Iran moderates held in "hard" conditions: website

TEHRAN (Reuters) - The wives of leading Iranian reformers detained after a disputed election in June have complained about their husbands' "hard and intolerable" prison conditions, a reformist website reported on Thursday.

The Norooz website published what it said was an open letter to the head of the judiciary from the wives of "political prisoners" accused of fomenting street unrest after the presidential poll and arrested more than three months ago.

The letter, which called for a reconsideration of the cases against the detainees, suggested that at least some of them were held in solitary confinement.

It was signed by the wives of former Deputy Interior Minister Mostafa Tajzadeh, former Deputy Foreign Minister Mohsen Aminzadeh, former government spokesman Abdollah Ramezanzadeh, opposition politician Mohsen Mirdamadi and four other detainees, Norooz said.

" ... for what crime have our loved ones been enduring solitary confinement in hard and intolerable conditions?" Norooz quoted the letter as saying.

"The pressure exerted against our dear ones behind bars ... in constant and long interrogation would only be understandable by those who have experienced similar conditions," it said.

There was no immediate comment from the authorities.

The June election plunged Iran into its most serious internal crisis since the 1979 Islamic revolution and has exposed deep divisions in the establishment's ruling elite.

Rights groups say thousands of people were detained after the vote, including pro-reform activists, journalists and others. Most have since been released but more than 100 have been put on trial.

Analysts see the mass trials as an attempt by the authorities to uproot the moderate opposition.

Defeated moderate candidates say the vote was rigged to secure hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's re-election. They also say some detainees were abused in jail.

The authorities, which reject opposition charges of vote rigging, have portrayed the huge opposition protests that erupted after the election as a foreign-backed bid to undermine the Islamic Republic's clerical leadership.

On Wednesday, Iran freed one detained reformer, Saeed Hajjarian, on bail, Iranian media reported.

Hajjarian, disabled since an assassination attempt in 2000, was quoted as saying at his trial last month he had "made major mistakes during the election by presenting incorrect analyses ... and I apologize to the Iranian nation for those mistakes."

Reformist former President Mohammad Khatami, who backed opposition leader Mirhossein Mousavi in the election, has said confessions made at the trials were obtained under "extraordinary conditions" and were invalid.

(Editing by Samia Nakhoul)