Iranian authorities will erect a plaque outside the German embassy tomorrow denouncing Germany's contribution to former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein's chemical-weapons arsenal, in the latest tit-for-tat measure in a diplomatic spat between Berlin and Iran's clerical leaders, the official IRNA news agency said.
Tehran's conservative-controlled municipality gave the order on April 27 to put up the plaque, in a direct response to the unveiling the week before of a plaque in Berlin denouncing Iran for the 1992 murders there of four Kurdish dissidents.
"We will put up the plaque to commemorate the chemical-weapons victims in front of the German embassy on Friday," city council head Mehdi Chamran was quoted as saying by IRNA.
The ceremony will be attended by the members of the Tehran City Council, the government and military officials and veterans of the bloody 1980-1988 war against Iraq who were victims of chemical weapons.
Chamran added that the purpose of the plaque was to "support the chemical-weapons victims and to condemn the German government who sold the technology and the weapons of mass destruction to the Baathist regime of Saddam."
"Germany and the other oppressing countries are collectively responsible for these crimes and we want the Germans to ask questions of their government," Chamran added.
He also insisted that, "the German government must apologize to the Iranian nation, especially to the victims of the chemical weapons and their families."
Nearly a month ago, local officials in Berlin's Charlottenburg district unveiled a plaque marking the 1992 attack in the Mykonos restaurant.
It carries the victims' names and the words: "Murdered by the then regime in Iran. They died fighting for freedom and human rights."
A German court concluded in 1997 that the killers of the four Iranian Kurds were acting on Tehran's orders.
The decision prompted the German government to recall its ambassador and the EU to suspend dialogue with the Islamic republic for a year.
DOUBLE-MURDER CASE: The officer told the dispatcher he would check the locations of the callers, but instead headed to a pizzeria, remaining there for about an hour A New Jersey officer has been charged with misconduct after prosecutors said he did not quickly respond to and properly investigate reports of a shooting that turned out to be a double murder, instead allegedly stopping at an ATM and pizzeria. Franklin Township Police Sergeant Kevin Bollaro was the on-duty officer on the evening of Aug. 1, when police received 911 calls reporting gunshots and screaming in Pittstown, about 96km from Manhattan in central New Jersey, Hunterdon County Prosecutor Renee Robeson’s office said. However, rather than responding immediately, prosecutors said GPS data and surveillance video showed Bollaro drove about 3km
‘MOTHER’ OF THAILAND: In her glamorous heyday in the 1960s, former Thai queen Sirikit mingled with US presidents and superstars such as Elvis Presley The year-long funeral ceremony of former Thai queen Sirikit started yesterday, with grieving royalists set to salute the procession bringing her body to lie in state at Bangkok’s Grand Palace. Members of the royal family are venerated in Thailand, treated by many as semi-divine figures, and lavished with glowing media coverage and gold-adorned portraits hanging in public spaces and private homes nationwide. Sirikit, the mother of Thai King Vajiralongkorn and widow of the nation’s longest-reigning monarch, died late on Friday at the age of 93. Black-and-white tributes to the royal matriarch are being beamed onto towering digital advertizing billboards, on
Tens of thousands of people on Saturday took to the streets of Spain’s eastern city of Valencia to mark the first anniversary of floods that killed 229 people and to denounce the handling of the disaster. Demonstrators, many carrying photos of the victims, called on regional government head Carlos Mazon to resign over what they said was the slow response to one of Europe’s deadliest natural disasters in decades. “People are still really angry,” said Rosa Cerros, a 42-year-old government worker who took part with her husband and two young daughters. “Why weren’t people evacuated? Its incomprehensible,” she said. Mazon’s
POWER ABUSE WORRY: Some people warned that the broad language of the treaty could lead to overreach by authorities and enable the repression of government critics Countries signed their first UN treaty targeting cybercrime in Hanoi yesterday, despite opposition from an unlikely band of tech companies and rights groups warning of expanded state surveillance. The new global legal framework aims to bolster international cooperation to fight digital crimes, from child pornography to transnational cyberscams and money laundering. More than 60 countries signed the declaration, which means it would go into force once ratified by those states. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described the signing as an “important milestone,” and that it was “only the beginning.” “Every day, sophisticated scams destroy families, steal migrants and drain billions of dollars from our economy...
RSS