Iranian clerical group says vote result "invalid"

By Parisa Hafezi

TEHRAN (Reuters) – A pro-reform Iranian clerical group said on Sunday the outcome of last month's presidential vote was "invalid," even though Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has upheld the result.

In a sign of a deepening rift among Shi'ite clerics, the Assembly of Qom Seminary Scholars and Researchers also called for the release of Iranians arrested in protests after the hardline president was declared winner of the June 12 vote.

"Other candidates' complaints and strong evidence of vote-rigging were ignored ... peaceful protests by Iranians were violently oppressed ... dozens of Iranians were killed and hundreds were illegally arrested," said a statement published on the Assembly's website. "The outcome is invalid."

Qom is Iran's center of Shi'ite learning, about 80 miles south of Tehran. The assembly has little political influence but its statement is a significant act of defiance since Qom is the power base of the clerical establishment.

It follows calls by hardliners for leaders of the protests, in which at least 20 people were killed, to be put on trial.

The demonstrations were the most striking display of dissent in Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution and the elite Revolutionary Guards on Sunday accused opposition leaders of "trying to overthrow the Islamic establishment."

"We had forecast a velvet revolution. But it was neutralized by our vigilance," the official IRNA news agency quoted General Yadollah Javani as saying.

Iran's police chief said on Wednesday 1,032 people had been detained during the protests in Tehran but most had been freed. Human Rights activists say as many as 2,000 people, including opposition leaders, professors, journalists and students, may be still be held across the country.

JOURNALIST FREED

On Sunday Iran said it had released a Greek journalist covering the election for the Washington Times, while British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said one of two British embassy employees detained in Iran would be freed later in the day.

The Foreign Ministry said later Tehran had told them the employee had been released but that it had yet to make contact.

European Union countries had summoned Iran's envoys to their capitals in protest at the arrests and Sweden, which holds the rotating EU presidency, welcomed the reported release.

"This is a constructive step in agreement with what had been discussed in the contact we have had in recent days," Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt wrote on his blog, noting one employee remained under arrest which was unacceptable to the EU.

Iranian officials deny the election was rigged, saying it was the "healthiest" since the 1979 revolution. They have clamped down on the protests, but opponents say they will not give up.

While some clerics, such as Ayatollah Mohammad Mesbah Yazdi, are aligned with hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, at least two grand ayatollahs, dissident Hossein Ali Montazeri and moderate Yusof Saanei, had already criticized the authorities.

"With all these problems, how can the result be recognized as legitimate? How can the next government be recognized as legitimate," the Qom assembly statement said.

Two losing moderate candidates, Mirhossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karoubi, have also said the result is illegitimate.

"A government which lacks people's backing does not have legitimacy ... Our fight will continue," Karoubi said in a statement published on his website on Sunday.

The hardline Kayhan newspaper said in an editorial: "Mousavi and his supporters are dangerous opposition for the establishment."

Hossein Shariatmadari, a top aide to Khamenei, called on Saturday for Mousavi and former reformist President Mohammad Khatami to be tried for committing "terrible crimes.

Iran accuses foreign powers, especially Britain and the United States, of inciting the anti-government protests to carry out a "velvet" revolution to undermine the Islamic Republic.

Tehran had arrested nine local British embassy staff but seven of them were later released.

On Friday, hardline cleric Ahmad Jannati, head of the Guardian Council that certified the election result, said the detained British embassy staffers had confessed and would face trial for inciting street protests.

In response to the detentions, EU countries summoned Iranian envoys and have pledged a strong, collective response to any Iranian harassment of staff at European embassies.

SKorea says NKorean missiles can hit key targets

By HYUNG-JIN KIM, Associated Press Writer

SEOUL, South Korea – The ballistic missiles that North Korea test-fired this weekend were likely capable of striking key government and military facilities in South Korea, a defense official said Sunday, amid growing concerns over Pyongyang's firepower.

North Korean state media did not mention the launches but boasted that the country's military could impose "merciless punishment" on those who provoke it.

Pyongyang launched seven missiles into waters off its east coast Saturday in a show of force that defied U.N. resolutions and drew international condemnation.

The missiles appear to have traveled about 250 miles (400 kilometers), meaning they could have reached almost any point in South Korea, an official at the South Korean Defense Ministry said on condition of anonymity, citing department policy.

The official said the exact details of the launches were still under investigation.

The launches on U.S. Independence Day appeared to be a poke at Washington as it moves to enforce U.N. as well as its own sanctions against the isolated regime for its May 25 nuclear test.

North and South Korea, which fought a 1950-53 war, still face off across the world's most heavily fortified border. The United States, South Korea's key ally, has 28,500 troops stationed in the country as a deterrent.

The North's main Rodong Sinmun newspaper said in a commentary that "our revolutionary forces have grown up today as the strong army that can impose merciless punishment against those who offend us," crediting the country's "military first" policy.

The commentary was carried Sunday by the official Korean Central News Agency.

Last month, the North threatened a "thousand-fold" military retaliation against the U.S. and its allies if provoked.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Il has been devoting much of the country's scarce resources to his 1.2 million-member military under the policy.

South Korea's Yonhap news agency — citing a government source it did not identify — reported that five of the seven ballistic missiles landed in one area, indicating their accuracy has improved.

Yonhap said two of the seven missiles launched are believed to be variants of Rodong missiles while the rest are believed to be upgraded versions of Scud-C missiles.

The modified Scud-C versions have a range of up to 370 miles (600 kilometers), which could hit most of South Korea. Rodong missiles, meanwhile, have a range of up to 800 miles (1,300 kilometers), putting most parts of Japan within striking distance.

Yonhap said, however, that the range of the Rodong missiles launched Saturday had been reduced apparently to improve accuracy.

The agency also said the North is believed to have deployed 200 to 300 Scud missiles and 200 Rodong missiles, with many of the Scud missiles positioned near the border with South Korea and capable of reaching the Seoul metropolitan area within four to six minutes. Yonhap said some experts thought the North had 500 to 600 Scuds.

Another South Korean Defense Ministry official said no signs of additional missile launches had been detected, but more were possible given North Korea warned ships to stay away from the area through July 10. He also spoke on condition of anonymity citing department policy.

The North has engaged in a series of acts this year widely seen as provocative. It fired a long-range rocket it said was a satellite in early April, and in late May it carried out its second underground nuclear test following the first in late 2006.

Australia and Sweden were the latest countries to criticize the launches.

Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith, while calling the firings a "provocative act," also told the Nine Network in an interview Sunday that it is "important not to overreact."

Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt, whose government assumed the rotating European Union presidency on July 1, called the launches "a conscious political provocation" and said the EU must support U.N. sanctions "in a robust way."

Koh Yu-hwan, a North Korea expert at Seoul's Dongguk University, predicted Pyongyang would now spend some time watching how the international community reacts to the launches.

"There will be a cooling off period for the time being," he said.

Reformists resist Iranian government pressure

By NASSER KARIMI, Associated Press Writer

TEHRAN, Iran – The son of an Iranian revolutionary icon called on parliament to dismiss president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from his post, as the country's conservative political establishment upped pressure Sunday on the reformists.

Ali Reza Beheshti, 47, a close Mousavi ally and son of one of the main leaders of the 1979 Islamic revolution, urged the parliament to reverse the election results, saying that "people expect their representatives to represent them and not to defend authorities by any means."

"I wish the lawmakers would respect the demands of the majority of their constituents" and submit a bill disqualifying the president, Beheshti was quoted as saying on the pro-Mousavi Web site, Norooznews. Beheshti, who ran Mousavi's now-banned Kalemeh newspaper, is the younger son of Ayatollah Mohammad Hossein Beheshti, Iran's top judge who was killed in a bombing in 1981.

Iran's leadership has been grappling with how to handle fallout from the elections, which critics maintain President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won by fraud.

On Sunday, the conservative Kayhan newspaper ran its second consecutive editorial targeting Mousavi and his backers, dubbing them as dangerous in comments highlighting the government's predicament.

"How should the Islamic Republic treat such groups? They would be a dangerous opposition if they were to win, and set the streets on fire if they lose," said Sunday's editorial. "The meaning of such behaviors is that they do not accept the system," or Islamic republic.

A day earlier, the paper ran another editorial by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's top aide that accused Mousavi of being an American agent and suggested he be tried for treason.

Hossein Shariatmadari, a top aide to Khamenei, called for Mousavi and former reformist President Mohammad Khatami to be tried in court for "horrible crimes and treason."

That commentary raised the possibility that Mousavi could be arrested and charged like many other pro-reform figures.

The weeks of unrest that immediately followed the vote have largely died down amid a crackdown by authorities. But reformists have pressed their cause, demanding recounts, appealing to the all-powerful Guardian Council and to the parliament.

The detention of protesters and reports of street violence have further tarnished the image of a government already criticized by many Western nations for a litany of issues — ranging from its controversial nuclear program to its foreign policy in the region.

The fallout from the election has led to wide rifts between Iran's clergy, potentially harming Khameni's standing in the country as pro-Mousavi dissent mounts among the clerics.

A group of clerics from Qom, a city known as a center of scholarship for Shiite Islam south of Tehran, issued a statement earlier last week in support of Mousavi. The statement urged religious leaders to back Mousavi supporters, and urged religious leaders to "oppose oppressors and aid oppressed" people.

It said that the reputations of the government and the religious establishment are simultaneously jeopardized because, in Iran, "if people find the system opposed to them, they will consider clerics to be against them, too."

Iranian officials, however, have resisted calls for a new vote, dismissing allegations of fraud and calling the elections "pure" and "healthy" following the supreme leader's declaration that the results would stand. They have also said Mousavi's supporters were operating at the behest of foreign powers — namely Britain and the United States.

Officials had detained nine Iranians working at the British Embassy in Tehran, accusing them of fomenting unrest. All but one have been released.

The one still being held, identified by his lawyer as Hossein Rassam, a political analyst at the embassy, was charged with harming Iran's national security, his lawyer, Abdolsamad Khorramshi, said Saturday.

The crackdown has spread to top opposition leaders, as well, with about a dozen detained since the protests began, said lawyer Saleh Nikbakht, who represents a number of them.

The semiofficial news agency Fars reported last week that prominent reformer, former Vice President Mohammad Ali Abtahi, had "confessed that he has provoked people and students to anarchy and riots and velvet revolution."

Abtahi was a vice president under Khatami. Fars did not give further details about what punishment Abtahi could face or about their confessions.

Their families have rejected the charges as baseless saying confessions obtained under pressure were worthless.

Police say more than a thousand people have been detained in total and 20 "rioters" killed during the violence. Eight members of the paramilitary Basij militia tasked with putting down the protests have also been killed.

Some human rights groups have raised concerns that people detained in the post election turmoil could be forced into making bogus confessions under torture or other duress.

Obama seeks new start in US-Russia relations

By STEVEN R. HURST, Associated Press Writer

MOSCOW – Presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev end a seven-year hiatus in U.S.-Russian summitry on Monday, with both men declaring their determination to further cut nuclear arsenals and repair a badly damaged relationship.

Both sides appear to want to use progress on arms control as a pathway into possible agreement on other, far trickier issues — like Iran and the tiny country of Georgia, a former Soviet republic. Those difficulties and many others have soured a promising linkage in the first years after the Cold War and pushed ties between Moscow and Washington to depths not seen in more than two decades.

Obama arrives here Monday afternoon, the first stop on a weeklong trip that will also take him to Italy and Ghana.

"It's not, in our view, a zero-sum game, that if it's two points for Russia it's negative two for us, but there are ways that we can cooperate to advance our interests and, at the same time, do things with the Russians that are good for them, as well," Obama's top assistant on Russia, Michael McFaul, said in a pre-summit briefing.

He seemed to be of one mind with the Russian leader, Medvedev.

"Russia and America need new, common, mutually beneficial projects in business, science and culture," the Russian president said in his weekly Internet address. "I hope that this sincere desire to open a new chapter in Russian-American cooperation will be brought into fruition."

Two things appear certain to be on the agenda:

_The Russians have said they will agree to allow the United States to use their territory and air space to move munitions and arms to U.S. and NATO forces fighting Taliban Islamic extremists in Afghanistan. The Kremlin announced the deal three-days before the summit as a significant sweetener for Obama.

_A directive by both presidents for negotiators to work on a nuclear agreement that would further reduce warheads and replace the 1991 START I accord that expires Dec. 5. Both sides are agreed in principle to cut warheads from more than 2,000 each to as low as 1,500 apiece.

Those deals are likely to be announced at an Obama-Medvedev news conference.