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TEHRAN - Five elderly Iranian pilgrims making the Moslem pilgrimage to the holy Saudi city of Mecca have died of heart attacks during the past two days, the official news agency IRNA said Thursday.
The five, four women and one man, died while performing the pilgrimage, IRNA said, adding that a sixth had been killed by a car while crossing a street in Mecca.
Some 80,000 Iranian pilgrims are taking part in the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, known as the hajj.
All Moslems are required to perform
the pilgrimage at least once in their lives if they are financially and
physically able to do so.
Khatami According to Khatami
Khatami on Freedom of Expression
State Television, November. 18, 1997: "In Iran, only those adhere to Islam and the Leadership have the right to engage in political activity and existence."
State-controlled Ettela'at, July 10, 1991: "We consider videos to be much more dangerous than drugs.... The Ministry of Islamic Culture and Guidance is one of the most adamant opponents of legalizing the use of video sets in society."
State-controlled Ettela'at, July 10, 1991: "As the country's chief authority on culture and art, I say: Music is allowed in this country but improper music is banned."
Former Hostage Taker Has No Regret, The Boston Globe, March 16
TEHRAN - Twenty years ago, Fatimeh Jaliehpour was an 18-year-old leader among the Islamic student revolutionaries who stormed the US Embassy here and took 52 Americans hostage…
And though the shifting tides of history may make it seem that Jaliehpour has changed course, she says her views and her values have been constant…. Jaliehpour has always believed in democracy, she says, but only within the context of Islam. She says she believed in democracy when she charged into the US Embassy in 1979 and the United States branded her a terrorist….
For Americans, the grainy television images of that day - students storming the embassy's steel gates and blindfolded Americans paraded before cheering crowds - remain a symbol of the frightening power of Iran's Islamic revolution. And Iran's subsequent history of exporting its revolution has kept the nation under strict international sanctions, isolated as a ''rogue state.''…
To Jaliehpour and many of the students who took part, it is still puzzling how the embassy protest turned into a hostage-taking that lasted 444 days. The students thought the Americans would be held for only two days. But it became a powerful political tool that was co-opted by Khomeini's circle to consolidate its power.
Jaliehpour… has no apologies for her
actions… '''We… felt then and feel now that, as youth who loved their country
and loved their faith in Islam, that the work of the revolution, even taking
the embassy, was necessary at the time…''
Building More Prisons and Bogus Amnesty for Prisoners, Iran Zamin News Agency, March 23
Two weeks ago, the clerical regime claimed that by Khamenei, the order of mullahs' top leader, twenty five percent of prisoners would be released. However, on March 12, the mullahs' head of Prisons Organization, Morteza Bakhtiari, announced that in the new Iranian year (started on March 21), 14 new prisons would be inaugurated.
According to the regime's official news agency, IRNA, he said: "Construction of six camps in provinces of Fars (south west Iran), Mazandaran (northern Iran), Central, Isfahan, Eastern Azerbaijan and Hormozgan have been completed and they will be utilized gradually by the beginning of the next year."
"Five camps are being established in provinces of Tehran, Khorassan (eastern Iran), Kerman (southern Iran), Sistan, Balouchestan and Kermanshah (all in eastern Iran). Also three new repentant facilities in cities of Gorgan, Hamedan and Shahr-e-kord will be completed and opened."
It is worth noting that the regime's agents have repeatedly admitted that the situation in prisons is critical and have warned of the consequences.