BRIEF ON IRAN	
No. 595
Tuesday, February 18, 1997

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


Tehran Police Break up Mass Protest  by Oil Refinery Workers, Agence France
Presse, February 16

	TEHRAN - Police broke up a mass demonstration by oil refinery workers in
the Iranian capital on Sunday, detaining a large  number of people,
witnesses said....
	Police cordoned off the entire block on Taleghani street where the
ministry building is located as armored anti-riot police vehicles stood by
loaded with policemen equipped with batons, shields and other riot  gear.
	The police were backed up by dozens of plainclothes intelligence  officers
with walkie-talkies and Islamic militiamen called in to help  break up the
demonstration and disperse bystanders....
	There were rumors that another work stoppage in an oil refinery in the
southern city of Shiraz took place on December 18 and 19...
	"If the oil workers are unsatisfied over their pay imagine how the others
feel," said a bystander to the demonstration.
	An average worker in Iran is paid between 50 to 100 dollars a month.

[In a statement by the National Council of Resistance of Iran, which was
beamed into Iran via Resistance's Radio and Television satellite, Mr.
Massoud Rajavi, President of the NCR, hailed Tehran's oil refinery workers
and called on Iranian oil workers and people across the country to rise to
their aid and support.] 


U.S. Senators Urge Clinton to Isolate Mullahs, Support Democracy for Iran,
Dow Jones News, February 14

	WASHINGTON - Sen. Alfonse D'Amato, R-N.Y., and a bipartisan group of
senators including Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., are urging
President Clinton to ''maintain and intensify efforts to isolate the Iranian
regime.''...
	The group urged Clinton to ''put support for democracy and human rights at
the very center of your Iran policy. We strongly believe that the United
States can encourage democrats inside Iran by extending a hand of friendship
to the Iranian people.''
	A current report by the U.N. Human Rights Commission confirms that
political executions, discrimination and breaches of human rights have
reached an all-time high in Iran. 
	''A strong, free and democratic Iran is in America's long-term strategic
interest,'' the senators wrote.


Iranians Protest in Paris Against Tehran, Reuters, February 14

	PARIS - Several hundred opponents of Iran's government demonstrated in a
Paris cemetery Friday to protest against Tehran's alleged harassing of
exiles, police said.
	The protest in the Pere Lachaise cemetery marked the first anniversary of
the assassination of Zahra Rajabi, a Paris-based leader of the National
Council of Resistance of Iran. She was gunned down Feb. 20, 1996, in
Istanbul, Turkey.
	Demonstrators denounced the "marked increase in Iranian-sponsored terrorism
and Europe's lenient policy toward it," a National Council of Resistance
statement said.
	Iranian dissidents accuse Tehran of sending commandos to Europe to kill
their leaders. French intelligence sources recently reported that Iran's
secret services were increasingly active in cracking down on opponents....


Bloody Anniversary, The Washington Post, Editorial, February 17

	For those who track censorship, particularly censorship by violence, the
last eight years have turned Valentine's Day into an anniversary of a
grimmer sort:  that of the 1989 Iranian decree, or fatwa, calling for the
death of novelist Salman Rushdie...  This year, the reminder comes from Iran
itself-along with, unfortunately, clear hints of a politics that has wider
implications and menaces for writers other than Mr. Rushdie.
	One case that has sparked worry among the American and European groups that
track abuses against writers is the tale of the Iranian literary editor and
critic Faraj Sarkuhi, who was arrested, freed and rearrested earlier this
winter in a saga
that is still not fully clear....
	It's far from clear what's happening in Iran or how many different
interests are being played out.  But the danger to these writers isn't past,
nor is the need to keep watch against the viciousness of this brand of
censorship by terror. 


German Prosecutor Accuses Tehran Again, Reuters, February 14

	BERLIN - A German prosecutor on Thursday renewed accusations of "state
terrorism" against Iran over a 1992 Berlin murder of Kurdish dissidents and
vowed he would not be intimidated by threats from Tehran.
	State prosecutor Bruno Jost also accused Iran of trying to discredit a key
witness in the trial with a mix of "half-truths, slanders, lies and false
accusations."
	"A background of state terrorism has been clearly proved," he said....