A hard-line Iranian newspaper has called for retaliation against Israel, a day after a nuclear scientist in Tehran was killed by a magnetic bomb attached to his car.

PRESIDENT Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, already at the centre of a post-election crisis, came under criticism from his own hardline supporters yesterday for appointing a first vice president who once caused an outcry by saying Iranians were friends of Israelis.

A top aide to Iran’s supreme leader called the country’s main opposition figure a US agent and said in an editorial today that he should be tried for committing crimes against the nation.

Iran lifted its ban on CNN today, a day after the government had barred the US television network from the country because of its mistranslation of nuclear comments by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, state television reported.