DrMaddVibe
04-25-2005, 07:01 AM
By Agence France Presse (AFP)
Saturday, April 23, 2005
TEHRAN: Ethnic Arabs were among thousands of Iranians who joined a rally against "foreign plots" in the sensitive southwestern oil province of Khuzestan on Friday, a week after deadly clashes between Arab protesters and security forces there.
State television aired footage of thousands of demonstrators carrying banners and chanting: "Down with America, down with Israel," in both Arabic and Farsi.
"People of Ahvaz from different groups once again enthusiastically took part in the parade to show their unanimity against enemy plots," the television reported from the provincial capital.
Five people were killed and 310 arrested in last week's clashes in Ahvaz, a city where Iran's 3 percent Arab minority are in the majority.
Iran blamed foreigners and counterrevolutionaries for the ethnic tensions, but admitted the province's development was still hampered by the devastation it suffered during the 1980-88 war with Iraq.
A senior cleric accused Israel and the United States of seeking to sow disunity.
"Zionism, which partly exists in Tel Aviv but is mainly based in the White House and Washington, has plans to harm Islam by stirring disunity," Ayatollah Mohammad Emami Kashani said in his sermon at the main weekly Muslim prayers in Tehran.
State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli called on Iran "to exercise restraint" in dealing with the ethnic Arab minority and "to respect the peaceful exercise by the Iranian people of their democratic rights." - AFP
Saturday, April 23, 2005
TEHRAN: Ethnic Arabs were among thousands of Iranians who joined a rally against "foreign plots" in the sensitive southwestern oil province of Khuzestan on Friday, a week after deadly clashes between Arab protesters and security forces there.
State television aired footage of thousands of demonstrators carrying banners and chanting: "Down with America, down with Israel," in both Arabic and Farsi.
"People of Ahvaz from different groups once again enthusiastically took part in the parade to show their unanimity against enemy plots," the television reported from the provincial capital.
Five people were killed and 310 arrested in last week's clashes in Ahvaz, a city where Iran's 3 percent Arab minority are in the majority.
Iran blamed foreigners and counterrevolutionaries for the ethnic tensions, but admitted the province's development was still hampered by the devastation it suffered during the 1980-88 war with Iraq.
A senior cleric accused Israel and the United States of seeking to sow disunity.
"Zionism, which partly exists in Tel Aviv but is mainly based in the White House and Washington, has plans to harm Islam by stirring disunity," Ayatollah Mohammad Emami Kashani said in his sermon at the main weekly Muslim prayers in Tehran.
State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli called on Iran "to exercise restraint" in dealing with the ethnic Arab minority and "to respect the peaceful exercise by the Iranian people of their democratic rights." - AFP