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TEHRAN - A businessman convicted of swindling customers was hanged in Tehran on Monday, newspapers reported.
A revolutionary court in Tehran ordered him hanged after describing him as "a corrupt of the earth," a crime in Iran that automatically carries the death penalty.
Another man was also hanged in Tehran after being convicted of throwing acid on two young girls.
The man had first been sentenced to 10 years in jail but the supreme court changed the sentence to hanging after objections from the girls' families.
The sentences come a day after the Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Mohammad Yazdi insisted on tough penal sentences and vowed not to show mercy to criminals.
The law sets out the death penalty for a number of crimes, including major drug trafficking, adultery and spying.
Former Political Prisoner Assassinated, Iran Zamin News Agency, November 30
A former political prisoner, Reza Pirzadi, was assassinated by terrorist agents of the clerical regime in Pakistan on November 26, reports say. Pirzadi, 45, was a warrant officer, freed two years ago from Iranshahr prison in southeastern Iran.
Last Thursday, before sunset, six terrorists kidnapped Pirzadi from his home in Panjgore, Pakistan and shot him by machine gun. The terrorists then returned his body back to his home and left it there.
Backlash in Iran, US News & World Report, December 7
…The conservatives who dominate parliament are pushing for tighter restrictions on women. Their latest proposal would prohibit male doctors from treating female patients, paving the way for segregation of hospitals for men and women. The Council of Guardians, an oversight body, rejected the bill on a technicality–lack of funding. But an amended version, with financing, has been resubmitted. If it goes ahead, Iran may rival Afghanistan for the most egregious discrimination in health care.
Iranian doctors have no doubt that the proposal would result in unequal treatment. "If you want to go back to the Stone Age, it can be done. But this is the modern age," says Sadegh Mahboobin, an orthopedist who treats women for osteoporosis at the Tehran Clinic Hospital. Of the 33 doctors there, only five are women…The backlash is also being felt in other areas…
Iranian Police Prevent March, Agence France Presse, November 30
TEHRAN - Iranian police on Monday prevented around 1,000 people seeking to march in Tehran Monday following a memorial service for slain Dariush Foruhar and his wife.
Witnesses said the mourners started to march in the streets after the service demanding an end to "repression and insecurity," but police immediately ordered the crowd to disperse.
"Security, security," chanted the crowd, which also demanded the arrest of the murderers.
Foruhar and his wife Parvaneh were stabbed to death at their home on November 22.
People of Isfahan Clash with Guards, Iran Zamin News Agency, November 26
On November 24, an extensive clash broke out between residents of Isfahan's Zeinabieh street and the Guards Corps and State Security Force's anti-riot forces, reports from Iran say. A large group of people staged a demonstration to protest shortage of kerosene. They chanted "death to Khamenei, death to Khatami."
Anti-riot forces opened fire to disperse the crowd and attacked the protesters with batons, but failed to disperse them. Authorities dispatched four water cannons but the protesters set two of them ablaze.
The clash continued for at least five hours. A large number of people were wounded and arrested.
Daily Accuses Saudis of "Betrayal", Agence France Presse, November 30
TEHRAN - A hardline Iranian newspaper accused Saudi Arabia on Monday of "betraying" OPEC interests by not doing enough to prevent the downward slide in oil prices.
"This sabotage seems to be dictated by the Americans. It is against the spirit of détente" currently governing Saudi-Iranian relations, the Jomhuri Islami newspaper said.
It accused the Saudis of secretly helping to keep crude prices low in a bid to gain a greater share of the US oil market.