Iranian clerics vow death for Koran-defilers

Two top Iranian clerics said anyone desecrating the Koran must be killed, Fars news agency reported, as hundreds of people protested yesterday outside the Swiss embassy in Tehran.

“From the point of view of Islamic jurisprudence, strong objection to such thoughts is mandatory and necessary and killing the people who have committed this act is compulsory,” Ayatollah Hossein Nouri Hamedani said as quoted by Fars.

His view was echoed by Ayatollah Naser Makarem Shirazi who added that such a response must be taken after consulting a “religious judge”.

“The blood of the person who burns the Koran can undoubtedly be shed. But in this issue, no action should be taken without the permission of a religious judge,” Makarem Shirazi told Fars.

Evangelical US pastor Terry Jones had threatened in the run up to the ninth anniversary of the September 11, 2001, attacks on the US to burn hundreds of copies of the Koran at his tiny Florida church. He later relented. But a group of conservative Christians tore up pages of the Muslim holy book in a protest on Saturday outside the White House.

Iran’s Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani condemned Washington’s inaction in response to Saturday’s desecration of the Koran, which he called a “brutal” act which shows “barbarism in the modern era”, in comments carried yesterday by Isna news agency.

Top Iranian officials have issued harsh criticism over the issue, with hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad even saying the US pastor’s bid to burn the holy book was a “Zionist plot” that would lead to the speedy “annihilation” of Israel.

“Zionists and their supporters are on their way to collapse and dissolution and such last-ditch actions will not save them, but multiply the pace of their fall and annihilation,” state TV quoted Mr Ahmadinejad as saying on Friday.

Mr Ahmadinejad has on several occasions questioned the accepted version of the 2001 attacks by Al-Qaeda militants, which killed nearly 3,000 people in the US.

Meanwhile up to 500 people demonstrated outside the Swiss embassy in northern Tehran in protest against the US over the Koran-burning issue.

The crowd, chanting anti-US and anti-Israel slogans, pelted stones at the embassy and tried to get into the building, but the guards prevented them from entering the premises.

Several protesters, carrying copies of the Koran on their heads, set US and Israel flags on fire as they chanted “Death to America! Death to Israel!”