IRAN: Iran has said two interrogators had been charged with complicity in "semi-intentional" murder over the death of a Canadian photojournalist in July, the official IRNA news agency said.
The death of Zahra Kazemi (54) who Iranian government officials have said was killed by a blow to the head after her arrest for taking photographs outside a Tehran prison, has sparked a diplomatic row between Canada and Iran. "The charges levelled against the interrogators, who are said to be members of the Intelligence Ministry, are announced as complicity in semi-intentional murder," IRNA said, quoting a report from the Tehran prosecutor's office.
It said the prosecutor's office had not identified the two.
IRNA said the indictment issued by the investigator in the Tehran prosecutor's office would be sent for approval by a higher-ranking criminal prosecutor, who has five days to issue a decision.
In Ottawa, Canadian Foreign Ministry officials said they would not comment until they had confirmed the IRNA story.
Canadian diplomats in Tehran were not immediately available for comment.
Iranian officials initially said Kazemi, a Montreal-based journalist of Iranian descent, died of a stroke. But a government inquiry revealed she had been killed by a brain haemorrhage caused by a severe blow to the skull. Iran's Vice President Mohammad Ali Abtahi said at the end of July she was probably murdered.
The incident has thrown a spotlight on the shadowy practices of Iran's security services and the treatment of the media in the Islamic Republic. - (Reuters)