Iran president plans to go to Asian Games-aide

TEHRAN, Nov 27 (Reuters) Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad plans to visit the Asian Games in Qatar, a presidential aide said today after FIFA provisionally lifted a ban to let Iran's soccer team compete.

''Ahmadinejad will go to the Asian Games in Doha,'' a close aide to Ahmadinejad told Reuters but did not give details about when the president might travel or why he had decided to go.

FIFA had suspended Iran, who won the Asian Games soccer title in 1974, 1990, 1998 and 2002, from all international competition last Thursday because of what it cited as government interference in the sport.

The Iranian president, a keen soccer fan, caused a stir earlier this year when he said he might attend the soccer World Cup finals in Germany, where Iran won a place but finished bottom of their group. In the end, he did not turn up.

Some German politicians had said Ahmadinejad would not be welcome because he dismissed the Holocaust, in which six million Jews were killed by the Nazis, as a ''myth'' and called for Israel's destruction.

The Asian Games run from December 1- December 15.

REUTERS LL HT2207