TEHRAN (AFP) — Iran on Thursday blamed a mosque explosion that killed 13 people in the southern city of Shiraz last month on Western-backed monarchists who oppose the Islamic republic, the Fars news agency reported.
"The Shiraz blast was an act of sabotage and a plot by the enemies of the Iranian people in the name of monarchism," Interior Minister Mostafa Pour Mohammadi was quoted as saying.
"Their headquarters are in countries which claim (to support) human rights, defend their nations and be anti-terrorist," the minister said.
"They are supported in these countries where they have been given radio and television stations."
Several opposition TV and radio channels have sprung up in the United States and Europe in recent years broadcasting programmes to Iran via satellite.
Initial reports claimed the April 12 blast, which wounded more than 200, was a bomb attack, but officials later insisted it had been an accident.
On Wednesday Fars quoted Intelligence Minister Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejeie as saying the explosion was caused by a bomb and that suspects believed to have links with the country's Western foes had been arrested.
Pour Mohammadi said on Thursday that the culprits had been identified and arrested "in another bombing attempt which was foiled" in an unspecified Iranian province.
He did not single out a particular country, but Iranians have a sizable diaspora community in Iran's arch-foe the United States, some of whom support the son of Iran's deposed Shah, Reza Pahlavi.
The Shiraz blast ripped through a packed mosque during an evening prayer sermon by a prominent local cleric.
Mohseni Ejeie said on Wednesday that the group responsible for the blast had links with Britain and the United States.
He charged that these countries "did not take any measure to prevent terrorist actions and rather supported them."
Iran has blamed US and British agents based in neighbouring Iraq and Afghanistan for launching deadly attacks in border provinces with significant ethnic minority populations in recent years.
But the strike in Shiraz was the first in decades in Iran's Persian heartland. The normally placid city is not in a border zone, nor is it home to any significant ethnic or religious minority population.
One of Iran's most famous tourist cities, Shiraz is popular because of its proximity to important ancient sites from the Achaemenid Empire that ruled much of central and southwest Asia from 550 to 331 BC.
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