TEHRAN, 28 August 2004 — Iran yesterday hailed the efforts of Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani to end the three-week-old conflict in Najaf and called on the United States to learn a lesson from the recent developments.

“Just a few days after complicated heart surgery, an old man returns to a war-shattered city and within a few days succeeds in establishing something which the US and the interim Iraqi government failed to do in the last three weeks,” former President Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani said at a Friday prayer sermon.

The terms of the deal negotiated by Sistani call for the militants to vacate the Imam Ali mosque in Najaf, one of Shiites’ holiest shrines, and for foreign troops to leave the city. Iraq’s interim government also gave its stamp of approval to the deal.

Rafsanjani called on the US to learn a lesson from the peace deal and realize the power and depth of belief of Islam. Calling Najaf a “second Stalingrad”, he said despite all their military power, the US and the interim Iraqi government had failed to conquer the city and defeat a bunch of young Muslims armed only with light weapons.

The ex-president, who still plays a highly influential role in Iran’s political scenery, termed remarks by President George W. Bush in a newspaper interview yesterday on having made wrong assessments in Iraq as a positive development, “although it came one-and-a-half-year too late”.

He added that if the US adopted a wiser policy in the Middle East and Gulf regions and invested in the right cause, then the US might also find support and assistance from regional countries. He did not elaborate further.

Meanwhile, the Baghdad bureau chief of Iran’s state news agency IRNA was released by authorities yesterday after being held for nearly three weeks, the agency said. Mostafa Darban, who was detained by police on Aug. 9 and held by the Interior Ministry, was turned over to Iranian officials at the Khosravi border crossing between the two neighboring states, IRNA said.

“I do not know why I was arrested,” Darban was quoted as saying after his arrival in Iran. “I think it was all the result of a misunderstanding. I thank everyone who worked to obtain my freedom.”

Two other IRNA journalists, Mohammad Khafaji and Mohsen Madani, were arrested at the same time, according to IRNA, but the news agency did not say if they were still being detained. Darban’s liberation comes on the eve of a visit to Iran by Iraq’s interim vice prime minister, Barham Saleh, as the neighbors try to mend fences after a certain tension in recent weeks.

IRNA said Thursday that Saleh had promised during a meeting with the Iranian charge d’affaires that the journalists would be released before his visit.

The Iraqi government has never explained the arrests, although Tehran stands accused of meddling in the affairs of the new US-installed government.

An Iranian diplomat also disappeared on the road between Baghdad and Karbala and has been presumed kidnapped. Fereydun Jahani went missing on Aug. 4 on the road leading from Baghdad to Karbala, in central Iraq, where Tehran was set to open a consulate. His kidnapping was claimed by the Islamic Army of Iraq, which was reported to have issued threats against him but is not known to have carried them out. Iraqi Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi said yesterday that Jahani was in “good health,” but he did not provide any details.