Iranian detainees tortured, beaten to death: Karroubi

An Iranian opposition leader made fresh claims yesterday that several protesters jailed in the June election unrest died in prisons after they were tortured, beaten and made to crawl like animals.
"Some youngsters who were chanting slogans were beaten in such a way that they lost their lives," said Mehdi Karroubi in his newspaper Etemad Melli on Saturday.
Meanwhile, Iran will put on trial 25 more people arrested after the disputed result of the June presidential election, as fresh claims surfaced yesterday that several protesters in jail were tortured to death.
"The third session of the elements of recent riots in Tehran will be held on Sunday," a court statement carried by the ISNA news agency said. "In this session charges against 25 defendants... will be presented."
Iran has already put on trial 110 people charged with protesting against the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
The defendants include top reformists, political activists, a French lecturer and two employees of the French and the British embassies.
The trial of lecturer Clotilde Reiss has finished, although she remains in custody. Securing her release has been a diplomatic priority for Paris, with President Nicolas Sarkozy raising the case with other leaders.
The reformist cleric charged that several protesters were tortured in the Kahrizak detention centre, south of Tehran, before it was ordered closed by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
"Unfortunately some of the people who took part in the protests were tortured," Karroubi said in a separate claim on the website of his political party, also called Etemad Melli.
"I heard they (security forces) stripped people in Kahrizak and made them crawl like animals with prison guards riding on their backs."
He said it was a "shame" for the Islamic republic to indulge in such tactics as "some of those arrested were forced to be naked and piled upon each other" in the prison cells.