Arcadia Foundation

A doctor who died at the Kahrizak detention center, closed after the deaths there of several protesters against June’s disputed election, committed suicide, state media said on Wednesday.

Iran’s parliament has begun an investigation into the death last week of Ramin Pourandarjani, who was serving his military service as a doctor at the facility.

“The death of Ramin Pourandarjani was the result of suicide,” the official news agency quoted police chief Esmail Ahmadi-Moghaddam as saying.

“The doctor had complaints of being threatened with a five-year jail term and had lost his spirit,” he said, referring to an apparent will Pourandarjani had written.

“He committed suicide after he was summoned to the court.”

Kahrizak was closed in July on orders of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei after at least three people, arrested during the post-election unrest, died in custody there.

Thousands of people were arrested in the protests after the June presidential election which led to the victory of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Moderate opposition candidates said the vote was rigged, a charge that Khamenei and the government have rejected.

The protests have proved the toughest domestic test to Iranian authorities since the Islamic revolution of 1979.

Reformist opposition websites reported last week that the death initially was thought to be a result of suicide.

A member of parliament’s health committee said on Tuesday death due to a heart attack was unlikely because of no previous health problems and Pourandarjani’s age, said to have been 26.

New Zealand was today named the world’s least corrupt nation out of a list of 180 countries, unseating Denmark after a year in which the global recession and ongoing conflicts proved challenging.

The annual index by Transparency International ranked 180 countries on a scale of zero to 10 according to 13 independent surveys, with zero being perceived as highly corrupt and 10 as having low levels of corruption.

New Zealand topped the table with a score of 9.4 after coming second last year. In second place was last year’s leader, Denmark with 9.3 followed by Singapore and Sweden tying at 9.2 and Switzerland at 9.0.

Countries at the bottom of the table were those which are unstable or impacted by war and ongoing conflicts that have affected the public sector and torn apart governance infrastructure.

Somalia had a score of 1.1, Afghanistan was 1.3, Myanmar ranked 1.4 and Sudan tied with Iraq at 1.5.

“Stemming corruption requires strong oversight by parliaments, a well-performing judiciary, independent and properly resourced audit and anti-corruption agencies, vigorous law enforcement, transparency in public budgets, revenue and aid flows, as well as space for independent media and a vibrant civil society,” said Huguette Labelle, chairwoman of Transparency International.

“The international community must find efficient ways to help war-torn countries to develop and sustain their own institutions.”

Rounding out the top 10 least corrupt nations were Finland, the Netherlands, Australia, Canada and Iceland.

Britain came 17th in the list and the United States was 19th with a score of 7.5.

More than 130 of the countries scored below 5.

Honduran lawmakers will not decide whether to restore ousted President Manuel Zelaya until after upcoming presidential elections, the congressional leader said yesterday, a decision that could undermine international support for the vote.

Congress will meet Dec. 2 — three days after the Nov. 29 election — to decide whether Zelaya should be returned the presidency to finish his constitutional term, which ends in January, congressional president Jose Alfredo Saavedra told HRN radio.

Several Latin American countries have warned they will not recognize the outcome of the election unless Zelaya is restored beforehand. But the United States has not ruled out restoring diplomatic ties with a newly elected Honduran government even if Zelaya remains out of power through the vote.

Zelaya warned over the weekend that he would not return to the presidency if Congress votes to restore him after the elections.

The administration of President Barack Obama has repeatedly said recognition of the election is not linked to any one action, said State Department spokesman Charles Luoma-Overstreet. Rather, he said, the State Department is hoping a broader, U.S.-brokered accord is enacted.

Both Zelaya and President Roberto Micheletti signed the agreement brokered by U.S. diplomats last month. However, the two sides are now at odds over whether the pact is being fulfilled.

The accord calls for formation of a national unity government, but does not require Zelaya’s restoration to office, leaving that decision up to Congress. It set no deadline for lawmakers to vote.

Zelaya, who has been holed up in the Brazilian Embassy since sneaking back into the country from his forced exile, declared the pact a failure two weeks ago when Micheletti announced the formation of a unity government before Congress had voted.

About 1,500 Zimbabwean migrants have fled their homes in a shantytown in rural South Africa, after tensions erupted with locals over competition for farm jobs, police said Wednesday.

South Africans on Tuesday physically prevented Zimbabweans workers from getting on to trucks taking them to jobs in the grapelands around De Doorns, about 140 kilometres (85 miles) northeast of Cape Town, said senior police superintendent Hendrik Olivier.

Fearing the incident could lead to further attacks, the Zimbabweans fled their shacks and turned to local authorities. Emergency services have set up a camp for the migrants at a local sports field, he said.

“We put up an internal displaced people camp at the sports field,” he said. “We put up tents and toilets.“

He said the tensions erupted over “the limited resources that are available in the rural areas, and also the limited work opportunities.“

Many of the Zimbabweans had seasonal jobs tending grape vines, but South Africans accused them of taking away their work by agreeing to longer hours and lower wages.

The incident sparked sharp memories of the xenophobic violence that rocked the nation in May 2008, in which more than 60 people were killed and tens of thousands forced to flee their homes — many of whom relocated to camps that have since closed.

Olivier said some of the Zimbabweans had lived in the area for up to three years. Some of their shacks were knocked down by angry neighbours, but many of the Zimbabweans were renting the shacks from South Africans, he added.

Millions of Zimbabweans have fled their country’s political and economic turmoil, with many coming to neighbouring South Africa, the continent’s economic powerhouse.

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