Iran Focus: Baghdad, Jan. 17 – At a conference in Baghdad today, some 3,230 eminent Iraqi law experts and lawyers released a statement on the legal status of the main Iranian opposition group, the People’s Mojahedin Organisation of Iran, calling it a legitimate movement. The conference in the Babylon Hotel was attended by more than 1,000 Iraqi law experts and political and social figures in support of the Iranian opposition, and by over 50 different media organisations.

Iran Focus: Tehran, Jan. 17 – Young doctors in Iran are living under the poverty line with many of them forced to find alternative work to earn enough to get by, according to head of Iranian Doctors’ Society.

Iran Focus: Baghdad, Jan. 17 – The Iraqi Defence Minister, Hazem al-Shaalan today accused Iran of interference, saying, “Iran has spent more than $1 billion on meddling in the internal affairs of Iraq”. In a telephone interview with the Arab language Ilaf website, al-Shaalan also accused candidates on the opposition list of Shiite figures led by Abdol Aziz Hakim as a group trying to invite sectarian and religious strife among the people of Iraq.

Iran Focus: Tehran, Jan. 17 – Two teenage students hanged themselves in the town of Sirjan (southern Iran) on Friday. Mohammad-Javad Maki-Abadi, a second year high school student, and Asghar Maki-Abadi, a third year high school student, were cousins. They committed suicide in Mohammad-Javad’s house when all of their relatives were out. The exact motive has yet to be confirmed.

Iran Focus: Tehran, Jan. 17 – The Head of Iran’s Addiction Prevention Office said that the drug addiction rate had surpassed the population increase rate by three times.
“Based on statistics obtained over the last 30 years, drug addiction has increased by eight percent, which is the equivalent of three times the growth of the population”, …