WORLD IN BRIEF
Wednesday, August 9, 2006; Page A13
Nobel Winner to Fight Iranian Closure Order
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi has said she intends to defy an Iranian government order that her Center for Defense of Human Rights cease functioning.
In an e-mail to her literary agent in the United States, Ebadi said she and other group members "shall continue our activities. However, there is a high possibility that . . . they will arrest us." She called the government's actions illegal.
Ebadi received the Nobel in 2003 for her work with street children, women and dissidents -- work often in conflict with the Iranian government.
Last week, the government in Tehran declared her group illegal. In the e-mail to literary agent Wendy J. Strothman, Ebadi said she thought that the decision was triggered by the publication of her book "Iran Awakening: A Memoir of Revolution and Hope."
Human Rights Watch, the New York-based advocacy group, on Tuesday called on the Iranian government to reverse its order.
The government has threatened to prosecute anyone acting on behalf of the center, which authorities contended did not have a proper permit.
The center applied for a permit when it was founded in 2001, but it never received a reply, according to Human Rights Watch.
Permits are not required by law, the New York group said, but the Iranian Interior Ministry has in practice mandated them.
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ASIA
· BEIJING -- An official from China's social security fund, Tong Daning, was executed in April after being convicted of spying for rival Taiwan, an agency spokesman said. Government employees have been required to watch a video about the case.
