Back to Brief on Iran
TEHRAN - Iranian youths stoned banks and fought municipal workers who tried to demolish illegal buildings in a teeming Tehran suburb, Iran's official news agency IRNA said on Tuesday.
The agency said the youths broke windows and caused other damage at the two bank branches in the poor southeastern suburb of Massoudieh on Monday night.
It said the unrest ended after police detained some demonstrators who had chanted 'Death to the Mayor' while marching to protest against the attempted demolitions.
The unrest followed a long-standing conflict between residents and officials refusing to issue building permits for areas designated for public parks, IRNA reported.
Sporadic clashes have erupted in Tehran in the past few years over attempts by city workers to raze illegal buildings and remove squatters.
In 1995, some 16 people were killed and dozens arrested in rioting over demands for fresh water and lower bus fares in another working-class suburb south of Tehran.
Officials and newspapers have repeatedly
called for action to deal with an acute housing shortage in the capital
which has an estimated population of 10 million.
Mullahs Do Not Even Spare Their Own, Torture Exposed, The Washington Post, July 6
TEHRAN - The mayor of the Iranian capital, being tried on corruption and embezzlement charges, sparred with his judge yesterday, calling his trial a sham built on false confessions and torture.
Gholamhossein Karabschi, whose trial has gripped Iran since it opened a month ago, denied all charges against him and again accused authorities of torturing senior municipality officials to extract false confessions to be used against him.
"You've set up a group of 70 men, most of whom have little more than a high school education, and put them in charge of this investigation. They take each person into a basement and emerge with a confession. What is the meaning of this?" Karbaschi asked the court.
Karbaschi's trial is widely seen as
an attempt by hard-liners in the ruling clergy to topple key officials
allied with… Khatami. Karbaschi ran Khatami's election campaign last year.
Iranian Defector Speaks Out, Associated Press, July 7
SANTA MONICA, Calif. - The son of the former commander of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard says he fled his country to help spread the word about an oppressive regime that assassinates opponents and sponsors terrorism.
"The Iranian government is giving arms or money to Hamas or the Palestinians to fight Israel. The Iranian government is helping Hezbollah to fight with Israel," Ahmad Rezai, a mathematics student, said Monday through a translator.
Rezai said … hard-liners loyal to the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, continue to wield power -- and support terrorists abroad.
"It is not only Lebanon that the Iranian
government is helping, also in Afghanistan, and in Azerbaijan and in Bosnia,
Algeria as well," said Rezai, son of Maj. Gen. Mohsen Rezai.
100% Unemployment Increase Predicted, Agence France Presse, July 7
TEHRAN - Iranian parliamentarians called for action to boost economic growth and combat surging unemployment during a closed-door session on the job crisis on Tuesday.
"Controlling unemployment requires major investment, both public and private," said Bagher Nobakht, a member of the conservative majority in parliament.
"To overcome this crisis, we need growth of 6.5 percent while it is barely one percent at the moment," Nobakht, an economic specialist, told state television.
He said the debate was attended by Labour Minister Hossein Kamali and several other government officials.
According to official statistics, more than 14.5 million Iranians have a job out of a total population of 60 million.
Iran is going through severe economic difficulties and unrest over the increasing unemployment, particularly among young people, is mounting although it is rarely reported in the official media.
Parliamentarian and labor leader Ali Reza Mahjub warned in April that the ranks of the unemployed would double because of the number of young people joining the labor force each year.
"As Iran has 37 million young people under the age of 24 out of 60 million inhabitants, the country will soon see a 100 percent increase in the unemployment rate," Mahjub said.