Iran opposition leaders jailed

TEHRAN, Iran – Iranian authorities have taken senior opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mahdi Karroubi to a prison in Tehran, a reformist website said Monday. A semiofficial news agency denied the report.

Kaleme.com said Mousavi, his wife Zahra Rahnavard, as well as Karroubi and his wife, Fatemeh Karroubi, were transferred to Heshmatieh prison in the Iranian capital. It was not immediately clear when they were moved.

"According to the latest information obtained from reliable sources, Mousavi and Karroubi, together with their wives ... have been arrested and transferred to Heshmatieh prison," kaleme.com said.

But the semiofficial Fars news agency, which is close to the powerful Revolutionary Guard, denied the report. Fars quoted an unnamed judiciary official as saying the men were still under house arrest and have not been allowed to leave their homes or have any outside contact.

Calls placed by The Associated Press to judiciary officials went unanswered.

The imprisonment, if confirmed, would mark a major escalation of Iran's political crisis amid defiant calls from the opposition to stand up to the ruling system.

Earlier Monday, Iran's state prosecutor, Gholam Hossein MOhseni Ejehi, said that authorities had cut all outside contact with the opposition leaders as part of a campaign to silence dissent.

The official IRNA news agency quoted Ejehi as warning that authorities would take "other measures" against Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mahdi Karroubi if necessary.

"In the first step, their contacts such as meetings and telephone conversations have been restricted," Ejehi was quoted by IRNA as saying. "Should circumstances arise, other measures will be taken."

Ejehi did not say where they were being held.

Mousavi and Karroubi were placed under house arrest after urging supporters to attend a Feb. 14 rally. Clashes between protesters and security forces during the demonstrations killed two and wounded dozens.

Karroubi's website, sahamnews.org, said Iranian security forces took the two and their wives to an "unknown location" on Thursday.

Activists and opposition members have demanded Mousavi and Karroubi be released, vowing to stage demonstrations every Tuesday until they are freed.

Ejehi said any attempt by opposition supporters to take to the streets will meet swift retribution.

Iranian officials had called Mousavi and Karroubi "leaders of sedition," but Ejehi said the two were no longer seditionists but counterrevolutionaries.

"Today, this current has passed the sedition stage. It has turned into an counter-revolution (current)," IRNA quoted him as saying.

Prominent pro-reform cleric, Grand Ayatollah Youssef Saanei, denounced the government's treatment of the two opposition leaders.

"We are witnessing anti-Islamic and antihuman attacks against political opponents," said Saanei in a statement posted on a reformist website, kaleme.com.

The men "have been deprived of their basic human rights and put under house arrest without holding any trial, even a show trial and without giving them the chance to defend themselves," said Saanei.

In a letter, the children of Mousavi and Karroubi urged other religious leaders in the holy city of Qom to break their silence and condemn the treatment of their parents.