IRAN: Eight Iranians were killed and dozens injured by two bombs in Ahvaz, on the day president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had been due to visit the southwestern city.
The blasts, in a bank and a government building, were the latest outbreak of violence to strike the ethnically sensitive city, which has a majority Arab population.
Officials said Mr Ahmadinejad had called off his trip because of bad weather, but there was speculation that the cancellation was due to intelligence warnings of an imminent attack.
The Lebanese television channel al-Manar, run by the pro-Iranian Shia group Hizbullah, reported that the attacks were an assassination attempt on Mr Ahmadinejad, but Iranian officials dismissed the suggestion.
"The place where the bombs exploded was a long way from where the president had planned to make a speech," said Ahvaz governor Muhammad Jafar Samari.
One explosion tore through the Saman bank at around 10am, when some 60 people were inside, causing the ceiling to collapse.
The second blast hit the local headquarters of the state-run centre for natural resources and was said to have been triggered by a device planted in a machine room. Several survivors had to have limbs amputated, doctors said.
There was no claim of responsibility, but several MPs in Iran's conservative-dominated parliament blamed the blasts on Arab separatists who they claimed are backed by foreign powers.
"Those behind the explosions are dependent on counter-revolutionary currents and influenced by foreign elements," Hamid Zanganeh, MP for Ahvaz, told the Mehr news agency.
"They were trying to use the president's planned visit to expose Iran's internal situation as unpeaceful and unstable."
In October officials, including Mr Ahmadinejad, blamed the UK for two blasts that killed seven in Ahvaz.
No evidence was presented, and Britain denied the claim.
In June four explosions within 24 hours killed seven people in the city, just days before Iran's presidential election.
The blasts followed the deaths in April of at least five people in clashes with security forces following demonstrations triggered by claims of discrimination from the local Arab population. - (Guardian Service)