BRIEF ON IRAN	
No. 575
Friday, January 17, 1997

Representative Office of
The National Council of Resistance of Iran
Washington, DC


Furious Over Peace Process Advance, Reuters, January 16

	TEHRAN - A deal on Palestinian self-rule in the West Bank town of Hebron
was only a face-saving agreement for U.S. and other mediators, Iran's
Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati said in remarks broadcast on Thursday....
	"...Now you see the peace process in the Middle East is in a deadlock and
after a long period of shuttle diplomacy between several countries, mainly
by the special representative of the United States in the Middle East Mr.
Dennis Ross, all of a sudden I heard that an agreement about the partial
withdrawal of the Israeli forces from Hebron has been signed," Velayati said
[in an interview with CNN].
	"I don't think this is a real peace agreement which could solve the very
complicated problems of Palestine. This is only for propaganda or
face-saving for those who have been involved in this shuttle diplomacy
between different parties," he added....


Economic and Social Hardship in Iran Cause Shocking Crimes, Reuters, January 9

	TEHRAN - Iranians have been shocked by a case in which two 16-year-old
lovers confessed to choking to death two younger members of the girl's rich
family and trying to kill her mother, apparently for opposing their marriage.
	The crimes, uncovered last week, sparked an outcry over youth problems in
Iran, an issue often debated in the strict Moslem country where some 70
percent of the country's 60 million people are below 30 years of age....
	"Many youths seem to have little hope for their future, ready to do
anything to secure a desired future," a high school teacher said....
	Tehran police chief Brigadier General Youssef Reza Abolfathi told the
program: "It is not really the 
first case, we have had a few others."...
	"Getting married is becoming an impossible dream for many young men because
the girl's family often demands that he should have an apartment and a good
job," he [an Iranian journalist] told Reuters. "They do not think of the
high rents and the shape of the job market."


Lead Pollution in Tehran, 50,000 Times Hazardous, The Journal of Commerce,
January 8

	TEHRAN - East of the huge lighted mosque that is the tomb of Ayatollah
Khomeini, they are flaring gas from a giant petroleum complex into the
night, creating a competing attraction with comets of flame.
	... It is also a monument to the government's failure to solve its
intractable problems of energy, pollution and waste....
	... Except in early morning hours, visibility on a clear day may be reduced
to a mile or less in a city that tumbles 22 miles from the apron of the
snow-topped Alborz mountains to the dusty industrial south.
	... Bloody noses are common even for short-term visitors, and hospitals are
said to be teeming with cases that are blamed on bad air.  According to
government statistics, the average Tehran resident inhales half a gram of
lead each day.
	In the United States, by comparison, Environmental Protection Agency
guidelines say anything more than 1/100,000 of a gram a day is hazardous....


Twenty Killed in Iranian Road Accident, Reuters, January 12 

	Twenty people died in Iran when a minibus they were riding in collided with
a truck carrying a crane, a local newspaper said on Sunday.
	Kayhan daily said 15 men, three women and one child died instantly in the
accident on Saturday and another died later in hospital.
	It said the accident occurred near Mashhad, 924 km (580 miles) east of Tehran.