Iran Says Detained Officer Involved in Man's Death During Arrest

An Iranian police officer allegedly involved in the death of a man during an arrest in the northeastern city of Mashhad has been detained, the judiciary's news agency reported Sunday.

The rare announcement of an investigation earlier today, and subsequent arrest of a law enforcement member, comes two weeks after Iran's judicial authority banned torture and other violations of defendants' rights.

"The offending officer... was arrested by the order of the military prosecutor's office," Mizan Online reported.

"Two other police officers who transferred the victim to the police station have also been investigated," it added.

The arrest comes after Khorasan Razavi province's police chief Mohammad-Kazem Taghavi announced an investigation into the incident, following reports by media outside Iran claiming the man "was poisoned by pepper spray."

"Special orders have been given ... for quickly investigating the case and finding out why and how" it happened, he told state news agency IRNA.

He expressed "regret" over the "incident" and said the results of the investigation will be announced soon.

The police were called to the scene over a 'family dispute' between the man and his ex-wife's family, IRNA said, adding that he died while being transferred to the police station.

According to Fars news agency, a video circulating on social media shows "a police officer using pepper spray and a taser in response to the arrested individual swearing at him".

"There are claims that the individual has died from suffocation due to being pepper sprayed," Fars added.

Mehdi Akhlaghi, an official with the province's judiciary said on Saturday that the man's family have pressed charges, IRNA reported.

Samples will be taken from the man's lung following autopsy to "investigate the impact of (pepper) spray on his death", Akhlaghi was quoted as saying.

Iran's judicial authority issued an order on October 15 banning torture, the use of "forced confessions", solitary confinement, illegal police custody and other violations of defendants' rights.

It came a week after controversy sparked by videos posted on social media showing police officers beating detainees in pickup trucks in the middle of a street.

In the videos, apparently filmed in Tehran, the detainees were also made to apologise for the "mistakes".

Iran's judiciary chief Ayatollah Ebrahim Raisi in response said the police action was a "case of violation of civil rights.”

He also ordered measures be taken against those responsible, saying it was "strictly forbidden to attack the accused, even if they are thugs.”

Photo: IRNA

Iranian Diplomat Held in Belgium Over 'Bomb Plot'

An Iranian diplomat was taken into custody in Belgium on Wednesday on suspicion of involvement in an alleged plot to bomb an Iranian opposition rally in France.

An investigating magistrate earlier questioned the Iranian, normally based in Vienna, in the northern Belgian city of Antwerp, the Federal Prosecutor's Office said in a statement.

Prosecutors said Tuesday that the suspect, previously identified as Assadollah Assadi, had been extradited to Belgium from Germany.

Tehran summoned the German ambassador on Wednesday to protest the extradition, which the foreign ministry said was "caused by a fabricated conspiracy by enemies of Iran and European relations.”

Iran has denied French accusations that Assadi was involved in a plot targeting an annual gathering of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI) on June 30 just outside Paris.

Belgian anti-terrorism prosecutors announced on July 2 that they had foiled the plot. They then requested the extradition of both Assadi and a man identified as Merhad A., who was detained in Paris.

Belgian police believe Mehrad A. is an accomplice of a husband and wife team caught in Brussels in possession of 500 grammes (about a pound) of the powerful explosive TATP and a detonator.

All three are Belgian nationals of Iranian origin.

The accusations come at a particularly sensitive time as Iran works with European powers to salvage the 2015 nuclear deal, abandoned by the United States earlier this year. 

Photo Credit: Wikicommons

Belgium Charges Two for Attack Plot on Iran Opposition in France

Belgium, France and Germany have detained six people, including an Iranian diplomat, over an alleged plot to bomb a weekend rally by an exiled Iranian opposition group in Paris, authorities and sources said Monday.

The apparent foiled attack was to have targeted a meeting of thousands of Iranian opposition supporters in a northern suburb of the French capital that was also attended by leading US figures, including close allies of President Donald Trump.

The developments came on the day Iranian President Hassan Rouhani arrived in Switzerland on a visit that Tehran said was of "crucial importance" for cooperation between the Islamic Republic and Europe after the US withdrawal from the Iranian nuclear agreement.

Rouhani is also due to visit Austria, which currently holds the six-month presidency of the European Union, and hosts the detained Iranian diplomat.

Iran's foreign minister dismissed the attack plot as a "false flag ploy" designed to overshadow Rouhani's tour. 

"How convenient: Just as we embark on a presidential visit to Europe, an alleged Iranian operation and its 'plotters' arrested," Mohammad Javad Zarif tweeted .

"Iran unequivocally condemns all violence and terror anywhere, and is ready to work with all concerned to uncover what is a sinister false flag ploy," he said.

Federal authorities in Brussels first revealed the arrests, charging a husband and wife described by prosecutors as Belgian nationals "of Iranian origin".

Amir S., 38, and Nasimeh N., 33, "are suspected of having attempted to carry out a bomb attack" on Saturday in the Paris suburb of Villepinte, during the conference organized by the People's Mujahedin of Iran, a statement from the Belgian federal prosecutor said.

The couple were carrying 500 grams (about one pound) of the volatile explosive TATP along with a detonator  when an elite police squad stopped them in a residential district of Brussels.

The statement said that an Iranian diplomat at the embassy in Vienna, a contact of the couple, was also detained in Germany.

In France, three people were taken into custody Saturday, a security source said on Monday—two of them later released.

In Belgium, police carried out five nationwide raids on Saturday, authorities said, though they refused to detail the results.
   
'Around the Corner' 

The Belgian statement said about 25,000 people attended the rally in France where people waved the red, green and white flag of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), and cheered its leader Maryam Rajavi.

The NCRI groups some exiled opposition organizations including the former rebel People's Mujahedin, which is banned in Iran.

At the rally, former New York mayor and Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani urged regime change in Iran, saying the prospect was closer than ever after the Islamic Republic was hit by a wave of strikes and protests.

Giuliani called for a boycott of companies "that continually do business with this regime".

"Freedom is right around the corner," he said of the recent protests in Iran.

Giuliani and other US politicians have been hugely paid to speak at the annual Paris rally in recent years. Republican firebrand and former House speaker Newt Gingrich also addressed the rally.

The People's Mujahedin, formed in the 1960s to overthrow the shah of Iran, fought the rise of the mullahs in Tehran following the 1979 Islamic revolution. 

It was listed as a "terrorist organization" by the US State Department in 1997 and was only removed from terror watchlists by the European Union in 2008 and Washington in 2012.

Belgium has been on high alert since the smashing of a terror cell in the town of Verviers in January 2015 that was planning an attack on police.

Photp Credit: EPA

Iran VP Says Government Against Using Force Over Hijab

Iran's vice president for women's affairs insisted Wednesday the government opposed using "force" to ensure women wear the hijab, after a spate of protests stirred debate over the mandatory headscarf.

Massoumeh Ebtekar told a press conference in Tehran that every country has a dress code: "There is no city in the world where you can walk naked in the streets and you won't be approached by a particular regulatory body."

She said Iran's hijab laws—which require women to wear a headscarf and long coat, as well as banning shorts for men—were a "social regulation."

"Our position is that it's a regulation but the use of force—we don't go along with that type of enforcement," she said.

"That is contrary to the basic principles and philosophy that the government of (President Hassan) Rouhani follows." Her comments follow a string of protests, mostly in Tehran, in which more than a dozen woman have stood in main thoroughfares without their headscarves.

The women risk prison sentences of up to two months for not wearing the headscarf, but up to 10 years if they are found to be encouraging others. Tehran police chief Hossein Rahimi took a rather tougher line than Ebtekar earlier this week, telling the conservative Fars news agency that Islamic laws were "obligatory for all citizens."

"These people will be firmly dealt with by the police," he said. He was responding to widespread criticism on social media after a video showed an officer shoving one of the women protesters off a plinth. "We have reminded our officers to comply with legal requirements when dealing with all people," said Rahimi.

In practice clothing rules have been steadily eroding for years, with many women wearing loose and colorful headscarves and letting them drop entirely, particularly in wealthier areas.

Since Rouhani came to power in 2013, the presence of the morality police who enforced clothing rules has been greatly reduced. Ebtekar said the government needs "this dialogue" with the younger generation, which no longer shares the same values as those who grew up during the 1979 revolution.

But she defended Iran's record on female empowerment, saying the Islamic republic had brought "true advancement" for women in higher education, politics and sports.

Iranian society is generally freer for women than many conservative Islamic countries, but activists complain they are still under-represented in government, particularly after Rouhani again failed to appoint a single female minister last summer.

Women also have less weight than men in Iran's Islamic legal system, including less right to inheritance and a ban on leaving the country without male permission.

Photo Credit: Wikicommons