British Freeze Ties to Iran Amid Threats

LONDON — Britain froze its diplomatic relations with Iran today as Iranian Muslim fundamentalist leaders said suicide squads are preparing to carry out the “death sentence” imposed on novelist Salman Rushdie and his publishers by the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

United News of India and the British Broadcasting Corp. said telephone callers threatened to bomb British planes to India unless Rushdie, whose novel, “The Satanic Verses,” has outraged many Muslim fundamentalists, appeared in public. Two airlines, British Airways and Air Europe, said they are taking the threat seriously.

Britain, which reopened its embassy in Tehran in December for the first time in eight years, condemned the threats and announced that it has frozen plans to “build up further our embassy.”

Iran’s lone diplomat in Britain, Mohammed Basti, was summoned to the Foreign Office in London to discuss the situation and emerged defiant, telling reporters that Khomeini’s “decree or verdict” was delivered “after careful consideration.”

“It has nothing to do particularly with your country,” the charge d’affaires said.

‘Totally Unacceptable’

The Foreign Office called Khomeini’s statement “totally unacceptable.”

“We recognize that Muslims and others may have strong views about the contents of Mr. Rushdie’s book,” it said in a statement. “However, no one has the right to incite people to violence on British soil or against British citizens.”

Britain maintains three diplomats and support staff in its Tehran embassy. It had planned to send in more representatives as part of its normalization of relations with Iran.

British news media said the Indian-born Rushdie is hiding with his wife, American novelist Marianne Wiggins, under police guard. Press Assn., the domestic British news agency, said Rushdie’s first wife, Clarissa Luard, also has been given police protection.

‘Put On Our Shrouds’

Tehran Radio, monitored in Cyprus, said religious figures in the northwestern Iranian city of Rezaiyeh declared in a statement:

“We have already put on our death shrouds and pledge to carry out the imam’s (Khomeini’s) death sentence against Salman Rushdie and his publishers in the United States and Europe.”

An Iranian cleric Wednesday offered up to $2.6 million for Rushdie’s murder, and the author canceled a U.S. promotional tour that was scheduled to begin Friday.

In Washington, the State Department said today that it is appalled by the death threats against Rushdie and denounced such actions as “completely irresponsible.”

Department spokesman Charles E. Redman said he did not see how “this in any way could improve the prospects” for U.S.-Iranian relations. Pakistan’s government demanded that the United States and Britain ban the book and that all copies of it be destroyed. Six people died in Pakistan during a weekend riot over the book.