin Laden's children since they fled Afghanistan following the U.S.-led invasion of that country in 2001 - most notably Saad and Hamza bin Laden, who are thought to have held positions in al-Qaida.
This year, U.S. officials said Saad bin Laden may have been killed by a U.S. airstrike in Pakistan, where they said he may have fled after being freed from Iran, but they could not confirm the information.
But Omar bin Laden, another son who lives abroad, told the Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper that Eman told relatives in a call from the embassy that 29-year-old Saad and four other brothers were still being held in Iran.