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BAGHDAD - The Iranian Mujahideen Khalq opposition group said on Monday it had foiled a car bomb attack by Iranian agents near its offices in the center of Baghdad.
The group said its guards had found the car -- laden with gas canisters loaded with explosives and linked to remote control devices -- parked 250 meters from its office.
"This sinister act of terrorism, which above all targeted innocent people, was carried out by agents dispatched by the clerical regime (in Tehran)," said a statement.
Reporters who visited the scene saw two large canisters filled with explosives, nails and sand in the boot of the car.
"It is a powerful bomb designed to cause a lot of damage and a lot of casualties," a Mujahideen official said.
The group also released photographs
of what it said were the remains of a car bomb planted by Iranian agents
which exploded near its Camp Habib base in southern Iraq on Saturday, wounding
one of its members and two Iraqi civilians.
State-run Hospital Detains Cash-Strapped Patients, Reuters, September 26
TEHRAN - An Iranian hospital has set up a cell to detain patients who are unable to pay their medical bills, a newspaper reported on Sunday.
Sina, a state-run hospital in central Tehran, has stationed three guards on the cell in its orthopedic unit around the clock, the daily Aftab-e Emrouz said.
"To make sure patients will fulfil their financial obligations, we began detaining patients who fail to pay several months ago," it quoted the unnamed director of hospital as saying.
"We had no other choice. We have to pay our staff and had to assign a room for this purpose."
The newspaper said the hospital locked up an average of 24 patients a month because they could not pay.
It has also been forced to readmit two inmates for treatment because of injuries they suffered while trying to escape, it quoted several nurses as saying.
Aftab said some officials at the hospital
were concerned about the rising cost of feeding and clothing the detainees,
some of whom have been languishing in the cell for months.
Student Play Sets Off Crisis in Mullahs’ Regime, Reuters, September 27
TEHRAN - A satirical play in a little-known campus journal has sent shock waves through Iran, exposing deep rifts in the ranks of ruling clerics.
The sketch, which invoked one of the holiest figures in Shi'ite Islam to lampoon campus conservatives, has been universally condemned by clerics, ministers, MPs and judges as an unforgivable insult to Islamic sanctities.
[According to Associated Press, "Khatami joined the conservatives in denouncing the play as blasphemous."]
One senior ayatollah decreed death a fitting punishment for the young playwrights, arrested last week by the secret police.
A senior police official, General Gholamreza Naqdi, told the police forces he was prepared to carry out the sentence himself.
"These people who have insulted the sanctities, even if they are sentenced to 20 years in jail, if I am alive when they get out, I will find them and carry out the command of God," newspapers quoted Naqdi as saying.
At issue is the clerical establishment's monopoly over religious interpretation in an Islamic republic.
"How long can we remain silent before the people who are making fun of our religious beliefs in the name of freedom?" demanded the Society of Militant Clergy.
Almost lost in the rhetoric is the fate of the two students, identified by campus sources as Mohammad Reza Namnamat and Hamed Ahangari, both editors of "The Wave." They were arrested by the Intelligence Ministry September 23.
Since their arrest, nothing has been
heard of the two students and campus leaders said they had no information
on their whereabouts or the conditions of their detention.
Birth Anniversary of Khomeini Amid Bitter Factional Struggle, Agence France Presse, September 27
TEHRAN - Iran’s Islamic regime on Monday marked the centenary of the birth of Khomeini amid an increasingly bitter struggle between his successors over his legacy.
Despite efforts to create a festive atmosphere, the centenary comes just two months after the worst unrest here since the 1979 Islamic revolution and is marked by a fierce struggle between Khomeini’s successors.
The past two years have been marked by increasing tensions between the two opposing factions following a systematic clampdown by the conservatives against Khatami’s faction.