The city of Isfahan in central Iran was the site of extensive, violent clashes on Thursday, July 1, between State Security Forces agents and young protesters that lasted for three hours.

As people crowded the Park Complex for week-end strolls, State Security Forces agents began harassing the young people and tried to arrest several teenagers on charges of "immoral demeanor." As the dispute between city residents and the Revolutionary Guards escalated, clashes broke out. The Guards fired into the air, while angry protesters chanted slogans against the clerical regime's leaders and responded to the Guards' attacks by throwing stones and bottles at them.

The Revolutionary Guards arrested at least 15 protesters and the people dispersed after three hours.

In a separate development, the regime's suppressive agents clashed with peddlers in the grand bazaar of Tabriz (northwest Iran) on Thursday, July 1. Scuffles broke out after agents of the "Task Force for Removal of Obstruction of Public Passages" tried to confiscate the booths owned by peddlers. They were backed by State Security Forces agents. People present on the scene of the clash sided with the peddlers.
 
 

Condemning Iran, The Washington Times, July 5

Don't expect Rep. Benjamin A. Gilman to be looking for a moderate in Iran.

The Chairman of the House International Relations Committee says the arrest of 13 Jews on espionage charges shows Iran has not changed under President Mohammad Khatami, whom many Western analysts believe is a moderate.

The New York Republican said Iran's actions prove it is not "rehabilitating itself."

Mr. Gilman said the Iranian Jews arrested in March "are innocent religious and community leaders" - not spies for the United States and Israel.

His committee last week passed a resolution that calls on Congress to condemn the arrests.

"[The resolution] notes Iran's poor human rights record, especially among minority groups," Mr. Gilman said.

"It calls on all countries with diplomatic and economic relations with Iran to condemn these arrests and urge the release of these prisoners."

"It expresses the sense of Congress that the United States should maintain current policy toward Iran until it improves its human rights record."
 
 

French Parliament Head Warns Iran Not To Hang Jews, Reuter, July 2

PARIS - The president of France's National Assembly, Laurent Fabius, warned Iran on Friday that Western governments could break diplomatic ties with Tehran if it executed 13 Jews arrested on charges of spying for Israel.

Calling on Tehran to spare the 13, Fabius, a former prime minister, said: "If that is not the case, they (Iran) can no longer hope for normal relations with the international community, for whom the rules of law, justice and freedom of conscience are inextricably linked to democracy."
 
 

Scandal Rocks Mullahs' Secret Service, Reuters, July 6

TEHRAN - The case has all the elements of a classic spy thriller -- serial murders, a mysterious suicide in the upper ranks of the intelligence service and a missing body.

Iran's widening security scandal has sent government officials, leading politicians and senior clerics scurrying for cover and raised doubts about the future of the country's feared secret service.

Last month's announcement that a former deputy intelligence minister and a prime suspect in last autumn's "mystery murders" of at least four secularist dissidents had died in custody, reportedly by ingesting deadly depilatory powder, fell like a bombshell among Iran's ruling establishment.

Three weeks later, questions surrounding the case still far outnumber answers, denting the reputation of a security service that has long been more a law unto itself than a wing of the executive branch of government.

Did the suspect Saeed Emami outwit his jailers and swallow deadly hair remover to seal his mouth forever? Was the contraband powder strong enough to do the job, or was he murdered? And where is the body of Emami, in the "martyrs' plot" of the national cemetery or hidden in an unmarked grave?

Or was the whole thing, perhaps, part of an elaborate ruse by Emami's protectors in the ministry, allowing him to escape abroad?

On Sunday the special prosecutor in the Emami case postponed for one week a news conference at which he was to give the latest details of his investigation. One newspaper quickly pointed out the new date, July 12, coincides with Tehran's big soccer derby, when the entire capital will be too busy with football frenzy to have much time for murder mysteries.

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