Iran S Islamic

A crucial civil rights issue receives dull, inelegant scrutiny in "Iranian Taboo," director Reza Allamehzadeh's documentary that attempts to shed light on the persecution and scapegoating of members of the Bahá'í faith by Iran's Islamic regime. Allamehzadeh, reportedly banned from entering his native Iran (friends secretly filmed "Taboo's" Iran-set footage, while the director shot in such countries as France and Israel), takes an unsatisfying, two-pronged approach to this complex subject.

A crucial civil rights issue receives dull, inelegant scrutiny in "Iranian Taboo," director Reza Allamehzadeh's documentary that attempts to shed light on the persecution and scapegoating of members of the Bahá'í faith by Iran's Islamic regime. Allamehzadeh, reportedly banned from entering his native Iran (friends secretly filmed "Taboo's" Iran-set footage, while the director shot in such countries as France and Israel), takes an unsatisfying, two-pronged approach to this complex subject.

Reporting from Beirut — A Russian-made passenger airplane caught fire during an emergency landing in northeastern Iran this morning, injuring dozens of people aboard in the latest in a string of Iranian civil aviation and transport mishaps. All 157 passengers and 13 crew members aboard Taban Air Flight 6437 survived as the Tupolev-154 aircraft caught fire on the tarmac of Mashhad International Airport, local media reported. At least 45 people were hospitalized. Experts say poor maintenance and management as well as international sanctions on Iran over its nuclear research and development program have taken a toll on Iran's civil aviation sector.

Iran hanged the leader of an outlawed Islamic militant group Sunday after convicting him on charges of terrorism, murder and collaborating with Western intelligence services, including the CIA, state television reported. Abdol-Majid Rigi, also known as Abdulmalak Rigi, was executed in Tehran's Evin Prison in the presence of the families of the victims of his alleged crimes, state television said. Among other charges, he was found guilty of heresy and corruption on Earth, capital offenses under Iran's Islamic law. State television claimed the rebel leader acknowledged in court that his crimes contravened Islam and humanity and asked his collaborators not to repeat his mistakes.

Iran hanged the leader of an outlawed Islamic militant group Sunday after convicting him on charges of terrorism, murder and collaborating with Western intelligence services, including the CIA, state television reported. Abdol-Majid Rigi, also known as Abdulmalak Rigi, was executed in Tehran's Evin Prison in the presence of the families of the victims of his alleged crimes, state television said. Among other charges, he was found guilty of heresy and corruption on Earth, capital offenses under Iran's Islamic law. State television claimed the rebel leader acknowledged in court that his crimes contravened Islam and humanity and asked his collaborators not to repeat his mistakes.

An Iranian American who alleges he was tortured in Iran for converting to the Mormon faith and for allowing mixed dancing at his wedding has filed a lawsuit against the Islamic republic, activists announced Tuesday at a human rights conference in Los Angeles. Ghollam Nikbin, 56, was whipped with an electric cable on his bare soles, flogged with a leather whip and hung upside-down during interrogation and punishment by Iran's security forces in the mid-1990s, he said this week.

Iran has sentenced an accused member of an exiled opposition group to death, Amnesty International said in an appeal for Tehran to rescind the ruling. Mohammad Reza Ali Zamani is the first person to be sentenced to death in connection with the unrest triggered by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's disputed June 12 re-election, the human rights group said. He was among about 100 people on trial since August who are accused of offenses ranging from rioting to spying and seeking to topple Iran's Islamic rulers.

Re "Don't Throw a Lifeline to a Failing Iran," Commentary, Nov. 11: History easily proves that shunning a nation does not encourage the fall of a regime within it. If anything, the opposite is true. Glaring examples are Iraq and Cuba. American policy has, in effect, strengthened and maintained those regimes. Anybody who knows anything about political doctrines that have a "mystic" ideology, either religious, nationalistic or intellectual, knows they do not unravel overnight. They weaken over a long period, as the "dream" is never fulfilled and the bulk of the population (including the intellectuals)

Iran has ordered members of the Bahai faith formerly employed by the government to pay back their lifetime earnings, the National Assembly of the Bahais in Britain said Friday. The judicial order led to a sharp rise in the number of arrests among followers of the 300,000-strong religion in Iran, a statement issued by the Bahai assembly said. It added that 101 believers have been jailed since September, most of them for failing to comply with the repayment order because of financial problems.

Iran on Thursday ordered three Italian diplomats to leave the country because an Italian television program mocked the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. The Islamic Republic News Agency said the Foreign Ministry told Italian Ambassador Giuseppe Baldocci that the three diplomats must leave Iran within a week. Baldocci also was ordered to close the Italian cultural center in Tehran. Two of the Italians were identified in the IRNA report as commercial attache Francisco A.

Tens of thousands of government supporters streamed into Tehran's Azadi Square on Thursday to commemorate the 31st anniversary of the Islamic Revolution, state television showed, as plainclothes and uniformed security forces faced off against anti-government protesters. The opposition news website Rahesabz.net reported that security forces opened fire on demonstrators north of the square, but there was no independent confirmation. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad delivered a defiant keynote speech broadcast live on television, condemning the West for its interference in the Middle East, hailing his nation's efforts to uplift the poor and oppressed and promoting his country's headlong drive to master nuclear technology, which has spurred international worries that Iran is pursuing atomic weapons.

Reporting from Beirut — A Russian-made passenger airplane caught fire during an emergency landing in northeastern Iran this morning, injuring dozens of people aboard in the latest in a string of Iranian civil aviation and transport mishaps. All 157 passengers and 13 crew members aboard Taban Air Flight 6437 survived as the Tupolev-154 aircraft caught fire on the tarmac of Mashhad International Airport, local media reported. At least 45 people were hospitalized. Experts say poor maintenance and management as well as international sanctions on Iran over its nuclear research and development program have taken a toll on Iran's civil aviation sector.

Iran has sentenced an accused member of an exiled opposition group to death, Amnesty International said in an appeal for Tehran to rescind the ruling. Mohammad Reza Ali Zamani is the first person to be sentenced to death in connection with the unrest triggered by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's disputed June 12 re-election, the human rights group said. He was among about 100 people on trial since August who are accused of offenses ranging from rioting to spying and seeking to topple Iran's Islamic rulers.

tehran -- They do the jobs that few Iranians would consider. For $11 a day, the Afghans mend shoes, haul bricks, dig drainage channels, push giant wheelbarrows of scavenged debris through treacherous ribbons of cars. It has been this way since the various wars in Afghanistan sent an estimated 2 million refugees flooding into neighboring Iran. Since April, however, more than 160,000 Afghans have been rounded up and sent home.

Iranian President Mohammad Khatami called on Islamic countries Friday to convene an emergency meeting to discuss what he called the catastrophe in Iraq, particularly the standoff in Najaf. Khatami urged the 57-member Organization of the Islamic Conference to hold the summit to decide on immediate action to end the escalating violence in the holy city, where militiamen loyal to Shiite Muslim cleric Muqtada Sadr have been fighting U.S. and Iraqi forces.

An Iranian American who alleges he was tortured in Iran for converting to the Mormon faith and for allowing mixed dancing at his wedding has filed a lawsuit against the Islamic republic, activists announced Tuesday at a human rights conference in Los Angeles. Ghollam Nikbin, 56, was whipped with an electric cable on his bare soles, flogged with a leather whip and hung upside-down during interrogation and punishment by Iran's security forces in the mid-1990s, he said this week.

Wright states that under Iran's Islamic system, it takes two female witnesses to equal the testimony of one man in court. Unless I'm doing my arithmetic incorrectly, that means that in Iran a man is valued as one whole human being, and a woman's value is one-half that. But Islam is not alone in this matter. If all human souls are pieces from the same God, and therefore completely equal, why do most religions expect the female half of the human population to subjugate itself to the male half just because they have a different set of genitals?

What do Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and Humbert Humbert have in common? Not much, at first glance -- the stern leader of Iran's Islamic revolution; the depraved but eloquent antihero of Vladimir Nabokov's most famous fiction, "Lolita." But U.S.-educated Azar Nafisi, who taught Western literature at universities in Tehran from 1979 to 1995, knows better. Khomeini was a visionary who tried to drag Iran back to the 6th century, the time of the prophet Muhammad.

What do Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and Humbert Humbert have in common? Not much, at first glance -- the stern leader of Iran's Islamic revolution; the depraved but eloquent antihero of Vladimir Nabokov's most famous fiction, "Lolita." But U.S.-educated Azar Nafisi, who taught Western literature at universities in Tehran from 1979 to 1995, knows better. Khomeini was a visionary who tried to drag Iran back to the 6th century, the time of the prophet Muhammad.

Re "Don't Throw a Lifeline to a Failing Iran," Commentary, Nov. 11: History easily proves that shunning a nation does not encourage the fall of a regime within it. If anything, the opposite is true. Glaring examples are Iraq and Cuba. American policy has, in effect, strengthened and maintained those regimes. Anybody who knows anything about political doctrines that have a "mystic" ideology, either religious, nationalistic or intellectual, knows they do not unravel overnight. They weaken over a long period, as the "dream" is never fulfilled and the bulk of the population (including the intellectuals)