Today's Story Line:

Iranians vote for a new parliament tomorrow in perhaps the most-energized democratic struggle in the Middle East. Conservative clerics square off against reformers. Women and younger voters (as young as age 16) are likely to figure prominently in the outcome.

In Germany, the conservative Christian Democrats were dealt another blow yesterday. Party leader Wolfgang Schuble became the latest to succumb to the party's financial scandal.

Spain isn't used to a large immigrant population. But its shrinking population has led to a more-open door. How it deals with recent unrest in Almeria, where 25 percent of the residents in some towns were born elsewhere, may be important to the nation's economic future.

Russia's building low-cost floating nuclear power plants for domestic and foreign use. Are they safe?

David Clark Scott World editor

REPORTERS ON THE JOB

*CAMPAIGN SECURITY GUARD: The Monitor's Scott Peterson accompanied an Iranian parliamentary candidate on her campaign Tuesday. At the end of the day, after a speech in south Tehran, a brief argument broke out as she prepared to leave. The local campaign organizer didn't want her to take a taxi without a security guard. South Tehran is a conservative stronghold, the lower-income heartland of the 1979 revolution. Another reformist candidate, the sister of a cleric who challenged the conservative position, has received a death threat. But Fatema Haqiqat-Jou breezily said, "Don't worry, I'm with them," waving at Scott and his translator. "I gulped and followed her into the cab," says Scott.

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