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Clark bitterly
denounces U.S.
administrations'
Jranian policies
Simple operation, AP h*t*
Politics have necessitated this transformation of Misha, official mascot
of the 1980 Moscow Olympics (left) to Misha, all-American teddy bear.
R. Dakin and Co. of San Francisco, the U.S. manufacturer of the cuddly
bear, has replaced its five-ringed Olympic belt withta red, white, and blue
T-shirtiemblazoned with a U.S. hockey player.
ACLU attempts to
block execution of
condemoned murderer-
From AP and UPI
TEHRAN, Iran - Former Attorney
General Ramsey Clark went before a
conference on "American crimes"
yesterday and bitterly denounced his
country's policy toward Iran under
current and former administrations,
the aborted hostage rescue mission,
and the deposed shah.
But he also appealed for the im-
mediate release of the 53 American
hostages and said he would gladly trade
places with any one of them if it would
help resolve the seven-month-old crisis.
CLARK, AN activist lawyer who ser-
ved as attorney general under
President Lyndon Johnson in the late
1960s, told delegates attending the con-
ference:
"I am so sure it is imperative that the
hostages be released now, so important
to the fulfillment of the Iranian
revolution which it is damaging in a
hundred ways, so important to the in-
dividual rights of the hostages and so
important to peace on earth, that I offer
today to take the place of any hostage if
that will help resolve this tragic crisis."
Amid heckling from Iranian officials
in the audience, Clark said the seizure
of the American hostages was "under-
standable" but wrong because it only
offered the "powers of imperialism a
delicious excuse to intervene" further
in Iran.
HE CHARGED that Richard Nixon,
Henry Kissinger, and former CIA
director Richard Helms were the "real
enemies ... the real imperialists" and
said it "might be different" if Iran were
holding them hostage instead of "53 lit-
tle people."
Others among the 10-member U.S.
delegation in Tehran led by Clark said
they would try to arrange meetings
with Iranian revolutionary leader
Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and
Iranian President Abolhassan Bani-
Sadr.
Iranian Foreign Minister Sadegh
Ghotbzadeh said he would meet with
Clark but "not enter into negotiations
with him."
ON MONDAY, the State Department
expressed concern that "travel to the
conference might be misconstrued as
our acceptance of the stated premise of
the meeting - which is the claim that
the United States committed
aggression against Iran."
Department spokesman Hodding-
Carter called the conference a
"propaganda circus."
The Americans attended the con-
ference in defiance of a Justice Depar-
tment ban issued last month on travel
to Iran. If tried and convicted in the
United States of violating the ban, the
10 Americans could be sentenced to 10
years in prison and fined $50,000.
President Carter sent Clark and
Senate staffer William Miller to Iran
just days after the hostages were taken
last Nov. 4, but they were refused entry
into the country. Clark had met with
Khomeini during the Iranian religious
leader's exile in France.
0
ATLANTA (AP) - The American
Civil Liberties Union asked a federal
judge yesterday to stop convicted mur-
derer Jack Potts from going to the elec-
tric chair this week.
Demonstrators at the governor's
mansion protested plans for the state to
conduct its first execution in' 16 years
tomorrow.
POTTS MET with friends and attor-
neys in his death row cell at the Georgia
State Prison at Reidsville. Later, anti-
death penalty lawyer Millard Farmer
emerged from the meeting and said
there had been no change in Potts'
decision to "get it over with."
U.S. District Judge William O'Kelley
of Atlanta set a hearing for today to
consider a "next friend" petition filed
by the ACLU naming Rev. Murphy
Davis as the friend. O'Kelley will con
sider whether Davis qualifies asa friend
of Potts, and whether he is competent to
waive legal action on his behalf.
O'Kelley said that if he finds Davis
qualifies as a "next friend" and that
Potts is incompetent, he would have to
grant at least a temporary stay of
execution.
Potts, 35, was convicted of murder
and kidnapping and sentenced to death
in 1975 in connection with a crime spree
in which Roswell, Ga., mechanic
Michael Priest was shot and killed.
Last fall, Potts fired his attorneys
and ended all appeals in his case,
saying he was prepared to accept the
death penalty.
4
Diggs resigns with a
'clear conscience'
WASHINGTON (UPI)-Rep. Charles
Diggs (D-Detroit) resigned from
Congress "with a clear conscience"
yesterday, a day ,after the Supreme
Court refused to overturn his conviction
on mail fraud and payroll padding
charges.
Diggs announced his surprise
resignation in brief letters to House
Speaker Thomas O'Neill and Michigan
Gov. William Milliken. Diggs, 57, the
senior black member of Congress, had
The CONSER VA TOR Y
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said earlier he would retire at the end of
his term in January.
DIGGS, WHO WAS elected to
Congress in 1954, faces a three-year
prison sentence. He said Monday shor-
tly after the high court's decision to let
the conviction stand that he would seek
a reduction in sentence and probation.
Diggs refused to see reporters after
his resignation, but issued a statement
assuring his constituents in Detroit that
services would be provided throughout
the remainder of the year from offices
in both Detroit and Washington.
"I leave Congress with a clear con-
science, and with deep appreciation for
the historic role I have been privileged
to play for the past 26 years on behalf of
the disadvantaged, both here and
abroad," he said.
Diggs was overwhelmingly elected to
a 13th term in the House in 1978 shortly
after his conviction. After the trial,
however, he stepped down as chairman
of both the House Foreign Affairs sub-
committee on Africa and the House
Committee on theDistrict of Columbia.
FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY General Ramsey Clark speaks yesterday in
Tehran at the international conference on U.S. intervention in Iran. Clark said
ih itod bhelrigso exha ygepldoesffvi-.ang M.the-33American-hostages
if it would help resolve the 214-day standoff.