Karrubi's Son Says Tehran Raid An Attempt To Intimidate

Mehdi Karrubi

The son of reformist Iranian cleric and former presidential candidate Mehdi Karrubi, whose Tehran office was closed on September 8 by authorities, says that the move is an attempt to pressure his father into not reporting abuse of postelection detainees, RFE/RL's Radio Farda reports.

Hossein Karrubi told Radio Farda that the authorities want to scare Karrubi, who has provided authorities with the names of four former detainees who say they were raped in prison.

Hossein Karrubi said authorities also want to prevent more people from bringing their complaints of abuse to his father.

He said his father is very serious in his investigation of the reported physical abuses of the detainees and that the raid and other possible actions will not cause him to give up.

A spokesman for Mehdi Karrubi's Etemad-e Melli party, Esmaeel Gherami Moghaddam, told the ILNA news agency that Karrubi's office was sealed off by an order from Tehran's Prosecutor's Office.

Moghaddam said the premises were searched and documents, CDs, computers, and films were confiscated.

Moghaddam said officials have also arrested the chief editor of the Etemad-e Melli website.

And the reformist website mowjcamp.ir reports that Iranian judicial agents have detained a top aide to Karrubi. It says agents raided and searched the home of Morteza Alviri and took him away.

The reports came a day after security forces raided an office run by allies of opposition leader Mir Hossein Musavi and confiscated documents, his website said.

with Reuters