The clerical regime’s president Khatami heaped praise on the Revolutionary Guards in a speech delivered at the annual seminar of Revolutionary Guards commanders on Wednesday.

Referring to the clerical regime’s unstable and shaky state especially in the wake of the extensive popular uprisings in Tehran, Tabriz and other cities, Khatami told the Guards: "We must be prepared to deal with any havoc."

"The Revolutionary Guards is the most popular revolutionary institution and the most revolutionary popular institution," he told the commanders of the military agency notorious for its role in suppression and terrorism. "The Guards Corps’ dignity as a revolutionary institution must be upheld."

The commanders included the 24 senior Guards commanders who wrote a threatening letter to Khatami during the July uprisings and gave him an ultimatum. "The reservoir of our patience is running low," they told Khatami. "We can no longer allow ourselves to tolerate this situation."
 
 

Amnesty International Slams Iran Death Sentences, Reuters, September 16

LONDON - Amnesty International condemned on Thursday death sentences passed against four people arrested in connection with student demonstrations in Iran last July.

The human rights organization called for the immediate halt of trials held in secrecy in Iran.

On Sunday the head of the Revolutionary Court system said four people had been sentenced to die for their role in the Tehran protests.

"The trial appears to have been conducted in complete secrecy and with no opportunity for a proper appeal procedure," Amnesty said in a statement.

Amnesty said it feared that some of those arrested may have been tortured in order to extract confessions.
 
 

EU Assembly Urges Iran to Suspend Death Sentences, Reuters, September 16

STRASBOURG - The European Parliament called on Iran on Thursday to suspend death sentences against four alleged leaders of student pro-democracy protests in July.

In a resolution adopted by an overwhelming majority, the assembly urged Tehran to free all prisoners held for the student demonstrations and on spying charges, to "enable them freely to prepare their defense with the lawyers of their choice."

European Commission vice-president Neil Kinnock told the parliament the European Union's Finnish presidency was preparing a protest urging the death sentences not be carried out. The protest would be delivered in the coming days to the Iranian Foreign Ministry.

EU officials suggested on Wednesday that Iran's response will determine whether several high-level visits go ahead, including a planned trip by Austrian President Thomas Klestil.
 
 

Greens Call on Austrian President to Cancel Iran Visit, Agence France Presse, September 16

VIENNA - The leader of Austria’s Greens called on President Thomas Klestil Thursday cancel a planned trip to Iran next week because of death sentences handed down there against four leaders of recent pro-democracy demonstrations.

Alexander van der Bellen said in a statement issued by his party that the two-day visit, the first by a European head of state since the 1979 Islamic revolution in Tehran, would be inappropriate with the four executions looming.

Van der Bellen said the Klestil’s visit would lend a veneer of respectability to Iran despite its human rights and be an "insult" to the democratic opposition in Tehran.

The [President of] the National Council for Iranian Resistance, Massud Rajavi, protested the visit in a letter to Klestil on Monday.
 
 

21 Jail Terms Over Provincial Unrest, Agence France Presse, September 16

TEHRAN - An Iranian revolutionary court has sentenced 21 people to prison in connection with July’s bloody unrest in the provinces, including some linked to the outlawed opposition, newspapers reported Thursday.

The 21 were given prison sentences between three months and nine years for being the main instigators of the disturbances in the provincial capital of Tabriz, which erupted along with six days of riots in Tehran, the Hamshahri said.

Twelve are students while several of the others have links to the People’s Mujahedeen, the paper reported, citing the head of the revolutionary court in East Azerbaijan province, Najaf Aqazadeh.

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