AP: Several people were killed and more injured by three bombs that exploded Sunday morning near government buildings in southwestern Iran, officials and an eyewitness said. The explosions, which come ahead of presidential elections set for Friday, rocked Ahvaz, capital of Khuzestan province bordering Iraq, and damaged several buildings, an eyewitness told The Associated Press by telephone. An official in the regional governor’s office said several people were killed.
Several killed by bomb blasts in Iran
Bombs hit government targets in Iran oil town
Reuters: At least three bombs exploded in the southwestern Iranian oil town of Ahvaz on Sunday, killing three people, an Interior Ministry spokesman said. The semi-official Fars news agency said five people had been killed and 25 wounded in the blasts at about 9 a.m. (4:30 a.m. British time). State television put the number of wounded at 30, but did not say how many had been killed.
At least three killed in bomb attacks in oil-rich Iranian city
AFP: At least three people were killed Sunday when a series of bomb attacks targetting public buildings rocked Iran’s restive southwestern city of Ahvaz, an interior ministry official said.
Interior ministry spokesman Jahanbaksh Khanjani told AFP there were four explosions and that “three or four people” were killed in Ahvaz, the capital of oil-rich Khuzestan province and an ethnic-Arab majority city close to the border with Iraq.
North Korea to help Iran dig secret missile bunkers
Sunday Telegraph: Iran is secretly negotiating with North Korea to build a network of underground bunkers to conceal its clandestine nuclear weapons project. A team of construction experts has arrived in Teheran to conduct a survey of Iranian requirements. It included a senior North Korean specialist in underground construction who helped to design the bunkers that contain Pyongyang’s illegal weapons programme.
Iran election candidate supports satellite/Internet censoring
Iran Focus: Tehran, Jun. 11 Irans former paramilitary police chief and presidential hopeful said in an interview with a state-run daily that he supported Internet censorship and state control over satellite channels. Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf, until recently commander of the State Security Forces and a top brass in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, told the daily Keyhan, We support the principle of Internet filtering and its the right thing to do.
Iran election candidate supports satellite/Internet censoring
Iran Focus: Tehran, Jun. 11 Irans former paramilitary police chief and presidential hopeful said in an interview with a state-run daily that he supported Internet censorship and state control over satellite channels. Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf, until recently commander of the State Security Forces and a top brass in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, told the daily Keyhan, We support the principle of Internet filtering and its the right thing to do.
Iran’s dual governing system breeds voter apathy
Knight Ridder Newspapers: A dizzying array of campaign posters across this sprawling city promises Iranian voters a brighter, freer future in the most contested presidential race in Islamic Republic history. But it’s unlikely that any of the eight candidates vying in June 17 elections to replace President Mohammad Khatami, who can’t run for a third term, will win the kind of victory that swept Khatami to office in 1997 and 2001 with hopes of political and social change.
US dismisses Iran election as rigged
AFP: The United States has not waited for the first ballot to be cast before dismissing Iran’s presidential election as rigged and exhorting the Iranian people to rise up for democratic reform. US officials took no pains to hide their concern after Iran’s hardline clerical regime barred more than 1,000 hopefuls from next Friday’s poll and narrowed the field to a handful of mostly conservative candidates.
U.S. Helsinki Commission Members Denounce Iran’s Human Rights Record, Call for Joint U.S.-Europe Res
U.S. Newswire: The human rights situation in Iran is deteriorating, and the United States and its European allies need to develop a joint strategy to pressure Tehran to improve its record. That was the key point made yesterday in what will be the first in a series of hearings held by the U.S. Helsinki Commission to examine rogue regimes and their impact on the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) region.
Iran reporter back in jail after going missing
Reuters: An Iranian investigative journalist, jailed for linking officials to political murders, was back behind bars on
Saturday and resuming a hunger strike after vanishing for three days. Akbar Ganji was granted home leave last month to have medical checks for asthma and back pains. Iranian authorities said he should have been back in jail on Wednesday but had given them the slip. On Saturday, Ganji returned alone to Tehran’s Evin prison, clutching a hold-all and a bag of medicines.
