Revelation and rejection of a cable that alleges bribery

Ahmed Shaheed, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Iran, in an interview with the BBC Monday denied allegations that he received bribes from the Saudis as he tried to elaborate on the sources he gets his information from.

In an analytical report on July 28, the website of Khorasan daily, assessed the conduct of the UN special rapporteur. The report featured a news story by Arabic-language news website http://www.alwaienews.com/ that claimed a leaked WikiLeaks cable suggests the UN rapporteur has received $1 million in bribes from the Saudi embassy in Kuwait to take a tougher line against the Islamic Republic.

Khorasan has rejected the sources and the way the UN rapporteur gathers information on Iran by saying, “There are many indications that Ahmad Shaheed is pushing the agenda of the anti-revolutionaries as part of a grand plan.”

The Khorasan report also included the reaction of the UN official to the allegation by Alwaie News and said,” Ahmed Shaheed, the UN Special Rapporteur on human rights in Iran, in an interview with the BBC Monday denied allegations that he received bribes from the Saudis as he tried to elaborate on the sources he gets his information from.”

It added “Without denying the report, WikiLeaks simply asked – on its Twitter account – the source that published the news to ‘show which cable this claim is based on’.”

[It should be noted that on Monday Iranfrontpage.com translated a report by the Young Journalists Club that suggested the UN rapporteur has received bribes from the Saudi embassy in Kuwait. Since Iranfrontpage seems to have been the first website to have released the English version of the controversial news story, WikiLeaks directed its Twitter demand at Iranfrontpage which in turn mentioned Alwaie News and the Young Journalists Club as the sources of its translated story].