Iran Increases Security for Nuclear Scientists Following Assassination - East Idaho News
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Iran Increases Security for Nuclear Scientists Following Assassination

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092611 Ahmadinejad2?  SQUARESPACE CACHEVERSION=1326826817098ABC/ Donna Svennevik(TEHRAN, Iran) — Iran is giving its nuclear scientists more security following the assassination of scientist Mustafa Ahmadi Roshan last week, a top Iranian official said Tuesday. First Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi said the new security included “remarkable measures.”

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad issued orders to improve the protection of the country’s nuclear scientists, Rahimi said during a memorial for the “martyrs of Iran’s nuclear industry,” according to Iranian news outlets. Roshan was a chemical engineer who worked at the Natanz uranium enrichment facility.

“Some remarkable measures have been taken in this regard and all people active in the nuclear sector have come under a special protection plan according to the very same order,” the semi-official Fars news agency quoted Rahimi saying.

Four scientists linked to Iran’s nuclear infrastructure have been killed in the past two years. Another, Fereydoon Abbasi-Davani, was targeted in late 2010 but survived and now heads the country’s atomic agency.

Iran says it has identified suspects behind Roshan’s death, its intelligence minister Heidar Moslehi on Sunday vowed a “crushing response” directed against the United States, United Kingdom and Israel.

After Roshan was killed last Wednesday by a magnetic bomb attached to his car by a motorcyclist, Iran immediately accused Israel and the U.S. of being behind the plot — and added the UK as an accomplice later — and said they had documents to prove Mossad and CIA involvement. American officials vehemently denied the accusation while Israeli officials remained mum.

According to the Tehran Times, Iran’s Minister of Science, Research and Technology announced Monday that some 1,300 university students had changed majors to nuclear physics and engineering in support of the country’s nuclear program.

At Sharif University, official Mehrdad Bazrpash reportedly said 300 had, “announced their readiness to work in the nuclear industry promising to rob the enemies of sleep.”

Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio

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