Iran candidate says prisoners tortured to death

By Parisa Hafezi

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's defeated presidential candidate Mehdi Karoubi said on his website Thursday that some of those arrested after the June presidential election were tortured to death, but other inmates defended their treatment.

Authorities were not immediately available for comment, but state television, in a report on a parliamentary committee investigating claims of prison abuse, has shown people testifying that they were treated properly.

"I am not under pressure. I am satisfied with the conditions provided by the jail authorities," said a young detainee in Tehran's Evin prison, where many political prisoners are held.

Expanding on allegations he made Sunday that some arrested protesters, men and women, had been raped at Tehran's Kahrizak prison, Karoubi said detainees had reported being forced to go naked, with prison guards riding on their backs.

Still others were piled on top of each other, also naked.

"We observe that in an Islamic country some young people are beaten to death just for chanting slogans in (the post- election) protests," Karoubi's Etemademelli website said.

"Some of the detainees said they were forced to take off their clothes. Then they were made to go on their hands and knees and were ridden (by prison guards)," Karoubi said.

"Or the prison authorities put them on top of each other while they were naked," he added.

His allegation about prisoners in Kahrizak prison being raped was rejected by Iranian authorities as "baseless."

Many of the post-election detainees were held in the south Tehran prison, built to house people breaching vice laws. At least three people died in custody there and widespread anger erupted as reports of abuse in the jail spread.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ordered the closure of the Kahrizak prison last month.

The abuse allegations, also rejected by Tehran's police chief, have created a rift among hardline politicians, many of whom backed President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's re-election.

The disputed election was followed by the worst unrest in Iran since its 1979 Islamic revolution.

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