Reuters, 4 January 1999

Iranian transvestite boys to be flogged -- paper

TEHRAN, Jan 4 (Reuters) - An Iranian court has ordered two teenaged boys to be flogged for dressing as girls to extort money from young men, a newspaper reported on Monday.

The daily Qods said the boys, both 15, were dressed as girls and wearing make up when arrested on a popular park promenade in the southern city of Shiraz.

The Islamic court sentenced the two to an unspecified number of lashes for "offending public decency," it said.

The boys told the court they resorted to cross-dressing to "extort money from rich young men," the newspaper added.

Reuters, 14 January 1999

Iran to jail, flog militants for beating officials

TEHRAN, Jan 14 (Reuters) - An Iranian court has condemned three militants to lashings and jail terms of up to 18 months for assaulting members of moderate President Mohammad Khatami's cabinet, a newspaper reported on Thursday.

The daily Iran said the court sentenced Amir Farshad Ebrahimi to an 18-month term and 40 lashes in connection with the attack by a group of hardliners on liberal Culture and Islamic Guidance Minister Ataollah Mohajerani and then Vice-President Abdollah Nouri at a public event in September.

Kiyanoush Mozaffari and Babak Shahrestani were each given a six-month jail sentence and 20 lashes for the attack in which Mohajerani was reported to have been slightly injured, said the newspaper, which is published by Iran's official news agency IRNA.

The ruling was a rare action against Islamic hardliners who have frequently attacked gatherings of moderates since Khatami's landslide election on a platform of liberal political and social reforms in 1997.

Despite Khatami's advocacy of the rule of law as a cornerstone of his reforms, conservative-run courts have often declined to act against the militants, who are widely believed to enjoy the support of powerful members of the clerical establishment.

The court's ruling came amid a row between moderates and conservatives over a spate of killings of dissidents and intellectuals blamed on death squads which included members of Iran's secret police.