3 Iranians Ordered Out of Britain; Plot Suspected
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LONDON — Britain on Friday ordered three Iranians to leave the country for “reasons of national security,” the Home Office said. British press reports said the men were suspected of plotting to assassinate author Salman Rushdie.
A Foreign Office spokeswoman said the three--two Iranian Embassy employees and an Iranian traveling on a student visa--had been given seven days to leave Britain or face deportation.
Press Association, Britain’s national news agency, said they were suspected of being Iranian agents sent to Britain to carry out the death sentence pronounced against Rushdie by the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Khomeini accused Rushdie of blaspheming Islam in his novel “The Satanic Verses.” Rushdie has been in hiding since February, 1989.
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