Police nab 14 in brothel raids

TEHRAN — Iranian police have arrested 14 people in separate raids on two brothels in the capital Tehran and the central city of Isfahan, press reports said Sunday.

After a police surveillance operation in the Iranian capital, the Entekhab paper said four women and three men — including a husband-and-wife pimp team — were detained.

The report said the male operator of the establishment, a 38-year-old taxi driver named Mahmud, was handed an eight year jail term after it emerged he had cruised the streets of the capital "promising a better life" for young runaway girls.

The report did not say whether his wife, identified as Jamileh, had been sentenced, but quoted her as saying she embarked on a career as a pimp because of financial problems.

"Nobody noticed us since we were a married couple," she was quoted as saying.

Meanwhile police arrested five men and two women and seized an undisclosed quantity of narcotics in a raid on a "corruption house" in the central city of Isfahan, the Jam-e-Jam newspaper reported.

The report gave no further details.

Iran's mounting economic woes have led to an explosion of street prostitution in recent years, despite the threat of harsh punishments.