Islamic World

Tehran, June 30: Iran’s top legislative body confirmed on Monday the results of a disputed June 12 election which was won by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, state broadcaster IRIB reported.

“The secretary of the Guardian Council in a letter to the interior minister announced the final decision of the Council … and declares the approval of the accuracy of the results of … the presidential election,” IRIB said.

The decision followed a partial recount of the election.

Tehran, June 29: Iran’s top legislative body confirmed on Monday the results of a disputed June 12 election which was won by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad,
state broadcaster IRIB reported.

“The secretary of the Guardian Council in a letter to the interior minister announced the final decision of the Council … and declares the approval of the accuracy of the results of … the presidential election,” IRIB said.

The Council decision followed a partial recount of the election.

–Agencies

Tehran, June 29: Iran’s top legislative body, the Guardian Council, Monday approved the result of the country’s disputed June 12 election, confirming incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as president.

–Agencies

Tehran, June 29: Iran dismissed the idea of downgrading diplomatic relations with Britain today despite soaring tensions between the two countries after Iranian authorities detained local British Embassy employees for allegedly stirring up post-election unrest.

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Britain has angrily denied that any Iranian staff at its embassy in Tehran have been involved in opposition challenges to the regime. Yesterday, the European Union condemned the detentions as “harassment and intimidation” and demanded the immediate release of those still in custody.

Corfu, June 29: The European Union wants to restart talks on Iran’s nuclear program, the bloc’s top foreign policy official said Sunday, even as its foreign ministers condemned the country for its crackdown on demonstrators and rights groups.

“The EU urges the Iranian government to restore and respect the freedom of media, press and all instruments used by the Iranian public to pursue democratic dialogue,” the EU’s 27 foreign ministers said a statement after a two-hour meeting on the western Greek island of Corfu.

Tehran, June 29: No Iranian presidential candidates had filed complaints as a Monday deadline approached in the country’s disputed presidential election, state-run Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting reported.

The powerful conservative Guardian Council last week extended the deadline for filing complaints after two candidates — Mir Hossein Moussavi and Mehdi Karrubi — questioned the legitimacy of the June 12 vote count.

Baghdad, June 29: Iraq is this week due to unveil which foreign firms have won contracts to develop its oil and gas fields, nearly four decades after Saddam Hussein’s party nationalised the country’s energy infrastructure.

The deals, likely to be announced live on television, will provide the government with much-needed revenue as it struggles to rebuild the country after three wars and 20 years of debilitating economic sanctions.

Tehran, June 29: Iranian Majlis Speaker Ali Larijani has recommended the US administration to abandon its “interfering” policies and respect rights of all nations.

“This change will be beneficial both to the region and to the US itself,” Larijani said in an address to the 21st Executive Committee meeting of the Parliamentary Union of the OIC Member States in Algerian capital Algiers on Sunday.

“Terrorism and occupation are two sides of a coin. Islamic countries should try to make occupiers cease their occupation in order to put an end to terrorism,” he added.

Tehran, June 29: Iran’s Guardian Council has offered opposition leader Mir-Hossein Moussavi a deal to settle the dispute over alleged fraud in the June 12 presidential election. Council spokesman Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei said a special committee would be formed to review the disputed poll results that gave president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a victory.

Baghdad, June 29: Sheik Maher Sirhan says his interrogators tortured him with electric rods and demanded $50,000 in cash to free him from the Iraqi jail where he is being held on terrorism charges.

But the Sunni Arab paramilitary leader, who has worked closely with U.S. forces, says he is hanging tough.

Babylon & Beyond: Times Mideast blog”I said that I’m not giving you the money,” Sirhan said in a phone conversation from his latest jail cell. “There is a government and coalition forces. Justice will release me, not you.”

Tehran, June 29: Iranian authorities have barred journalists for international news organizations from reporting on the streets and ordered them to stay in their offices. This report is based on the accounts of witnesses reached in Iran and official statements carried on Iranian media.

Several thousand protesters — some chanting “Where is my vote?” — clashed with riot police in Tehran on Sunday as Iran detained local employees of the British Embassy, escalating the regime’s standoff with the West and earning it a stinging rebuke from the European Union.

Tehran, June 28: Iran has detained several local British embassy staff, sparking a new row with Britain on Sunday that underscored the hardline leadership’s effort to blame post-election unrest on foreign powers, not popular anger.

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband demanded the release of all the staff still held and said his European Union colleagues had agreed to a “strong, collective response” to any such “harassment and intimidation” against EU missions.

Tehran, June 28: Defeated Iranian presidential candidate Mehdi Karroubi on Sunday demanded an independent panel to probe irregularities in the disputed Presidential Election.

“If an independent panel is set up by the Guardians Council with full responsibility to investigate all aspects of the election, I will welcome it and later nominate my representative,” the reformist Karroubi wrote in a letter to the council which was published in his newspaper Etemad Melli.

Baghdad, June 28: Iraq’s prime minister blames Arab states for fanning the flames of violence in his country by turning a blind eye to the rulings of hard-line religious leaders.

As US troops are preparing to leave the Iraqi cities, there has been a wave of deadly terrorist attacks, which has killed hundreds of Iraqis.

Nouri al-Maliki did not mention any country or group by name, but said, “There are states, which are silent on fatwas (Islamic decrees) urging killings and branding others as infidels,” Iraq’s Azzaman newspaper reported on Saturday.

Tehran, June 28: Iran’s hardline president lashed out anew at the United States and President Barack Obama on Saturday, accusing him of interference and suggesting that Washington’s stance on Iran’s post-election turmoil could imperil Obama’s aim of improving relations.

“We are surprised at Mr Obama,” Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in remarks to judiciary officials broadcast on state television. “Didn’t he say that he was after change? Why did he interfere?”

Tehran, June 28: Intensifying the unrest in Iran, the authorities on Sunday arrested eight local staff at the British Embassy in Tehran.

According to Iran’s Press TV, the staff has been arrested for their role in recent unrest in the country following the disputed June 12 Presidential Election.

Earlier, Iran had ordered a BBC correspondent to leave the country and lawmakers called for Tehran to review its often strained relations with London.

Tehran, June 28: Iranian opposition leader Mir Hossein Moussavi Saturday refused to support a panel set up by the electoral watchdog Guardian Council to conduct a partial recount of votes in the disputed presidential election, a media report said.

Refusing to be cowed by attacks on his party offices, Moussavi again demanded for fresh polls.

“Limiting the probe into complaints about electoral irregularities to recounting 10 percent of the ballot boxes cannot attract people’s trust and convince public opinion about the results,” Moussavi said on his campaign website.

Tehran, June 27: Iran’s hardline president is lashing out anew at the United States and President Barack Obama. Ahmadinejad, who was re-elected this month in disputed vote says the U.S. response to the turmoil is a mistake.

He hints it could imperil Obama’s aim of improving relations with Tehran.

“Why did he interfere?” Ahmadinejad said in remarks to judiciary officials shown on Iranian state television Saturday.

“They keep saying that they want to hold talks with Iran but is this the correct way? Definitely, they have made a mistake,” Ahmadinejad said.

Tehran, June 27: A woman unfolds the pre-Islamic revolution Iranian national flag as she stands next to photographs… Enlarge Photo A woman unfolds the pre-Islamic revolution Iranian national flag as she stands next to photographs…

Iran has banned an ally of the country’s opposition leader Mirhossein Mousavi from leaving the Islamic state, the official IRNA news agency reported on Saturday.

Abolfazl Fateh, head of Mousavi’s media office, said the ban would not change his political stance, adding he was banned from leaving Iran because of his role in post-election developments.

Kabul, June 27: President Hamid Karzai is calling on Taliban and other militants to “vote for the president they want” in Afghanistan’s Aug. 20 presidential election.

Karzai is also telling the militants that they should vote for the provincial council delegates they support. Karzai was speaking during a news conference Saturday at the presidential palace.

Forty-one candidates are running for president. A recent poll showed Karzai with a big lead over his opponents despite the increasingly bloody Taliban-led insurgency.

Tehran, June 27:Iran’s Guardian Council has offered opposition leader Mir-Hossein Moussavi a deal to settle the dispute over alleged fraud in the June 12 presidential election.
Council spokesman Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei said a special committee would be formed to review the disputed election results that gave President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a controversial victory.

The council also called on Moussavi and fellow defeated presidential candidate Mehdi Karroubi to send representatives within 24 hours to join the committee.

Tehran, June 27: President Barack Obama on Friday praised the bravery of Iranians who protested against a disputed election in the face of “outrageous” violence, while a hardline Iranian cleric called for the execution of leading “rioters”.

Iran’s top legislative body, which had said it found no major violations in the presidential election which set off the worst unrest since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, said 10 percent of ballot boxes would be recounted.

Tehran, June 27: A senior Iranian cleric yesterday called for protesters to be executed as “enemies of Allah”, as authorities came one step closer to formally declaring Mahmoud Ahmadinejad winner of the disputed election.

Teheran, June 27: A senior cleric on Friday urged Iran’s protest leaders to be punished ‘without mercy’ and said some should face execution — harsh calls that signal a nasty new turn in the regime’s crackdown on demonstrators two weeks after its disputed election.

Hard-liners have ordered long sentences and hangings before, and some fear those awaiting trial by a judiciary whose verdicts reflect the will of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei could face the most severe punishments the Islamic system can dish out.

Washington, June 27: President Barack Obama’s criticism of Iran escalated Friday into an unusually personal war of words. To Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s demand he apologize for meddling, Obama shot back that the regime should “think carefully” about answers owed to protesters it has arrested, bludgeoned and killed.

“The violence perpetrated against them is outrageous,” Obama said. “We see it and we condemn it.”