France bars Iranian exiles as Khatami arrives in Paris

For the first time since the Shah was overthrown in 1979, an Iranian head of state has come to Paris. President Mohamed Khatami's three-day visit, which began yesterday, is widely seen as the most important foreign journey of his 2 1/2-year-old presidency, aimed at ending Iran's isolation and bolstering Mr Khatami in his power struggle in Tehran.

French authorities went to unusual lengths to prevent the Iranian leader's visit being marred by protests from the National Council of Resistance of Iran, whose chief component are the Baghdad-based People's Mujaheddin. In the past, Paris and Washington supported the Mujaheddin, but the US State Department now regards them as a terrorist organisation.

Citing a get-out clause in the Schengen agreement, France set up immigration controls on its borders with Italy and Germany to prevent hundreds of Iranian exiles from reaching demonstrations in Paris. The Interior Minister, Mr Jean-Pierre Chevenement, said he had "knowledge of serious and precise threats". Before dawn yesterday, gendarmes arrested 39 Iranians at three locations. At the Mujaheddin headquarters in Auvers-sur-Oise, security forces were pelted with stones. Three metro stations were closed in central Paris because of the visit.

All but four of the Iranians were later released, and up to 2,000 people attended an NCRI demonstration at the Place du Trocadero. The NCRI's leader, Mr Massoud Rajavi, sent a letter to President Jacques Chirac saying the group's human rights and freedom of expression had been violated by the police raids.

A rumour circulating in Iranian exile circles said two Iranian women were planning to immolate themselves in front of UNESCO when Mr Khatami gave a speech there today. UNESCO announced yesterday that the speech had been cancelled, but the Iranian embassy said "things are still evolving".

That Mr Khatami arrived in Paris at all was something of a miracle. An earlier visit fell through last April because the Iranians objected to wine being served at official functions. The issue was evaded this time by leaving meals off the schedule. Both the French and their Iranian guest are anxious to avoid anything that would help Mr Khatami's conservative religious critics in Iran. Although no one has clarified whether his is a state visit, President Khatami is sleeping at the Hotel Marigny, the official guest palace across the street from the Elysee. He met both the Prime Minister, Mr Lionel Jospin, and President Chirac yesterday.

The French leaders said they would raise the question of 13 Iranian Jews who were arrested last spring on charges of spying for Israel. If found guilty, they could be executed. The French Foreign Minister, Mr Hubert Vedrine, has said it is "unlikely" that the 13 were spies. His predecessor, Mr Herve de Charette, said progress on this issue "will be the test of whether Iran is in the process of evolving or closing itself off".

Mr Khatami's visit is taking place four months before Iranian legislative elections in which his moderate-left faction hopes to take the parliament from xenophobic conservatives led by the Guide of the Revolution and successor to Ayatollah Khomeini, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Since he was elected by more than two-thirds of the popular vote in May 1997, Mr Khatami has brought a degree of press freedom, but he has not succeeded in improving the economy or in wresting the judiciary and security forces from control by conservatives. In last summer's student riots, he at first appeared to support the protesters, then condemned them.