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Prayer Time (Tehran)
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Dawn: 4:10
Sunrise: 5:36
Noon: 12:05
Evening: 18:52
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Weather Guide
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THU |
FRI |
Tehran: |
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High: |
33 oC |
35 oC |
Low: |
23 oC |
23 oC |
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Athens |
27 |
27 |
Ankara |
33 |
24 |
Cairo |
32 |
33 |
Copenhagen |
18 |
18 |
Frankfurt |
19 |
20 |
Karachi |
31 |
31 |
Kuwait City |
46 |
46 |
London |
20 |
20 |
Madrid |
33 |
34 |
Moscow |
16 |
17 |
New Delhi |
30 |
31 |
Paris |
24 |
25 |
Riyadh |
43 |
43 |
Rome |
26 |
26 |
Vienna |
18 |
20 |
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Identification
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Published by the Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA)
Address:
Iran Cultural & Press Institute, #212 Khorramshahr Avenue Tehran/Iran
Executive Editor: Amin Sabooni
Editorial Dept. Tel: 88755761-2
Editorial Dept. Fax: 88761869
Advertising Dept. Tel: 88501499, 88737250
Internet Address:
www.iran-daily.com
E-mail Address:
iran-daily@iran-daily.com
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Insurgents Kill 74
In Iraq
14 US Soldiers Dead
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Women react to the sight of bodies at the Hilla Hospital morgue after rebels targeted an Iraqi Army recruitment center in the Shiite town of Hilla, 120 kilometers south of Baghdad, Aug. 30. (AFP Photo)
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BAGHDAD, Iraq, Aug. 30--Insurgents have killed at least 74 Iraqis and wounded scores in a series of shootings and bombings, including one in a crowded Baghdad market and another at a military recruitment center.
A blast in the Shurja market left 24 dead and 35 wounded, and came just two hours after rebels targeted an Iraqi Army recruitment center in the Shiite town of Hilla, south of Baghdad, killing 12 volunteers and wounding 38, AFP reported.
The Baghdad market blast came despite a massive security crackdown in the violent Iraqi capital, rattling windows one kilometer (half a mile) away as a plume of dust and smoke climbed above the skyline.
In the day’s second biggest bombing, insurgents also used a bicycle to hide a bomb that exploded outside the army recruitment center in the Shiite town of Hilla, 120 kilometers (75 miles) south of Baghdad.
The recruitment center was set up four days ago to boost enlistments by youths from the mainly Shiite areas around Samawa, Karbala and Najaf, a police officer said.
Iraqi security forces are a regular target of insurgents who bomb army and police recruitment centers to stop young men trying to escape Iraq’s massive unemployment from joining the forces. Police said violence also erupted in the Diyala province, with at least 20 people killed, including seven from a single family who died in a roadside bombing against their minibus while on their way to a wedding party.
Elsewhere in Iraq, nine people were killed, while police recovered six bodies of men shot dead in execution style, of which five washed up on the banks of the Tigris in the town of Suweira, south of Baghdad, police said.
The attacks came at a time when Iraq’s hard-pressed government forces are battling to rein in a surge in violence, which in the past four days has already left more than 150 dead. Iraq’s latest bout of bloodshed--which erupted as Maliki held peace talks with tribal leaders on Saturday--has also killed 14 US soldiers, most of whom were involved in a large-scale security sweep in and around Baghdad.
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Veep Confers With Lebanese Officials
BEIRUT, Lebanon,
Aug. 30--Iran and Lebanon here late Tuesday discussed the regional situation and the consequences of the Zionist regime’s aggression.
An Iranian delegation, headed by Vice President for Executive Affairs Ali Saeedlou, arrived in Beirut on Tuesday for talks with Lebanese officials, IRNA reported.
The delegation held talks Tuesday with Lebanese President Emile Lahoud, Prime Minister Fuad Siniora and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri.
Saeedlou told a news conference in the Iranian Embassy in Beirut that Iran is prepared to have a substantial share in the reconstruction of Lebanon following the massive destruction of the country by the Zionist Israeli regime.
“The people of Lebanon have passed the period of war and succeeded in defeating their illegitimate enemy,“ he said.
“We hope to play our role in the postwar period with the reconstruction of what has been devastated by the Zionist regime’s aggression and assist the people of Lebanon.“
He told journalists that the brave defense of the Lebanese people against the enemy has earned the spiritual and material support of all freedom lovers.
“After my negotiations with the president and prime minister of Lebanon, it was agreed that we would start the first phase of assisting the people of Lebanon with the reconstruction of their roads,“ he said.
Saeedlou also said that Iran has agreed to repair damaged schools and religious sites, and will start reconstruction work within the shortest possible time.
“Municipalities in Tehran, Mashhad and Isfahan have expressed their readiness to take part in the reconstruction and reorganization of Lebanese cities,“ he said.
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Rafsanjani Urges
Muslim Solidarity
IRIB Performance Criticized
TEHRAN, Aug. 30--State Expediency Council Chairman Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani stressed on Tuesday the importance of maintaining solidarity in the Muslim world.
“Enemies of Islam and extremists are working on a plan to destroy the unity and solidarity of the Muslim world,“ Rafsanjani said while addressing a meeting of Experts Assembly, IRNA reported.
“Exchange of views among officials of Islamic countries can be useful in maintaining unity,“ he said.
Commenting on the cultural invasion being waged by the enemies against Islamic culture and values, the SEC chairman said a thorough strategy to counter this invasion is necessary.
“We need to have specific plans to defend the Islamic world’s young generation from the massive cultural invasion of the enemies,“ he said.
Meanwhile, members of the Experts Assembly on Wednesday criticized the performance of the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting over its coverage of the assembly’s 6th official session.
According to IRNA, the members said, “We expected IRIB to pay more attention to the coverage of the 6th session since the upcoming election of the new assembly is near.“
Experts Assembly is composed of 89 members--all clerics--who have the authority to select the leader and oversee his performance.
The two-day Experts Assembly session convened on Tuesday.
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Iran Entitled
To Peaceful Nuclear Technology
TEHRAN, Aug. 30--Former Malaysian Premier Mahathir Mohamad on Tuesday declared support for Iran’s right to peaceful use of nuclear technology.
In a meeting with the visiting head of Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, in Kuala Lumpur, the former Malaysian premier said Iran is being denied access to peaceful nuclear technology by the very countries that possess the biggest nuclear arsenals, IRNA reported.
“They are opposing Iran because they believe they have the sole right to this knowledge,“ he said.
Condemning the double standards of the West in dealing with Iran, he noted that the West is opposing Iran’s peaceful use of nuclear technology while assisting the Zionist regime in building up its nuclear weapons stockpile.
Elsewhere, Mahathir referred to the recent Israeli aggression against Lebanon and criticized the weak performance of international bodies in preventing the wanton killing of civilians by the Zionist regime.
He said whenever the Iranian president speaks out against the crimes committed by Israel, the West, particularly the US, hardens its stance against Iran.
“However, Israel’s trampling on the rights of the Palestinians and the Lebanese is met with silence from world powers,“ he said.
For his part, Boroujerdi referred to Iran’s response to the package of proposals presented by the 5+1 group (the five veto powers plus Germany) and declared Tehran’s readiness to continue negotiations on its peaceful nuclear program.
He added that Iran has every right to conduct its nuclear activities within the framework of international regulations and IAEA protocols.
Boroujerdi, who arrived in Malaysia early Tuesday for a one-day visit, is scheduled to meet with Malaysia’s parliamentary speaker and foreign minister to discuss developments related to Iran’s nuclear program.
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Int’l Passport Needed
For Pilgrimage
SHAHR-E KORD, Chaharmahal-Bakhtiari,
Aug. 30--All pilgrims need to obtain international passports, an official said on Wednesday.
Seyyed Abbas Hosseini, executive director for Pilgrimage Affairs of the province, also told IRNA that earlier pilgrims only required a special ’pilgrimage’ permit, but henceforth they must have an international passport.
Estimating the number of the province’s pilgrims to be around 344, he said, “All those who registered in 2002 will be dispatched to holy shrines this year.“
The official further said 1,050 pilgrims will visit the holy shrines of Iraq and Syria, 596 of whom have registered to visit Iraqi shrines and the rest for Syria.
He noted that default payments for delayed pilgrimage are paid through Islamic contracts signed by operating banks.
Hosseini also announced that 22 teams comprising 2,540 pilgrims will be dispatched for the minor pilgrimage (Umrah) to Mecca and Medina this year.
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Israel Rejects UN Call to End Lebanon Siege
BEIT-UL-MOQADDAS, Aug. 30--Israel rejected a call by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Wednesday to lift its air and sea blockade of Lebanon, saying it would only end the seven-week-old siege once all aspects of a ceasefire were in place.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert also told Annan he would not withdraw Israeli troops fully from southern Lebanon until the full implementation of the ceasefire, which took effect on Aug. 14 and ended 34 days of conflict with Hezbollah, Reuters reported. Olmert’s statements effectively amounted to a rejection of the two main requests Annan had come to Beit-ul-Moqaddas to discuss, but Annan later played down the differences of opinion, saying his and Olmert’s thinking were not so far apart.
“There isn’t that much of a difference between Prime Minister Olmert and myself,“ Annan told a news conference in the West Bank city of Ramallah when asked about the apparent failure of his bid to strengthen the two-week-old ceasefire.
Annan, who visited Lebanon on Monday and Tuesday, later left for Amman, where he will meet Jordan’s King Abdullah and Foreign Minister Abdelelah Al-Khatib on Thursday.
Annan’s Middle East tour also includes Syria and Iran.
During an hour of talks with Olmert, Annan said he pressed for a lifting of the embargo, imposed after the start of the war against Hezbollah on July 12, on economic grounds.
Annan had made lifting the blockade his top priority for his visit to Israel, after describing it as a ’humiliation’ for Lebanon as well as an economic millstone.
Israeli forces in another aggression killed three Palestinian gunmen and four civilians on Wednesday, pressing on with an offensive in an Islamic militant stronghold in Gaza City, medics and witnesses said.
The latest casualties in the Shijaia neighborhood raised to 13 the number of Palestinians killed over the past 24 hours in Israeli attacks on militants in Gaza and the occupied West Bank.
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Siniora: Don’t Expect a Peace Agreement
BEIRUT, Lebanon, Aug. 30--Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Siniora said on Wednesday Lebanon would be the last Arab country to sign a peace deal with Israel and insisted that there were no contacts with the Jewish state.
“Lebanon will be the last Arab country that could sign a peace agreement with Israel,“ he told a news conference in Beirut, AFP reported.
“There will be no agreement with Israel before there is a global peace deal that is just and lasting.“
Siniora added that there were no “direct or indirect“ contacts with Israel on a peace agreement.
Also on Wednesday, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said he hoped conditions would allow for direct contacts between the governments of Israel and Lebanon soon.
Siniora and Olmert’s comments came as a fragile ceasefire was holding in Lebanon following a month-long conflict between Israel and Lebanese Shiite Muslim Hezbollah guerrillas. There have been no diplomatic relations between Israel and Lebanon since the creation of the Jewish state in 1948.
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Problems Persist
By S. Sadeghi
In making their callous case for war in Iraq, King George and his lapdog in Downing Street, Lord Blair kept on harping that their man in Baghdad was hiding weapons of mass destruction. So, they invaded in March 2003.
However, after a year or so the two rulers and their ilk were forced to confess that they were given doctored intelligence and Saddam Hussein’s Iraq did not have WMDs.
Since the occupation of Iraq by the US-led coalition, an estimated
150,000 Iraqis have been killed, most of them civilians. Double that figure have been maimed.
Although a democratically-elected government has taken office in Baghdad, the country remains unsafe, unsteady and with hardly any light at the end of the tunnel.
Recently George Bush said he couldn’t allow terrorists to gain influence in oil-rich Iraq. The message he has been trying hard to convey is that more than 120,000 American troops are in the far away land and are killing and getting killed to make the world a safer place! Translation: the coalition’s controversial presence in Iraq is essential to fighting and defeating terrorists.
How much safer the world has become after Bush and the neocons embraced the Israeli ’recommendation’ to bomb Afghanistan and then Iraq is anybody’s guess.
Impartial observers in the East and west have maintained, both before and after the illegal invasion, that the main objective behind attacking Iraq was to further ensure Israel’s security and prepare the grounds for full US control over the Muslim country’s huge oil resources.
America now needs permanent pretexts to justify its dangerous military presence in Iraq to be able to keep Israel and the powerful Zionist lobby in Washington happy.
So, for this and a whole set of other reasons, an unstable and chaotic Iraq is in America’s interest. What better reason than this for the Bush clique to continue lying to the world, and deceive public opinion at home regarding the need to stay in Iraq despite the heavy toll in American life and limb?
Beside the unwanted US military presence, other sources of insecurity in Iraq today are Al-Qaeda operatives and the remnants of the former Ba’athist regime. However, Al-Qaeda militants were nowhere to be seen in Iraq at the time when the Anglo-American crusade was launched.
The extremists and their staunch supporters quietly entered the war-battered country from neighboring states. Given the suspect working relations between Bush’s America and the banned militant group, it is highly likely that Al-Qaeda members are entering Iraq with the knowledge and probably support from the Americans and their spy networks.
The point normally made is that almost all terrorist activities in Iraq are concentrated in a few provinces, especially in areas with heavy Sunni populations.
Many Iraqis and their friends ask how could terrorists create such mayhem and kill innocent people everyday in densely-populated areas when 150,000 American and British troops are stationed in Iraq and their intelligence services have sprung up there like wild mushrooms.
It seems the bombings are aimed at also giving the impression that the majority Shiites want to spread sedition and the seeds of factional discord. Informed sources believe the huge US Embassy in Baghdad handles all covert activities in that country including ’liaison’ with the terror networks.
By spreading insecurity in Iraq, the US also seeks to create deeper cracks in the sensitive relations between the Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds. The good omen, however, is that tribal and religious leaders from all three sects have maintained their steadfastness and vigilance and so far succeeded in preventing full-fledged internal strife.
Another objective pursued by the Americans is to frustrate the Iraqi people with the prevailing pain and misery so that they give in and eventually accept another puppet regime that would do as America wants.
Iraqi leaders and intellectuals have indeed demonstrated over the past three years that they have been able to uphold the spirit of solidarity and protect their territorial integrity despite heavy odds.
It is hoped that they can also find ways to end the chaos, get rid of the occupying armies and themselves decide what is good for their future.
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