Kurds shot in 'act of revenge'

BERLIN - German crime investigators said yesterday that the murderers of four Iranian Kurdish politicians shot in a restaurant here on Thursday were probably members of a rival Kurdish faction or of an Iranian group, writes Adrian Bridge.

Hans-Jurgen Forster, a spokesman for the Federal Crime Office, said that the killings bore the hallmark of an 'act of revenge' or of 'punishment'. Kurdish leaders in Germany said that the murders had been carried out by members of the Iranian secret service. The most prominent of those killed was Sadiq Sharafkindi, leader of the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran, which seeks autonomy for the country's Kurdish minority