State-owned television quoted the Assembly of Experts, a body of 83 senior clerics with the power to appoint or remove Iran's supreme leader, as saying Friday's rally reflected the "zeal and political vigilance of the people in their loyalty to the Islamic system."

The crowds, numbering more than 30,000 according to Iranian television, marched in Isfahan to denounce dissident senior Moslem cleric Hossein Ali Montazeri who has challenged the paramount power of Khamenei.

Montazeri, who last year questioned Khamenei's credentials, has been under virtual house arrest.

Iranian television also slammed the foreign media's coverage of the demonstrations, saying it showed their "hostility" to the Islamic republic.

Ahmad Montazeri, the eldest son of the dissident cleric, said his father's supporters called off their rally, due to be held at the prayers, to avoid potential clashes.

Residents in Isfahan said there were limited clashes between hard-line backers of Khamenei and some Montazeri supporters.

Pro-Khamenei marchers chanted "Death to Montazeri" and called him a "foreign agent," the residents told Reuters in Dubai by telephone.

Montazeri's son said the decision to cancel the rally showed that the dissidents did not want to jeopardize Iran's national security. "They do not take orders from me or anyone else and... they are not against Iran's government," Montazeri said.

He was reacting to charges by Khamenei who blasted the dissidents as "remnants" of exiled armed rebels and of a group
convicted of political crimes, and said they posed a threat to national security.
 
 
Iranians Call on G8 for Action Against Mullahs' Regime, Reuter,  May 15
 
BIRMINGHAM - Group of Eight leaders arriving in the central English city of Birmingham on Friday were greeted by
colorful, noisy protests from an array of pressure groups.

Around 100 Iranian dissidents calling for action against their country's Islamic rulers chanted and waved flags and banners with slogans such as "G8 cut off ties with Mullahs now."

The protesters from the National Council of Resistance of Iran accuses the Tehran government of carrying out political
executions and says 24 dissidents have been put to death in the past year.
 

Argentina Arrests 8 Iranians And Ousts 7 in Anti-Jewish Bombings, The New York Times, May 17
 
BUENOS AIRES - The Argentine government, saying it is nearing a breakthrough in the investigation of two bombings of Jewish centers in recent years, has arrested eight Iranian residents and ordered the expulsion of seven of Iran's eight embassy employees stationed here.

Senior officials say Argentina is close to breaking relations with Iran, acknowledging that U.S and Israeli intelligence officials have been correct for years in asserting that Tehran played a direct role in the 1992 bombing of the Israeli Embassy here and the 1994 bombing of the Argentine Israeli Mutual Association, the city's main Jewish community center. A total of 114 people died as a result of the two attacks.

At a news conference Friday night, Foreign Minister Guido Di Tella said "potential but very significant evidence" had prompted the government to downgrade relations with Tehran and consider even stronger actions in the next few days. He said Argentina would remove one of its two remaining diplomats in Tehran. Both nations had withdrawn their ambassadors after the 1994 bombing....

A federal judge, Juan Jose Galeano, the lead Argentine investigator in the case, has heard testimony in recent days linking Mohsen Rabbani, the former cultural attaché at the Iranian Embassy, to the two bombings. Several Iranian witnesses reportedly told the judge that the Iranian diplomat had falsified passports and even given orders to terrorists who carried out the attacks....

Argentine officials have given few details about their investigation, but Argentine newspapers reported Saturday that
government intelligence agents had intercepted telephone conversations from inside the Iranian Embassy strongly suggesting the complicity of Rabbani in the bombings.

Ismanian Khosrow, one of the Iranians arrested Friday, reportedly threatened Iranian officials in one of the intercepted
conversations that he would reveal what he knew of Iranian involvement in terrorist actions here unless he was paid an
unspecified amount of money.

In a statement, the NCR welcomed the decision by the government of Argentina to reduce its diplomatic ties with the
mullahs' regime. It called on that country to sever completely its diplomatic and commercial ties with Tehran's rulers.

The statement said that these revelations further underscores the need to impose political and economic sanctions against this regime by the G8 Summit.

The Iranian Resistance also called on governments of Switzerland, Italy, Austria and other countries to reactivate the files on mullahs' terrorism and bring those responsible for these crimes to justice.
 

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