Guerrillas hit Iran’s oil province again

Press, 2 October 1979, Page 8

Guerrillas hit Iran’s oil province again

(NZPA-Reuter Teheran ‘ Guerrillas have struck at Iran's oil province, blowing up telephone links with the I world’s largest refinery at (Abadan and the country’s biggest port at KhorramIshahr. ■ It was the most serious guerrilla action in the oilrich province of Khuzestan, on the south-western border with Iraq, since oil and gas pipelines were blown up in July. The Minister of Posts and Telecommunications (Mr Hassan Eslami) said a micro-wave station 40km from Khorramshahr had been blown up by a timebomb. The Minister told the official Pars news agency that para-military reinforcements had been sent to the area to prevent further acts of sabotage. The station’s 100m e t r e-tall red-and-white steel mast had collapsed, Pars said. The deposed Shah built a network of micro-wave stations in the early 19705. The isolated stations, surrounded by barbed wire fences, were usually guarded by small detachments of troops under the previous regime. Pars said the attack on the station on the road be-, tween Khorramshahr and the oil centre of Ahwaz was the work of “counter-revolution-aries.” Dozens of alleged counterrevolutionaries have been executed in Khuzestan, and many more arrested, since fierce fighting broke out between the province’s Persian and, Arab communities at the Star* of the northern summer. Iran is short of more than 20,000 barrels a day of highgrade fuel because of an emergency shut-down of the Abadan refinery’s main boilerhouse three weeks ago, according to refinery technicians. !

tl Even if refining returns to I tj normal within the next few t (days as much as a million I ? I barrels of high-grade petrol | Hand aircraft fuel will have s heen lost. -j The loss comes at a time I when Iran is facing heavy .(demands for refined fuels in ! the coming winter. The ,i United States last month agreed to sell Iran about a . I million barrels of middle-1 'grade heating and cookingb (fuel to overcome expected! 11. seasonal shortages. Engineers shut down the boilerhouse after two of the | 12 boilers failed within .301 minutes of each other. Three • of the boilers were under; !maintenance and already out] I of action. Steam pressure] dropped, slowing pumps! Ifeeding water to the remain ! ring boilers. A former Prime Minister] • of Iran, Dr Shapur Baktiar,] ■ tin a radio interview broad-; ,'cast in France, has forecast] I the collapse of the regime of! Ayatollah Ruhollahj Khomeiny, the unofficial!: ■’Head of State, within six or (seven months. •I Iran, he said, was facing! (possible catastrophic econ-] domic consequences as a re-1 isult of the recent dismissal! jof the Iranian National Oil t (Company’s president, Mr Flassan Nazih. i “Khomeinism” would col-].' lapse largely because of the I bad economic situation in h which Iran was plunged, he - said. “National production has i 1 gone down by nearly two- i thirds. We now live without Is production, without work.; There are three and a halfit million unemployed more or h less known and registered,” I Dr Baktiar said. i ■I One day, he said, because t of clashes between the 'Prime Minister (Dr Mehdi t jßazargan) and oil-company 1 | leaders, "everything will im- t ; mediately come to a halt.” f I Iran's first civilian r

(Defence Minister (Dr Mustafa Ali Chairman) said (yesterday that fe would (purge the armei forces, (starting at the top. In his first intervew since his appointment thiee days ago, the 48-year-old former guerrilla told the Teheran daily. “Kayhan,” tlat the purge was intended bring the armed forces up o Islamic and revolutionart standards. Dr Chamran, who as a deputy Ptime Ministe bad been responsible for Atting up revolutionary Iran's new intelligence agency, said: “The purge will start ronr the top and will later tach lower levels." He said that at first he thought Iran would not ned any armed forces, and l|amic Revolutionary Guads would be sufficient. "But, unfortunately, in te last few months I discovert! about colonialist plots, a now we will always nee’ strong armed forces,” h< said. The Iranian Ministry of (Education has closed art colI leges in nine Iranian cities, including the capital, the English-language newspaper. “Kayhan International,'’ has reported. A Ministry circular, quoted by the newspaper, said the decision had been taken because the colleges taught “destructive arts,” which had led to the corruption of young minds. Ine colleges are apparently to be reorganised before opening again. The paper gave no further details about the kind of arts taught in the colleges. Ayatollah Khomeiny said earlier this month that Islam was not against art, but that universities should make distinctions between art that had served the revolution and art that was harmful frivolous, and had led the nation’s youth to oblivion