Suicide or murder? Iran blames US after 152 dolphins die

When 152 dolphins were washed up on Iran's southern coast mass suicide was blamed. Then suspicion was shifted to fishermen, who were said to have beaten the dolphins with grappling irons after they became entangled in fishing nets.

But now a more familiar target has been accused: the US military and its hi-tech hardware and spying equipment. Rejecting suggestions that his employees may have committed a mass cull, the head of Iran's state-run fisheries organisation, Sha'aban-Ali Nezami, has alleged that the dolphins were victims of experimental US surveillance techniques. He has also said they could have been killed by electro-magnetic waves from military vessels in the Gulf and Oman Sea, where the US and British navies conduct regular patrols.

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Distressing pictures of rows of dead dolphins have appeared in the Iranian media, alongside reports that they had "committed suicide".

However, Mr Nezami blamed more sinister factors, telling Iranian journalists: "As these dolphins are not among the species normally found in the surrounding Persian Gulf and Oman Sea, probably the Americans - for tracking purposes - have brought them to carry out laboratory works in the Gulf region. This group of dolphins have not been able to tolerate the tests. The likely reason for these deaths is water pollution, the spreading of electro-magnetic waves by military ships or a kind of virus disease."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/iran/story/0,,2203846,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=12

anything said by the "government" of Iran.:banghead:

You might wind up believing stuff like this.

:rofl:

I have to say I tend to believe the environmentalists. Unless of course, they're those right-wing, BushCo loving, war enthusiast, GOP environmentalists--there are so doggone MANY of those floating about, aren't there??


Why would Americans bring dolphins over by the herd-load to conduct "laboratory work," and then zap them? And wouldn't these dolphins be, er, TAGGED? Or would they be like Flipper, very obedient?

They should go for the simplest explanation first. I'm surprised they didn't come up with the 'SONAR did it' explanation, accompanied by slews of submarines said to be just off their coast. Hoofbeats? Think horses, not zebras....

Of course, sometimes it's useful to blame stuff on someone else...!