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Oddly Enough News - updated 7:08 AM ET Mar 10 Add to My Yahoo!

Reuters

Friday March 9 10:57 AM ET Hands of 20 Thieves Severed

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Authorities in Iran's holiest city said they had cut off the hands of 20 thieves in two years and warned they would take a tougher line on using the Islamic punishment during an upcoming pilgrimage season.

Ali Akbar Yasaqi, the top judiciary official in the northeastern city of Mashhad, said on Thursday that judges would be given increased powers to deal with rising theft and other crime in the city, the official news agency IRNA said.

``Under emergency laws, judges can issue harder sentences including hand severing,'' he was quoted as saying.

Under Iran's Islamic law, thieves will have four fingers on their right hand severed for repeated stealing.

Mashhad is home to Iran's holiest Shi'ite Muslim shrine.

-- (Paracelsus@Pb.Au), March 10, 2001


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