Sunday, December 03, 2006
:: International
Iran passes new law to fingerprint US visitors http://www.asianage.com/presentation/leftnavigation/news/international/iran-passes-new-law-to-fingerprint-us-visitors.aspx
By ALI AKBAR DAREINI
Tehran, Dec. 2: Iran has passed a law requiring immigration officials to fingerprint US passport holders despite Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's opposition to the measure. A spokesman for the Guardian Council, a constitutional watchdog that must vet all bills before they become law, announced the approval of the legislation on Saturday, the official Iranian news agency reported.
"The Guardian Council approved the bill requiring inspecting and fingerprinting American nationals upon arrival in Iran," council spokesman Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei said on Saturday, Iranian news agency reported. Mr Kadkhodaei said the government "is required to inspect and fingerprint all American nationals at entry ports and visa issuance centres in consistency with the US behaviour." The council approved the law earlier this week, he said.
Iran's Parliament passed the bill on November 19th. Mr Ahmadinejad last month said he was against the bill because has no quarrel with ordinary Americans. The power to cancel the law lies with parliament and the Guardian Council, which must pass a new legislation that annuls the measure. Conservatives drafted the law in retaliation for the US requirement that Iranian visitors be fingerprinted. The United States measure, which also applies to nationals of some other countries, was implemented after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington. Iran's foreign minister Manouchehr Mottaki last month announced his opposition to the parliamentary bill.
Small numbers of American passport holders visit Iran, mostly academics interested in Iran's history and culture. The United States and Iran have had no diplomatic relations since militant Iranian students stormed the US embassy in Tehran in 1979.
The atmosphere between the two countries improved marginally under former President Mohammad Khatami, who encouraged athletic and cultural exchanges, but it deteriorated after the September 11, 2001 attacks when US President George W. Bush declared that Iran belonged to an "axis of evil" with Iraq and North Korea.
Since taking office last year, Mr Ahmadinejad has widened the gap with Washington by taking a hardline on Iran's nuclear programme and calling for Israel's destruction. Iran and the United States are at odds over the Islamic republic's support for the Lebanese Hezbollah rebel group. (AP)
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