Iran

Iranians scattered flowers into the Persian Gulf and released white pigeons into the air Wednesday as the nation remembered the 290 passengers killed when a U.S. warship shot down an Iranian airliner two decades ago.

Some 300 relatives of victims as well as artists and officials sailed from the southern port city of Bandar Abbas to the spot where the Iran Air Airbus A300 crashed into the water on July 3, 1988, killing all on board.

America's top military officer has said opening up a third front in the Middle East through a strike on Iran would be "extremely stressful" for US forces.

Adm Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was commenting on the likelihood of US or Israeli military action over Iran's nuclear programme.

Tensions have risen amid reports Israel may be planning a possible strike against Iran's nuclear facilities.

Iran denies its nuclear programme is anything other than peaceful.

Iranian Foreign Minister says a "new process" is under way in negotiations between Tehran and the West over his nation's disputed nuclear program.

Iranian state media Wednesday quote Mottaki as saying Tehran is "constructively" reviewing an international incentives package designed to encourage Iran to suspend its uranium enrichment activities. Mottaki says Iran also has presented its own proposal to resolve the issue.

The United States has beefed up its covert effort to undermine Iran's leadership since Congress approved late last year President George W. Bush's funding request of 400 million U.S. dollars against the Islamic republic, the New Yorker magazine reported Sunday.

Following the special investment by the Bush administration, the United States has increased its support for Iran's minority and dissidents and intelligence gathering about Iran's nuclear facilities, the U.S. magazine quoted former military, intelligence, and congressional sources as reporting.

Thousands of supporters of an Iranian opposition group called on the European Union and the United States to remove the organization from terror blacklists at a massive rally Saturday outside Paris.

The Paris-based National Council Resistance of Iran -- an umbrella group that includes the blacklisted People's Mujahedeen of Iran, or PMOI -- held the rally at an exhibition center in the northern Villepinte suburb just days after Britain removed PMOI from its list of banned terror groups.

The commander of the Revolutionary Guards said Iran would impose controls on shipping in the vital Gulf oil transit route if the Islamic Republic came under attack, a newspaper reported on Saturday. Speculation about a possible attack on Iran because of its disputed nuclear ambitions has risen since a report this month said Israel had practiced such a strike.

The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran has expressed its grave concern for the rule of law in Iran and the welfare of two human rights activists there, Hana Abdi and Ronak Safarzadeh.

Below is a press release issued by the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran:

Many Iranians believe the country's miserable economic situation is a byproduct of mismanagement and widespread corruption at the top.

Iran, the world's third-largest oil exporter, sold its crude last week for $136 a barrel. So the question on the lips of people in the streets is: Where's all this money going?

Iran's Majlis (Parliament) Speaker Ali Larijani said on Saturday a possible Israeli attack against the Islamic Republic would be a "grave mistake," the official IRNA news agency reported.

"If they make such a grave mistake, they will pay a high price for it," Larijani was quoted as saying on the sidelines of the commemoration ceremony for late martyr Mostafa Chamran.

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Mohamed el-Baradei warned on Saturday that any military strike on Iran could turn West Asia to a “ball of fire” and lead Iran to a more-aggressive stance on its controversial nuclear program.