Iran airs new confession by woman in stoning case

An Iranian woman sentence to death by stoning for infidelity confessed to helping a man kill her husband and re-enacted the alleged crime in an meeting broadcast Friday by Iranian state television — an clear effort by the government to deflect international criticism over the case.

It was the fourth time Sakineh Mohammedi Ashtiani has been shown on TV as Tehran has faced an international outcry over the proclamation that she would be stoned to death, the latest source of friction between Iran and the West.

Establishment announced her conviction in the assassinate case only after the uproar over the stoning sentence erupted last summer, and her lawyer — who has since been arrested — said she was never properly put on trial for the killing and was tormented into confessing. Iranian authorities could use the assassinate charge to justify perform Ashtiani by hanging instead of stoning.

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Iranian nuclear scientist killed, another injured in Tehran bombings

A well-known Iranian nuclear scientist was killed Monday and a second was gravely wounded in nearly concurrent car bomb attacks in the Iranian capital, the semiofficial Fars news agency report.

The explosion, which took place near Shahid Beheshti University, are the latest in a string of recent murder attempts in which five doctors and professor have been killed in Tehran.

Iranian establishment blamed agents of Israel and the United States for the killings, saying they want to cause chaos in the country. But leading figures in Iran's resistance movement accused the government of intrigues the attacks in order to increase fear in the capital, where many oppose the regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

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Iran says foreign planes violated its airspace

Iran said Wednesday that nameless foreign planes violated its airspace six times as the nation kicked off its biggest ever air protection drill but that the intruder were intercept and forced back by Iranian jets.

The remarks by Gen. Hamid Arjangi, a spokesman for the exercise, were the first Iranian claim of an infringement. Initially, he had only said that distant investigation planes had approach Iran's air space.

There was no way to verify Iran's claims. The spokesman did not identify whether the aircraft were warplanes or pilotless watch drones that might have been sent up to observe the drill.

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Netanyahu: Israel's very existence is our answer to Iran

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu affirmed on Thursday that the very survival of the State of Israel discredit those looking for to destroy it.

Speaking at the Independence Museum in Tel Aviv hours following Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's address to thousands of Hezbollah faction in southern Lebanon, Netanyahu said: "The best answer to scorners was given in this auditorium 62 years ago."

"And since then, look at what a nation, what a state, what an army we have," said Netanyahu. "We will carry on to build and to create, and we will know how to defend ourselves as best as we can."

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Ahmadinejad says capitalism faces defeat

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad affirmed Tuesday that capitalism countenances predictable defeat and called for the repair of "undemocratic and unjust" global decision-making bodies.

In a words on the second day of a U.N. anti-poverty peak, the Iranian leader blamed capitalism and transnational businesses for "the affliction of innumerable women, men and children in so many countries."

Ahmadinejad's speech to the 192-member Universal Assembly by no means mentioned the Millennium Development Goals — the U.N. aim set by world leaders in 2000 to battle global poverty by 2015 — that are the center of the three-day peak called by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to spur their implementation.

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Iran Strike Could Rely on US Missiles, Bombers, Analysts Say‎

Reports of an assassination attempt on the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, were denied by the Tehran regime today, which said the confusion stemmed from a firecracker being mistakenly described as a "grenade".

The Iranian website khabaronline.ir said a homemade grenade exploded near Ahmadinejad's presidential motorcade in Hamedan, western Iran, as he was on his way to address a crowd.

But the official Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) reported that a local youth had thrown a firecracker as "a sign of joy" and blamed the use of the words "homemade grenade" for the confusion.

It quoted the governor of Hamedan saying: "No one has been injured and no damage has been made."

However, Mehr news agency said that a number of people had been arrested at the scene.