Iran Watch: Iran Blames U.S. and Britain for Bombings

Iranian bank employees worker, search for ducuments at the Saman Bank in the city of Ahvaz, Iran, Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2006, where a bomb exploded, Tuesday . The death toll in a pair of bombings on Tuesday rose to nine dead with more than 46 wounded in Ahvaz, a city in southwestern Iran with a history of violence involving members of Iran’s Arab minority, Iranian state media reported.

ASSociated Press: Iran Blames U.S., Britain for Bombings

Iran’s president on Wednesday blamed “the occupiers of Iraq” — inferring the United States and Britain — for two bombings that killed at least nine people in the southwestern city of Ahvaz.

The foreign minister said the bombers were supported by the British military, which is based in southern Iraq. Ahvaz has a history of violence involving members of Iran’s Arab minority.

A spokesman for British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s office called the allegations “ludicrous.” A group seeking independence for the Ahvaz region later claimed responsibility.

State television said President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad issued a decree ordering his foreign minister and intelligence minister to investigate the possibility that “foreign hands” were responsible for Tuesday’s blasts inside a bank and outside a state environmental agency building. Forty-six people were wounded, the official Islamic Republic News Agency has reported.

“Traces of the occupiers of Iraq is evident in the Ahvaz events. They should take responsibility in this regard,” state television quoted Ahmadinejad as saying.

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