IRAN: THREE MEN HANGED FOR MOSQUE BOMBING

May 30, 2009: Iran hanged three men who were accused of being involved in a mosque bombing that killed 25 people and wounded more than 100, the official IRNA news agency reported.
Two others were arrested and are being questioned in connection with the bombing, which took place on May 28 in the southeastern city of Zahedan, the news agency said.
IRNA identified the men as Haji Nouti Zehi, Gholam Rasoul Shahroo Zehi and Zabihollah Naroui.
A provincial judiciary official, Ibrahim Hamidi, said the men were arrested a few days before the bombing but all three confessed to providing the explosive, the IRNA news agency reported.
They were hanged at 6 a.m., before the funeral of the victims today.
The explosion occurred at the Ali Ibn-Abitaleb mosque, the second largest Shiite mosque in Zahedan, during a Shiite mourning ceremony.
A Sunni militant group called Jundullah, meaning God’s Brigade, took responsibility for the attack on its Web site and said it was a suicide bombing.
It also said in a statement on its Web site today that the three men who were executed had no involvement in the bombing.
Iran says the group is a terrorist organization linked to Al Qaeda and backed by the United States. Iran is a predominantly Shiite country but a large number of Sunni Muslims live in the south, including in Sistan-Baluchistan Province, where Zahedan is the provincial capital.
Jundullah has waged an insurgency in Sistan-Baluchistan for several years and says the Sunnis in the region suffer from persecution by the central government. (Sources: nytimes.com, 30/09/2009)