Tehran, 14 Jan. (AKI) - A Turkish citizen has been hanged in Iran while still on the stretcher that was used to transport him from the prison hospital to his execution in the Khoi jail in western Iran.

Hassan Hekmat Demir, was believed to be a member of the Kurdish group, PJAK, the Iranian branch of the Kurdish militant group PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party).

A photo of his execution was published in the Kurdish magazine Asu.

Hekmat Demir, a Kurd with Turkish citizenship, was arrested two months ago, after he was found almost frozen to death by a platoon of Iran's Revolutionary Guards.

He was accused of terrorism and of being a member of an armed group. His trial proceeded in the absence of a lawyer and he was condemned to death by hanging.

The photo showed the blood stains on Hekmat Demir's shirt and is is believed that he was probably tortured before being executed.

Tehran, 14 Jan. (AKI ) – Iranian security forces have arrested the parents of two leaders of the Kurdish student movement.

Fatemeh Ghoftari, mother of Yasser Gholi, a Kurdish student arrested three months ago, was arrested in Sandandaj in Iranian Kurdistan on Monday morning by two agents from the ministry of intelligence.

Ghoftari was accused of producing anti-Islamic propaganda and for criticising the conditions of her son's imprisonment in radio interviews broadcast from western cities.

Modares Omarzadeh, father of Farzad, a student from Mahabad University who has since escaped abroad, was also arrested.

Omarzadeh was summoned to government offices in Orumieh in Iranian Azerbaijan, where he was taken to prison for "complicity in the escape of his son".

Press Gazette

By Dominic Ponsford

There are now no UK national newspaperss with a correspondent in Iran following the expulsion of Guardian journalist Robert Tait.

Tait was forced to leave with his Iranian wife on 20 December after nearly three years reporting from the country, after his accreditation was stopped.

He said there are now just three British journalists in the country representing AFP, Reuters and the BBC.

“I know for a fact that all the major British newspapers have tried very hard to get journalists into Iran over the last year, and they have been knocked back or granted visas which are reviewed fortnightly, no doubt on the basis of what they write.”

He said that when he arrived in Iran all the quality UK nationals had representation in Iran, but since then correspondents have either been expelled or had not had their credentials renewed.

He said: “When you consider what kind of regime the Iran government is, the biggest surprise is that they let Western journalists in at all. They allow it because they realise Iran is a uniquely important country in a strategic sense, and they need to show a more human face to the world.”

Tait, who is a retained freelance for The Guardian, is now back in London and staying in a hotel at the paper’s expense, with his wife.

He said: “We both realised we were not going to stay for the rest of our days in Iran – but didn’t expect to have to leave our home in the space of two-and-half weeks.”

By TERENCE HUNT

MANAMA, Bahrain (AP) — A naval commander told President Bush on Sunday that he is taking the recent confrontation between Iranian and U.S. Navy forces in the Persian Gulf "deadly seriously."

White House press secretary Dana Perino said Bush did not raise the showdown in the Hormuz Strait when he spoke with U.S. Vice Adm. Kevin Cosgriff, commander of the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, which patrols the Gulf. But Perino said Cosgriff told the president that he took it very seriously when an Iranian fleet of high-speed boats on Jan. 6 charged at and threatened to blow up a three-ship U.S. Navy convoy passing near Iranian waters. The Iranian naval forces vanished as the American ship commanders were preparing to open fire.

Bush spoke with Cosgriff after he had a breakfast of pancakes and bacon with troops of the U.S. 5th Fleet based in Bahrain. Bush then flew to the United Arab Emirates where he was to give a speech in Abu Dhabi about regional security and his push for democratic reform in the Mideast.

"The media may be free to second-guess the military decision, but his (Bush's) captains are not and they take it very seriously," Perino told reporters aboard Air Force One. "They have deliberate and measured ways to engage other traffic there in the Strait of Hormuz, which they did. But all the military people remember what happened in the past, such as the USS. Cole."

Seventeen sailors were killed in October 2000 in a terrorist attack on the USS Cole.

On Saturday in Kuwait, Bush said he was open to the possibility of slowing or stopping plans to bring more U.S. troops home from Iraq, defying domestic demands to speed the withdrawals. Updated on war developments, Bush said the U.S. presence in Iraq will outlast his presidency.

Bush said any decision about troops levels "needs to be based upon success." He said there was no discussion about specific numbers when he was briefed by Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Baghdad.

The president was cheered by news that Iraq's parliament had approved legislation reinstating thousands of former supporters of Saddam Hussein's dissolved Baath party to government jobs. Bush had prodded Iraqi leaders for more than a year to enact the law.

"It's an important step toward reconciliation," Bush said as he opened talks with Bahrain's King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa. "It's an important sign that the leaders of that country understand that they must work together to meet the aspirations of the Iraqi people."

The first U.S. president to visit Bahrain received a splashy welcome. Sword-waving men in flowing robes and headdresses swayed and danced to rhythmic music in a palace courtyard. The president and the king were presented with swords and flashed them skyward.

The war, now in its fifth year, was a dominant theme during Bush's stops in Kuwait and Bahrain, two Persian Gulf nations crucial to U.S. military efforts in the region. Kuwait, invaded by Saddam and liberated by a U.S.-led war in 1991, is a major military staging area for the deployment of U.S. troops and equipment.

Bush, speaking to U.S. forces in Kuwait, gave one of his most optimistic assessments of the war. "There is no doubt in my mind when history was written, the final page will say: Victory was achieved by the United States of America for the good of the world," he said.

Bush began the day receiving an hourlong briefing from Petraeus and Crocker at Camp Arifjan, the largest U.S. base in Kuwait and home to about 9,000 American troops. Acting on the two men's recommendation a year ago, Bush ordered a buildup of 30,000 U.S. forces in Iraq. In September, again on their advice, Bush announced he would withdraw some troops from by July — essentially the 30,000 in the buildup — but still keep the U.S. level there at about 130,000.

With Petraeus at his side, Bush said, "My attitude is, if he didn't want to continue the drawdown, that's fine with me, in order to make sure we succeed, see. I said to the general, `If you want to slow her down, fine. It's up to you.'"

Petraeus and Crocker are to give Congress an update on Iraq in March and make a recommendation about troop levels.

"Iraq is now a different place from one year ago," the president said. "Much hard work remains, but levels of violence are significantly reduced. Hope is returning to Baghdad and hope is returning to towns and villages throughout the country."

Polls show people in the U.S. overwhelmingly oppose the war. The Democratic-led Congress has tried for a year to force Bush to order withdrawals or set deadlines for pullbacks. But Bush, supported by most GOP lawmakers, has prevailed in every showdown.

Iran also is a main issue of Bush's trip, particularly in the five Arab nations he is visiting. Nervous about Iran's military might and rising influence, the leaders of these nations also are anxious about the confrontation between U.S. and Iranian naval vessels off their shores.

Arab allies want assurances that Bush is not interested in starting a war that could threaten military bases on their soil or the lucrative oil trade through the Strait of Hormuz. But they also want security commitments from the president.

Bush said Iran "has supported extremist groups with training and lethal aid."

Petraeus told reporters that the overall flow of weaponry from Iran into Iraq appears to be down, but attacks with "explosively formed projectiles" tied to Tehran are up by a factor of two or three in recent days. "Frankly, we are trying to determine why that might be," he said.

The roadside bombs, known as EFPs, are armor-piercing explosives that have killed hundreds of U.S. soldiers in Iraq. U.S. military officials have said for months that mainly Shiite Iran has been supplying the devices to Shiite militias in Iraq. Tehran denies it.

In Bahrain, Bush congratulated the king for holding free elections and noted the election two years ago of a female member of parliament. "Our two nations share a common vision for the future of the Middle East," Bush said at the welcome ceremony.

Bush's comments echoed his praise for similar democratic gains in Kuwait, where women were given the vote in 2005.

Posing for pictures in Bahrain with the king, Bush said, "I know you've been concerned about Iraq and the politics of Iraq." Bush went on to talk about the action in Iraq's parliament.

"I come with an upbeat message, a hopeful message — a message that will prevail here in the Middle East," Bush said.

Earlier, in Kuwait, Bush spoke optimistically about Iraq despite his oft-stated frustrations about the slow pace of progress.

"I'm not making excuses for a government, but to go from a tyranny to a democracy overnight is virtually impossible," Bush said. "And so when you say, `Am I pleased with the progress?' _what they have gone through and where they are today I think is good progress. Have they done enough? No. Are we going to continue to work with them to do more? Absolutely. Absolutely."

NCRI - On Friday, more than 300 angry residents gathered outside the city hall to protest two weeks shortage of heating fuel amid freezing winter in Qaemshahr in the northern coastal province of Mazandaran.

In Gorgan the residents gathered outside the state-run gas company to express their anger at the Iranian regime's officials.

A protester in Gorgan said, "We are living on a see of gas and oil in Iran but in this unprecedented cold winter our families are suffering from fuel shortage and no body is paying attention to our needs. Even the state gas company is closed."

In Uroumiyeh, northwestern Iran, residents waiting in long lines for fuel, clashed with the SSF over recent gas shortage.  At the same time students staged a sit-in outside the city hall and called for recession of university classes until the crisis is resolved.

Despite enjoying the world's second largest gas reserves after Russia, Iran frequently suffers from winter gas shortages which is the result of  the mullahs' regime corruption.

Chief of Kurdish alliance list in Iraqi national assembly said the new Iraqi flag would be flied on the Kurdistan region buildings, since it represented a new style and concept.

The Kurdish official also said he would propose to Iraqi national assembly flying the first flag of the first formed Iraqi republic, as it represented all the communities of Iraq.

Earlier before, Iraqi national assembly made superficial changes in the Ba’ath party to convince the Kurdish alliance fly it over the formal institutions.

The change national assembly has made in the flag was in the color of the script and meaning of the three stars. The color of the script was changed from green meant” unity freedom and socialism” to Yallow, which represent the concepts of peace tolerance and justice.

But still Kurdish people and most of the Iraqis consider the new flag as the second face of Ba’ath party and assert on designing a new flag which represent the major communities of Iraq.

Basically, the style of the flag showed the so-called unity of the three nationalist governments and states of Iraq Syria and Egypt to form one larger “Arab” country during the late seventies of last century, but it never came true.

After medical examinations conducted by Dr. Sarin Azar and Dr. Khalid Sa’id for a number of the patients wounded in the Chemical bombardment of Halabaj on March 16, 1988, the results showed that 12 of the patients cannot be treated in Kurdistan.

To save the lives of the victims, Kurdistan Regional Government- Council of Ministers, on its budget, has decided to send the patients abroad to be treated in Europe hospitals.

A source from Sharazur Directorate of Health said, “The Vice-President of Kurdistan Region has decided to send 12 of the victims of Halabja Chemical bombardment to be treated abroad because they cannot be treated inside Kurdistan.”

By Parisa Hafezi

TEHRAN (Reuters) - The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog met Iranian leaders on Saturday to push for swifter cooperation in resolving questions about Tehran's atomic activity, which the West fears will be used to make bombs.

International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohamed ElBaradei held talks with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and will, for the first time, meet Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has final say on nuclear policy.

A senior Iranian official said on Friday, after talks with ElBaradei, that the meeting with Khamenei would involve an "important exchange of information". He did not elaborate and no time has been announced for the meeting.

ElBaradei met chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili before going into talks with Ahmadinejad, who has taken a hardline stand in the row with the West. There was no immediate word on the outcome.

The IAEA chief, seeking to defuse a standoff that has helped send oil prices to record levels and sparked fears of a military confrontation, is expected to hold a news conference before returning to Vienna early on Sunday morning.

His two-day trip to Tehran, which began on Friday, coincides with renewed tension between Iran and the United States over a naval incident in the oil-rich Gulf last Sunday.

Washington is seeking to isolate Iran over atomic activities it suspects have military aims. Iran says it only wants to generate electricity and has refused to heed demands to halt sensitive nuclear work despite two rounds of U.N. sanctions.

ElBaradei urged Tehran to boost cooperation in talks with Iran's atomic energy chief Gholamreza Aghazadeh on Friday. "I asked Mr. Aghazadeh to give us maximum transparency and provide assurances about all present nuclear activities," he said.

The Vienna-based IAEA has sought to verify that Iran's uranium enrichment program is geared solely to producing civilian energy.

A diplomat close to the IAEA said before ElBaradei's visit that an IAEA inquiry stonewalled by Iran for years until August had entered a final phase with Iran addressing U.S. intelligence about past, covert attempts to "weaponize" atomic material.

Iran said in August it would answer outstanding questions about its nuclear past but an end-of-year target for completing the process passed with the sensitive issues still unresolved.

ElBaradei's visit coincides with a Middle East tour by U.S. President George W. Bush, who has called Iran a "threat to world peace" and is seeking Arab support to rein in Iran.

In Washington on Friday, the top U.S. military officer said last Sunday's encounter between U.S. Navy ships and Iranian boats in the Gulf showed Iran posed a threat and that the United States was ready to counter it.

(Writing by Fredrik Dahl, Editing by Elizabeth Piper)

Iran Focus

Tehran, Iran, Jan. 11 – The head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog Mohamed ElBaradei began a two-day visit of Iran early on Friday.

ElBaradei is being accompanied on the trip by Olli Heinonen, a deputy director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Elbaradei will hold discussions on Tehran’s controversial nuclear program with top Iranian officials including hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who he is expected to meet on Saturday, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, and chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili.

ElBaradei was greeted at the airport in Tehran by Mohammad Saeedi, deputy head of the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran, and a host of other nuclear officials

By Jeremy Pelofsky

MYRTLE BEACH, South Carolina (Reuters) - Republican presidential hopefuls leapt on Thursday to show their willingness to challenge Iran after an incident between the two countries in a critical Gulf waterway for crude oil.

At the same time, the candidates declined to second-guess the U.S. commanders who, according to American accounts, held their fire against Iranian speedboats that they said threatened to attack three U.S. Navy ships before turning away.

"I think an incident like this reminds us that we shouldn't be lulled into some false sense of confidence about Iran," former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani said during the Fox News Channel debate. "We have to be very focused on the fact that Iran should not be allowed to become a nuclear power."

Washington has accused Tehran of trying to develop nuclear weapons under the cover of a civilian nuclear energy program and interfering in Iraq, which Iran denies. But that has led to escalating tensions between the two countries.

This latest incident occurred in the Strait of Hormuz, arguably the most prominent "choke point" in the global crude oil trade, which handles 17 million barrels per day of water-borne crude oil, over a third of total global shipments.

"I believe it was a very serious act," former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney said. "And the Iranians continue to take acts like this, it points out that we have in Iran a very troubled nation."

The tough words about Iran by the Republican hopefuls came in South Carolina, a state home to numerous military bases that will hold its nominating contest on January 19. The general election will be held November 4.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, winner in last week's Iowa caucuses and a Baptist preacher who has been criticized for having limited foreign policy experience, said Iran and other countries should not just expect a limited response from the United States if attacked.

"Be prepared, first, to put your sights on the American vessel. And then be prepared that the next things you see will be the gates of Hell, because that is exactly what you will see after that," he said.

Rep. Ron Paul, a staunch Iraq war opponent who has been unable to break into the top tier in opinion polls despite strong fund-raising, said he believed his presidential rivals were unnecessarily ratcheting up war rhetoric.

"I would certainly urge a lot more caution than I'm hearing here tonight," he said. "This incident should not be thrown out of proportion to the point where we're getting ready to attack Iran over this."

(Editing by David Alexander)

(For more about the U.S. political campaign, visit Reuters "Tales from the Trail: 2008" online at blogs.reuters.com/trail08/)

Iran regime hanged four men in public in different cities, state-run media reported Thursday.  Two men, identified only by their first names as Mojtaba and Mohammad-Hossein, were hanged in public Wednesday in the southern city of Jahorm, Iran daily reported.

The daily Jomhouri Islami reported that two others hanged in the northern town of Abbasabad Tonekabon.  The two were identified as Mohamadreza Sadeghi-nejad and Ali Kurd Rodgarmi.

In Tehran a man of 21 named Shayan has been condemned to death and the execution will be carried out very soon, Jomhouri Islami added.

ARBIL, Iraq (Reuters) - Turkish artillery shelled northern Iraq on Friday morning, but there were no immediate reports of any casualties or material damage, a Kurdish government official said.

Jabbar Yawar, spokesman for the Peshmerga security forces of northern Iraq, said Turkish forces had shelled two areas in Dahuk province for two hours. Earlier, Iraqi Kurdish television said the Turkish military had bombed northern Iraq.

A senior Iraqi border guards officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said there were no casualties in the shelling, which took place between 7 a.m. (11 p.m. EST on Thursday) and 9 a.m. (1 a.m. EST on Friday).

It was the first reported cross-border action since a bomb attack in the Turkish town of Diyarbakir on January 3, which killed six people. Turkish authorities blamed that attack on Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) guerrillas.

Turkish warplanes repeatedly struck PKK targets in the mountainous north of Iraq in December and troops also made small-scale cross-border raids. Turkey has also massed up to 100,000 troops on the border with Iraq.

Ankara blames the PKK, which is fighting for a separate Kurdish homeland in southeastern Turkey, for the deaths of nearly 40,000 people since it began an armed struggle in 1984.

Turkey says some 3,000 PKK members are based in the mountains of northern Iraq.

(Baghdad newsroom; Editing by Ibon Villelabeitia)

By Nidhi Verma and Luke Pachymuthu

NEW DELHI/SINGAPORE--(Reuters) - Indian refiner Reliance quit selling gasoline and diesel to Iran last year after French banks BNP Paribas and Calyon stopped offering credit on the deals, four company and industry sources said on Thursday.

BNP and Calyon, the investment bank arm of Credit Agricole, likely stopped offering Letters of Credit (LCs) -- a standard form of payment guarantee in the oil trade -- because of political pressure from Western nations that believe Tehran is trying to develop nuclear weapons, one of the sources said.

The move by the banks is a sign that the U.S.-led campaign to isolate Tehran over its nuclear programme is making it more difficult to do business with the Islamic Republic.

A top Iranian official denied any difficulty for Iran in securing the fuel it needs.

"None of the banks which have something to do with the United States were willing to open (LCs)... because of U.S. pressure," said a senior Reliance Industries Ltd source who declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the business.

Trade sources said Reliance, India's biggest private refiner, had been shipping major supplies of gasoline to Iran and occasionally sold diesel, but stopped those shipments in October last year and had not resumed.

In the physical oil markets, the buyer of a cargo or volume of oil is usually required to open an LC from a top bank that the seller will do business with, in order to guarantee payment upon delivery or at the agreed-upon time.

In many cases, particularly those involving deals with Iran, the letters need to be confirmed by European banks, or some Middle Eastern banks, to ensure payment to the seller, said an industry source.

BNP and Calyon are major providers of credit for oil traders globally. Fuel imports are a sensitive subject for Iran, the world's fourth largest crude oil exporter whose ageing refineries cannot cope with demand.

The banks' move has not stopped shipments from coming in, but forced Iran to seek supplies from further afield. It has bought some 160,000 tonnes of diesel in the Singapore market over the past week, trading sources have told Reuters.

Iran has had a gasoline rationing scheme since the middle of last year to reduce its dependence on imports, but it has been forced to step up overseas purchases of gas oil this winter as it runs short of natural gas for home heating.

"With refinery maintenance and gas cuts from Turkmenistan, they need to import more diesel," said a Singapore-based trader.

"NO PROBLEMS ON CREDIT"

Earlier in the day Hojjatollah Ghanimifard, international affairs director at the National Iranian Oil Company, denied any difficulty in securing fuel, telling Reuters: "We have no problems with transactions for exports of crude or imports of products."

He declined to comment on whether international companies faced problems obtaining LCs, but said: "We could find other means aside from letters of credit, whatever buyers or sellers are happy with."

Some Asian traders said that some Singapore banks are willing to handle Iranian LCs, but not in dollars. Singapore's biggest banks are DBS, UOB and OCBC.

U.S. and United Nations sanctions over Tehran's disputed nuclear programme have targeted Iranian banks, while international banks have come under pressure not to deal with it.

Swiss-based independent trader Vitol, Iran's biggest supplier of gasoline, decided to end its long-running contract to provide fuel to the country this year after losing money on the deal, an industry source said last month.

An Iranian official was quoted as saying in December that Chinese banks had stopped opening LCs with Iran, although Beijing has resisted moves to penalise Tehran, and recently agreed a major deal to develop its Yadavaran oilfield.

A BNP Paribas spokesman declined to comment on its credit dealings. A spokesman for Calyon did not immediately respond to emails seeking comment, while a Reliance spokesman was not immediately available for comment.

Many bank majors including Switzerland's UBS AG and Germany's Deutsche Bank AG have decided to cut some or all of their ties with Iran in the face of political pressure.

Iran's Central Bank governor said in September that those that left the country, which holds the world's second-largest reserves of oil and natural gas, would not be welcome back.

Iran, the second-largest producer in the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), pumped about 3.9 million barrels per day of crude oil in December, a Reuters survey showed.

Tehran says its nuclear programme is purely for electricity generation. (Additional reporting by Simon Webb in Dubai; Felicia Loo and Yaw Yan Chong in Singapore; Editing by Jonathan Leff and Ramthan Hussain)

Iran Focus

Tehran, Iran, Jan. 10 – Angry residents of Qaemshahr, in Iran’s northern coastal province of Mazandaran, attacked and set fire to the town hall this afternoon, locals told Iran Focus by telephone.

Protestors were angry that authorities had failed to provide basic services to counter the recent disruption in gas supply which provides for much of the city’s heating during the winter cold.

“For two weeks, the gas has been cut off in my home. My children have caught a cold, and I don’t have the means to see to their needs”, said a working-class protestor present at the standoff outside the compound housing provincial officials.

He told Iran Focus that residents gathered outside the town hall at 14:00 local time and began to chant anti-government slogans. Soon after, the angry protestors attacked the building and set parts of it ablaze. The protest rapidly grew in size and lasted for several hours.

State Security Forces were brought in to disperse the crowd.

Nearby, in the city of Sari, angry residents took to the streets fed up with the government’s lack of performance in tackling the gas shortages.

 
Iran regime hanged three today in Birjand, capital of South Khorasan province bordering Afghanistan, state-run Fars News Agency reported.

"The death sentence for these (three) people was issued…and was carried out," the report quoted the Iran mullahs' judiciary official. The report did not identify the three.

They were accused of drug related charges.  

Iran Focus

London, Jan. 09 – The United States’ Department of Defence released on Tuesday an audiotape and video footage of Iranian gunboats displaying hostile behaviour towards three U.S. Navy ships in the Strait of Hormuz.

The incident which occurred on Sunday nearly led to an exchange of fire on the 50-kilometre-wide entrance to the Persian Gulf through which about two-fifths of the world's oil supplies pass.

The Pentagon has said the Iranian speedboats aggressively approached the three U.S. ships and threatened that the ships would “explode”.

U.S. President George W. Bush described the Iranian actions as "provocative" and "dangerous".

"They should not have done it, pure and simple. ... I don't know what their thinking was, but I'm telling you what my thinking was. I think it was a provocative act", Bush told reporters on Tuesday.

The four-minute video showed the Iranian boats swarming around the U.S. ships.

“I am coming to you”, said a heavily-accented voice. “You will explode after a few minutes.”

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have previously described the Strait of Hormuz as the “economic lifeline” of the West, saying it could be used to put pressure on Tehran’s “enemies”.

Click here to watch the videoclip

By Selcuk Gokoluk

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey (Reuters) - Migrants seeking a better life in Iraq? It sounds bizarre but thousands of Turkish Kurds are finding jobs and trade opportunities across the border that are largely absent at home.

While Turkish warplanes bomb Kurdish PKK rebel targets in northern Iraq, Turkish businessmen and workers are busy making money in the autonomous region of Iraqi Kurdistan, and Iraqi Kurds are coming to Turkey both for business and relaxation.

Firms based in Turkey's impoverished, mainly Kurdish southeast region also work as intermediaries between Western companies and the Iraqi Kurds.

"Iraq contributes seriously to employment in Diyarbakir. Our youths get the chance to find jobs there, in construction, in restaurants and the clothing industry," said Seyhmus Akbas, chairman of southeast Turkish business forum DOGUNSIFED.

Diyarbakir, with about 1 million inhabitants, is the largest city of southeast Turkey but its economy has long been hostage to separatist violence as security forces battle militants of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).

The conflict, which dates back to 1984 and has killed nearly 40,000 people, scares off investors and helps keep unemployment at a staggering 60 percent of the local population against 9 percent nationwide, officials say.

Six people, mostly students, were killed in a bomb blast in the centre of Diyarbakir last week. Authorities have blamed the separatist PKK for the explosion and the group has signalled PKK members acting independently may have been to blame.

Per capita income in southeast Turkey is just one third of the national average. Half its residents hold a state "green card" which entitles the very poor to free health care and help in buying food and fuel oil. 

ECONOMIC BOOM

Little wonder, then, that Turkish Kurds have been keen to share in the economic boom in energy-rich Iraqi Kurdistan.

Construction sites in northern Iraq pay workers as much as $2,000 (1,020 pounds) a month. Similar work in southeast Turkey pays just 400 lira (176 pounds).

Turkish construction firms, active across the Middle East, Russia and central Asia, are eager to share in northern Iraq's infrastructure projects, estimated to be worth $20 billion over the next 20 years.

Contracts won by Turkish construction firms in Iraq in 2007 topped $4 billion. Turkey's total exports to Iraq neared $3 billion and included capital goods such as electronics as well as consumer goods and food.

Turkish truck-drivers, many from southeastern Turkey, bring back crude oil, far cheaper in northern Iraq, to sell inside Turkey. Iraq also pumps crude oil to Turkey's Mediterranean coast via the Kirkuk-Yumurtalik pipeline.

Close cultural links and a common language help Turkey's Kurds find jobs in Iraqi Kurdistan.

"Western companies look for partners in Turkey's southeast to do business in northern Iraq because of the common language and culture. There are at least 20 such intermediary companies in Diyarbakir alone," said Mursel Tuncay, chairman of the Diyarbakir-based Murkan Group of Companies.

Tuncay said Iraqi Kurdish businessmen also prefer doing business with Turkey because of its open economy.

"They come here to work, strike deals and have fun in Istanbul. They cannot do this in Iran or Syria. They see Turkey as their gateway to the world," Tuncay said.

Some local businessmen fear the Turkish army's bombing campaign against PKK targets over the past month could hurt business. "You watch northern Iraq bombed live on TV. This breaks our hearts as human beings," Akbas said, who described Iraqi Kurds as cousins of the Turkish Kurds.

Businessmen in the southeast have urged the Turkish government to develop closer political ties with Iraqi Kurds, but Ankara prefers to deal directly with Baghdad.

Turkey is anxious to prevent the emergence of an independent Kurdish state in northern Iraq, fearing this could fan separatism among its own large Kurdish population and also destabilise the broader region.

"Turkey should assume the role of a father (to Iraqi Kurds). They are not a threat. We are the biggest country in the Middle East and their population is small compared to us," said the head of Diyarbakir's commodities exchange, Fahrettin Akyil.

"It is a very rich region. Its possibilities should be utilised effectively. Terrorism and northern Iraq should be kept quite separate. If we do not go there, businessmen of other nations will go and fill the vacuum," said Akbas.

But trade with northern Iraq can be risky. Several Turkish truck drivers have been killed in the past few years. Turkish businessmen face other risks too.

"Northern Iraq does not have an established authority. Many of our friends incurred losses there because they were not paid for the goods they delivered," Akyil said.

(Editing by Gareth Jones and Robert Woodward)

Human Rights Watch
Human Rights News

New York -- The Iranian government is relying on its broadly worded “security laws” to suppress virtually any public expression of dissent, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. It uses these laws to subject those arrested to prolonged incommunicado detention without charge, solitary confinement, and denial of access to counsel.

The 51-page report, “‘You Can Detain Anyone for Anything’: Iran’s Broadening Clampdown on Independent Activism,” documents the expansion in scope and number of the individuals and activities persecuted by the Iranian government over the last two years.
 

“Dozens of Iranian laws provide the government cover for suppressing any peaceful activity they perceive as critical of their policies,” said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch. “The authorities can trample over people’s basic rights and still claim to be acting legally.”

Relying on information from detainees and eyewitnesses, as well as a close analysis of Iran’s security laws, “You Can Detain Anyone for Anything” documents the government’s use of security concerns as a pretext for detaining and denying due process rights to a range of civil society activists. These include women’s rights campaigners calling for changes to Iran’s laws that discriminate against women, students working for social and political reform, workers calling for better wages and independent unions, and journalists and scholars, including those with no history of political activism.

Since President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad took office in August 2005, government officials have increasingly used “security” as grounds for persecuting independent activism. A set of laws within Iran’s Islamic Penal Code entitled “Offenses Against the National and International Security of the Country” lay the groundwork for the government to suppress peaceful political activity and deny due process rights to those arrested.

The government has also increasingly brought security charges based merely on an individual’s connections to foreign institutions, persons, or sources of funding. In most of the cases documented in this report, the authorities have accused those arrested of undermining national security through their alleged foreign connections.

The authorities frequently hold detainees arrested on security grounds in facilities operating outside the mandated prison administration, most notoriously in Section 209 of Tehran’s Evin prison. Detainees in Evin 209 are subject to violations of their due process rights as well as abusive treatment during interrogation and in detention.

One former detainee told Human Rights Watch about the psychological and physical abuse he and fellow detainees suffered at the hands of his interrogators in Evin 209:

“They would insult us and our family in the most vulgar ways. Or they would threaten to beat us or throw us in the cells of dangerous criminals like al Qaeda members. They would threaten rape with soda bottles or hot eggs. They also would give us false news about our loved ones and brought forged documents to scare us. They told one guy that his dad had been fired because of him and showed him a piece of paper on official-looking letterhead.”

Another former detainee described the authorities’ disregard for Iranian laws pertaining to the treatment of prisoners and their use of indefinite solitary confinement as a form of punishment:

“We didn’t know what we were being charged with, or what was going to happen to us. The guards blindfolded us at the entrance of [Evin] 209. Almost everyone objected at once to this, but they ignored us. I think to scare us for speaking out, they took one of us to solitary confinement right away.”

Iran’s vague security laws allow the government to arbitrarily suppress and punish individuals for peaceful political expression, association, and assembly, in breach of international human rights treaties to which Iran is party. Prison units such as Evin 209 and the treatment of detainees inside its walls are also in violation of Iranian laws governing the operation of detention centers and the rights of detainees.

Human Rights Watch called on the government of Iran to amend or abolish the vague security laws and other legislation that allow the government to arbitrarily suppress and punish individuals for peaceful political expression, association and assembly in breach of international law. Human Rights Watch also called on the government to treat detainees in accordance with international standards, and to either bring Evin 209 under the supervision of the regular prisons administration or shut it down.