Le Matin Dimanche reproduced part of the document in which Jacques Antenen, an investigative magistrate in the Swiss canton (state) of Vaud, requested Swiss federal authorities to demand the arrest of Ali Fallahian, Teheran’s hardline former intelligence minister.

The Lausanne-based newspaper reproduced the beginning of the “strictly confidential” document, which it said was sent March 20 to the Swiss Federal Justice Ministry — which is responsible for transmitting the document internationally — requesting the arrest on grounds that Fallahian “decided and ordered the execution of Kazem Rajavi,” who was shot to death near his suburban Geneva home in 1990. The ministry declined to say whether it received the warrant or had acted on it.

“We never confirm whether there is an international arrest warrant or not, because searches under such a warrant are confidential,” ministry spokesman Folco Galli told The Associated Press.

Antenen, who has been in charge of the investigation since 1997, could not be reached for comment yesterday. Rajavi, a member of the Mujahedeen Khalq resistance movement, obtained political asylum in Switzerland in 1973 and publicised human rights violations in Iran.

He was killed in the Lake Geneva town of Coppet, 11km east of Geneva, when his car was sprayed by machine gun fire.