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Ahmadinejad won fair and square: Samareh-Hashemi
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's election campaign manager, Mojtaba Samareh-Hashemi, says Iran's electoral process was fair and healthy. Iran became the scene of opposition rallies after the announcement of Ahmadinejad as the winner of the 10th presidential election with nearly two-thirds of the vote. At least 20 people were killed and many others were injured when some protests turned violent. In an interview with Press TV on Thursday, Samareh-Hashemi said that the supporters of the defeated candidates knew fully well that "the result of the election was true". He went on to claim that this knowledge was the reason behind the refusal of Mir-Hossein Mousavi, Mehdi Karroubi and Mohsen Rezaei to send representatives to the committee tasked with probing the vote result. Iran's election watchdog, the Guardian Council, formed a "special commission" to look into the issues surrounding the election and to conduct a partial vote recount. Samareh-Hashemi explained that the Ahmadinejad administration had temporarily suspended text-messaging services, made cell phone services intermittent and blocked certain websites to "ensure security in the country" following the post-election unrest. He went on to accuse certain American internet service providers of implementing the policies of the US government by "launching attacks on 200 Iranian websites and helping fuel the unrest." "Even, the election website came under cyber attack," he said. Samareh-Hashemi insisted that Mousavi must publicly declare his adherence to the law, saying all Iranians are required to abide by the Constitution. He went on to describe the defeated candidate's recent statement as a "step forward". Posted by: Fred 2009-07-03 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=273486 |