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Prosecutor Accused of Killing Journalist is Appointed to Investigate her Fate!

July 22, 2003
The Associated Press
Ali Akbar Dareini

TEHRAN, Iran -- The prosecutor accused by reformers of responsibility for the death in custody of a Canadian-Iranian journalist has been appointed to investigate what happened to her after she was detained while covering anti-government protests.

Tehran prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi was named to head the investigation into the death of Zahra Kazemi, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported Tuesday.

Mortazavi controls the prosecutors and police who interrogated Kazemi for 77 hours before she was taken to a hospital emergency room, where she died on July 10.

Mortazavi is also widely believed to have pushed for Kazemi's quick burial. Presidential investigators stepped in last week to prevent the burial, and the vice president said she had died of a beating, not a stroke as originally claimed.

Late Tuesday, the state-run news agency IRNA said it had received a letter from Kazemi's mother, who lives in Iran, saying she wanted her daughter buried in her hometown of Shiraz "in order to prevent any misuse of the tragic incident."

Kazemi's only child Stephan Hachemi, who lives in Montreal, wants her body sent to Canada for an independent autopsy and for burial. He said earlier his grandmother told him she was being pressured by Iraqi officials into agreeing that the body be buried in Iran.

The death has become one more bitter dispute between hard-liners and reformists struggling for power in Iran. Reformers have called for the ouster and prosecution of Mortazavi and other hard-liners they hold responsible for her death.

Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, the hard-line head of Iran's judiciary, named Mortazavi to head the investigation. A day earlier, a committee appointed by reformist President Mohammad Khatami had called for an independent inquiry into the 54-year-old photojournalist's death.

"Public opinion expected that an independent judge will head the investigation, not a man who is seen as the main suspect in the case," reformist lawmaker Mohammad Kianoushrad told The Associated Press Tuesday.

Another reformist lawmaker, Reza Yousefian said: "Now, I don't expect that the whole truth will be revealed."

Kazemi died nearly three weeks after she was detained for taking photographs outside a Tehran prison during last month's student-led protests.

After the interrogation, she spent 14 days in the intensive care unit of Baqiyatollah Azam Hospital before she died, the report said. The hospital is controlled by the Revolutionary Guards, a hard-line security force.

The presidential committee that investigated the death said Kazemi had complained of punishment from her guards and died of a fractured skull. The report, which appeared in full in an Iranian newspaper Monday, didn't say who was behind the death.

The presidential committee's report discredited an initial official account that Kazemi died of a stroke — an explanation many had seen as an attempt by Iran's hard-liners to absolve themselves and their security agents of responsibility.

On Sunday, prominent reformist lawmaker Mohsen Armin accused government security agents of beating Kazemi to death, echoing accusations from her family and friends. Armin said Mortazavi, the prosecutor, had ordered her detention and later forced a Culture Ministry official to announce Kazemi died of a stroke.

Before being appointed prosecutor this year, Mortazavi served as a judge and was behind the closure of over 90 pro-democracy publications, as well as the imprisonment of dozens of writers and political activists over the past three years.

Khatami asked judiciary head Shahroudi on Monday to launch a judicial inquiry and punish those responsible for Kazemi's death.

Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Bill Graham on Monday called on the Iranian government act quickly to bring to justice those responsible for Kazemi's death.

http://pennlive.com/newsflash/lateststories/index.ssf?/base/international-6/105889405184740.xml

United Against the Ruling Mullahs

July 23, 2003
The Wall Street Journal
Review & Outlook

The pronouncements of America and Europe on the Middle East have sometimes seemed a tale of two policies. The U.S. brought freedom to Iraq even as Dominique de Villepin led France in Saddam's defense; the U.S. quarantined Yasser Arafat even as Brussels continued to have dealings with him; the U.S. attempted to isolate Iran even as Paris and sometimes even London pursued a fruitless policy of engagement.

This history of disagreement makes it all the more encouraging that, at least on the question of how to deal with the tyrants in Tehran, America and the EU are moving closer together.

The most recent signs of a trans-Atlantic meeting of minds came Monday. President George W. Bush escalated the war of words with Iran's ruling mullahs, saying from his Texas ranch that the U.S. "will not tolerate" Iran's constructing a nuclear weapon. At his side stood Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi -- who has just assumed the rotating presidency of the EU, and who is an unabashed supporter of Mr. Bush's Middle East policy.

Meanwhile, in Brussels, the EU's foreign ministers had strong words of their own for Iran. They expressed "deep shock" over the death of Canadian journalist Zahra Kazemi, who was detained and beaten to death by Iran's police thugs for having the audacity to photograph an anti-government demonstration. The ministers also called on Iran to end its crackdown on pro-democracy protesters, and demanded that Iran "show full transparency and co-operate fully" with the International Atomic Inspection Agency.

Of course, such words mean little without a credible threat backing them up. But things may be different this time. The foreign ministers said that "future steps of co-operation" with Iran will be reviewed by September, after the IAEA gives a report on Iran's clandestine nuclear program. In diplomatic speak, that's a threat. Tehran's rulers have been put on notice that the EU stands ready to cut them loose unless they renounce their nuclear ambitions.

That the EU has moved closer to a more tough-minded view of the ruling mullahs comes as welcome news. Reports came on Sunday that Iran has put into service a new ballistic missile with a range of 1,300 kilometers. At a ceremony marking the event, Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said, "Today our people and our armed forces are ready to defend their goals anywhere."

It is chilling to think of Mr. Khamenei's theocracy defending its "goals" -- which have included, among other worthy causes, the destruction of Israel, the exportation of terrorism, and the destabilization of Iraq -- with a missile capable of delivering a nuclear payload anywhere in the Middle East. Predictably, Iran has denied that it intends to build nuclear weapons -- but has said nothing to explain the mystery of why a nation sitting atop vast oil reserves needs a nuclear reactor to generate electricity.

Fortunately, the world need not permit a nuclear-armed Iran. The regime is in a position of extreme weakness, having been shaken by mass protests in June. Escalating the pressure on Tehran may force real concessions -- or, more likely, encourage a democratic revolution by showing Iran's predominately pro-Western population that the opinion of the free world is on their side. A united front against Tehran may also prompt greater maturity from Russia, which has been a shameless supporter of Iran's nuclear program.

Of course, the EU is made up of many nations. It's impossible to know how determined Mr. de Villepin is to stick to his guns, for example. But Europe has taken a big step in the right direction.

http://iranvajahan.net/cgi-bin/news_en.pl?l=en&y=2003&m=07&d=23&a=4

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Sham scenario of "Military Justice" to be played again

SMCCDI (Information Service)
Jul 23, 2003

The so-called investigations in the the case of the murdered Iranian-Canadian journalist have been entrusted to the Islamic regime's Military "justice" following the wave of indignation raised about the original decision to let Kazemi's assassin, Mortazavi, to investiagte the murder case.

It's to note that the new official decision follows the same exact path as another mascarade witnessed during the "Chain Murders" of 1997, when, the so-called regime's Military Justice investigated in the murders of several Iranian writers and opponents, such as the late Forouhars.

Several so-called rogue agents were arrested and one of them was eliminated under the label of "Having Committed Suicide in Prison with Depilatory Products"; While the real masterminds are still sitting in their leadership chairs.

http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_1355.shtml

White House:Iran Must Turn Over Any Al-Qaida It's Holding

July 23, 2003
Dow Jones Newswires
Alex Keto

WASHINGTON -- The Bush administration Wednesday reacted cautiously to the announcement from Tehran that Iran is holding al-Qaida suspects but added that, if that were true, Iran must turn the suspects over to face justice.

Earlier in the day, Intelligence Minister Ali Yunesi told reporters that Iran has "a large number of small and big-time elements of al-Qaida in custody."

The comments back up previous contentions by U.S. officials that al-Qaida terrorists fled to Iran. There has been speculation that al-Qaida members in Iran helped plan the bombings in Riyadh earlier this year and U.S. officials have questioned what Iran means by having the terrorists in their custody.

White House spokesman Scott McClellan repeated some of those points again.

"I'm not in a position where I can confirm the accuracy of those statements by the Iranians, nor am I exactly sure what the term 'custody' means. The statements would appear to confirm what we and others believe to be a significant al-Qaida presence in Iran, to include members of its senior leadership," McClellan said.

"These terrorists, we've made very clear, must be brought to justice. We, along with a number of our allies, have called on Iran to turn these terrorists over to the United States or to their countries of origin so that they will face justice for their terrorist activities," he added.

Yunesi gave no indication of what Iran plans to do with the al-Qaida suspects he said his country is holding. In the past, Iran has offered to turn over to Saudi Arabia any al-Qaida suspects that come from that country.

On Monday, President George W. Bush accused both Syria and Iran of aiding and harboring terrorists and called the practice "unacceptable." He added any country that harbors terrorists will be held to account.

-By Alex Keto, Dow Jones Newswires; 202-862-9256; Alex.Keto@dowjones.com

http://iranvajahan.net/cgi-bin/news_en.pl?l=en&y=2003&m=07&d=23&a=8