Protesters allegedly raped in Iran prison

PARIS, Aug. 10 (UPI) -- Some protesters arrested after Iran's presidential election were raped in a notorious prison in Tehran, a reformist candidate said.

"Some young male detainees were raped, while some young female detainees were raped in a way that have caused serious injuries," reformist Mehdi Karroubi said on his Web site.

Karroubi said senior Iranian officials contacted him about "really shameful issues" that had arisen during the detention of protesters at the Kahrizak prison, which since has been closed on orders from Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

In a news conference, a top judiciary official Saturday acknowledged that some of the protesters had been tortured. It was the first such acknowledgment by a senior Iranian official.

There was no immediate official response to the rape accusations, though Iran's top police chief, Esmail Ahmadi-Moqaddam, Sunday said the prison "was only built for thugs and gangsters" and election protesters should not have been held there, The New York Times reported Monday.

At least two protesters who died at the prison fell ill from a virus and not as the result of mistreatment by guards, Ahmadi-Moqaddam said.

Hundreds of protesters were arrested after the June election that returned President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to power in a victory critics said was rigged.