Deadly explosions hit two Iran cities

[dave502d]

At least eight people have been killed and 36 others injured by four huge blasts in Iran's southwestern city of Ahvaz, while in Tehran one person has been killed and four others have been injured in an explosion.


The explosions on Sunday morning targeted several public buildings in Ahvaz, an ethnic Arab-majority city close to the border with Iraq and capital of the oil-rich Khuzestan province.

Aljazeera reported that the buildings were damaged by the blasts, adding that no group has claimed responsibility so far.

The province's deputy governor, Gholam Reza Shariati, told state television that unidentified attackers were trying to "attack the territorial integrity of the country and damage the election process".

Iran is to go to the polls to elect a new president on Friday.

Shariati put the toll at five and said 80 were hurt. State television, quoting medical sources, said eight people were killed.

Interior Ministry spokesman Jahanbaksh Khanjani said one of the blasts - the first to strike Iranian soil in several years - was a car bomb outside the Ahvaz prefecture.

Iran's state-run television reported later on Sunday that one person was killed and four injured in an explosion in central Tehran, hours after the Ahvaz blasts.

No further details were immediately available about the Tehran blast, which occurred near the Imam Hussein square in the city centre.

'Terrorists' blamed

A top national security official, Ali Agha Mohammadi, blamed "terrorists" and Arab separatists sheltered by US troops in neighbouring Iraq for the blast.


He said that an ethnic Arab separatist group had claimed responsibility for the quartet of bomb blasts in Ahvaz.

"The terrorists of Ahvaz infiltrated Iran from the region of Basra" in southern Iraq, Mohammadi said. "These terrorists have been trained under the umbrella of the Americans in Iraq."

He said Iran suspected British troops based across the border in southern Iraq might also have links to the group, but added: "We are not certain."

There has been no reaction to the comments thus far.

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/69C4B4BD-774D-41D8-942C-B0D35DE214CA.htm

[whistle]

1. Bush has already given the order to attack Iran...

...it is now just a matter of timing and opportunity of when it is best to do it. June 15 is this Wednesday!

[KCDoug]

2. humnmm

sounds like the opening round of the U.S./Iran war........ "Democracy is on the march!"

[cornermouse]

3. Hmm.

Wasn't there something about us having troops on the ground in Iraq for a couple of weeks before Bush announced "shock and awe"?

[Moderator]

4. dave502d

Per DU copyright rules
please post only four
paragraphs from the
copyrighted news source.


Thank you.


DU Moderator

[dave502d]

7. Ok. n/t

[spanone]

5. CIA? FBI? SPECIAL OPS?

[H2O Man]

9. Door #3.

This is not the first of the explosions, either.

[in_cog_ni_to]

6. I read a thread here in DU about Bush signing off on the plans to attack

Iran. This must be it! :grr:

[RBHam]

8. "Terrorists from Iraq"...

Indeed.