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Iran Court to Release More Opposition Members Next Week
TEHRAN, Aug 24 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - After freeing two opposition figures earlier this week, Tehran's revolutionary court is set to release several more nationalist opposition members next week, reported the state news agency IRNA Friday.
One of the two newly freed was Mohammad Omrani, released on bail Tuesday after more than five months in jail, who said at least four more of his opposition colleagues could be set free by the court, Agence France-Presse (AFP) reported.
Around 60 nationalists, many of them members of the banned main opposition pro-democracy group - Iran Freedom Movement (IFM) - have been detained since a crackdown in March, just ahead of June's presidential elections.
Four of them have been freed in recent days.
Omrani, a businessman, and chemistry professor Hossein Rafii, were released Tuesday on bail. The two were freed just three days after the public relations department of the revolutionary court said a number of jailed opposition members could soon be freed.
Ali Reza Rajaei and Masoud Pedram, both close to the IFM, were also freed after posting bail, the agency said late on Wednesday.
The four released were among the many detained IFM sympathizers who were accused of plotting to overthrow the regime.
Meanwhile, the revolutionary court has issued an arrest warrant for IFM leader, Ibrahim Yazdi, who is currently in the United States, AFP added.
The IFM had been outlawed for years, but was generally tolerated until the arrests. It is opposed to the regime, but supports reformist President Mohammad Khatami.
The detention of the Islamic liberals has caused friction between the reformist-dominated parliament and conservative judicial officials.
President Khatami has notably criticized the campaign against liberals, some of whom are former officials.
Khatami, who has seen many of his supporters jailed and pro-reform newspapers closed since reformists gained a majority in parliament in February 2000, won re-election in June by a landslide 77-percent majority.
"The people have the right to pose questions, to know, to criticize and to protest," Khatami said, addressing Iran's top political, religious and military personalities in a ceremony following his win.
"Control, criticism and protests constitute an undeniable right of the people," the 57-year-old moderate leader said.
"Our regime is compatible with Islamic and republican values," he said. "That is called religious democracy."
The victory of the liberals over the long-ruling conservative elite in parliamentary elections in April 2000 has signaled a sea change in the Islamic republic.
Khatami's support for greater social and political freedoms has made him popular with the young - an important factor in electoral terms as over fifty per cent of the population is currently under the age of twenty-five.
His liberal ideas have, however, put him at odds with Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei and hard-liners reluctant to lose sight of established Islamic traditions.
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