Political tension in Iran following a tumultuous election ratcheted up a notch when a top aide of Iran's supreme leader called the country's main opposition figure a US agent and accused him of committing crimes against the nation in an editorial published Saturday.
Supporters of reformist candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi , wearing green wristbands, rally in downtown Teheran, Sunday.
World The editorial marked the first time that Mir Hossein Mousavi, who was the main challenger to incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in Iran's presidential elections on June 12, has been publicly called a US agent.
Weeks of demonstrations erupted in Iran after Mousavi lost to Ahmadinejad, claiming the election was rigged; authorities maintain that the protests were instigated by foreign elements.
"It has to be asked whether the actions of [Mousavi and his supporters] are in response to instructions by American authorities," said Hossein Shariatmadari in an editorial appearing in the conservative daily Kayhan.
Shariatmadari, who holds no official position but is a close adviser to Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, added that Mousavi was trying to "escape punishment for murdering innocent people, holding riots, cooperating with foreigners and acting as America's fifth column inside the country."
He called for Mousavi and former reformist president Mohammad Khatami to be tried in court for "horrible crimes and treason."
The editorial added that there were "undeniable documents" proving Mousavi's foreign links.
When Iran's incumbent president was re-elected by a landslide, Mousavi and other opposition candidates cried foul sparking weeks of giant protests across the country that were eventually crushed.
Police said 20 "rioters" were killed during the violence as well as seven or eight members of the paramilitary Basij militia tasked with putting down the protests.
But the crackdown included severe limitations on press freedom, significantly against international news agencies and foreign reporters in the country. The number of dissidents killed or jailed cited by Iranian officials can therefore not be corroborated independently.
There have been no street protests since Sunday, but Mousavi has maintained his opposition to the results, issuing a defiant statement on Wednesday that he considered the government "illegitimate" in a posting on his Website, and demanded political prisoners, which he called "children of the revolution," be released.
He has been maintaining a low profile, however, and made no public appearances for days amid calls by many hard-liners for him to be prosecuted.
[Beirut Daily Star: Region] The political unrest in Iran over President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's re-election marks a key point in the ideological struggle between ultra-conservatives and reformers, according to analysts. Thirty years after the creation of the Islamic Republic of Iran, the two factions are finding co-habitation increasingly difficult and the show of force in the wake of the disputed elections has unleashed a chain reaction.
The final effect on the nature and orientation of the regime in Iran remains unpredictable with some influential figures yet to take sides.
One key element is that the country's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who "has always tried to play an arbitration role in order to maintain the illusion of being an honest broker came out so quickly in support of Ahmadinejad," said Rouzbeh Parsi, Iran researcher at the Paris-based Institute of Security Studies.
While there are plenty of indications that the opposition supporters who have taken to the streets to cry foul over the election results have a valid grievance, in a place like Iran proof is hard to come by, analysts say.
"Nobody was allowed to follow the ballot boxes, that is why the opposition does not accept the partial recount," said Parsi.
"A lot of things make it [the result] impossible even if we don't have proof," argues Shahram Chubin of the Carnegie Institute.
Thierry Coville, of the Institute of International and Strategic Relations in Paris, has no doubt that massive electoral fraud has been committed.
"There's been an electoral hold-up," he said."They massively rigged it so you have two thirds, one third in order to eliminate the reformists," he added, speaking of a "coup d'etat in disguise."
According to the official results, Ahmadinejad won by a thumping majority of 63 percent against just 34 percent for opposition runner-up Mir Hossein Mousavi, a gap of 11 million votes.
But if the electorate is being cheated then the goal for the "extremist right wing circles" around Ahmadinejad "is to see an Islamic state established once and for all," said Parsi.
"They do not trust the people," he stressed. Chubin sees the emergence of "two very different assumptions of what Iran should be."
On the one hand there are those who want to see "political accountability and institutions that work properly" while the other faction "emphasises the religious legitimacy, lives on crises, on confronting the world".
The hardliners stole the election not just because the reformers were a threat to their candidate, the incumbent president, at the June 12 election but because they were openly challenging the regime's view of what Iran should be, he argued.
What is clear at the moment is that Mousavi and Mehdi Karoubi, a reformist Iranian leader and also a candidate in the presidential election, are getting worsted because the ultra-conservatives have "the means of repression," he added.
Nevertheless "the regime has been weakened" and its ultimate victory remains uncertain in the medium to long term due to the fissures in their own ranks, he opined.
"The row is not limited to the students and the middle-class. It is very diversified geographically and socially," due to the modernisation of Iranian society over the past 30 years, according to Coville.
The "conservative traditionalists" like parliamentary speaker Ali Larijani and Ali Akbar Velayati, an adviser to Khamenei "will have to take sides if the confrontation persists," he added.
According to Tehran press last week, Larijani and over 100 MPs refused to attend a victory party hosted by President Ahmadinejad.
The "conservative modernists" grouped around former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani will similarly have to choose sides.
Rafsanjani, head of state from 1988-1997, remains an influential figure and is chairman of the Assembly of Experts, the only body which can elect, monitor or even dismiss the supreme leader of Iran.
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[Al Arabiya Latest] Iran said on Friday that some local British embassy staff arrested for allegedly playing a role in post-election violence will be put on trial as the European Union said it was seeking ways to object to Iran's crackdown on opposition.
The head of Iran's powerful Guardians Council, Ahmad Jannati, said embassy staff have "made confessions" and said "in these incidents, their embassy had a presence, some people were arrested. Naturally they will be put on trial."
"Allegations that our staff were fomenting unrest are wholly without foundation...We will be seeking an urgent explanation from the Iranians"
Foreign Office spokesperson
Minutes later, Britain said it was "concerned" and was seeking clarification about the announcement.
"We are concerned and we are checking the reports," a Foreign Office spokeswoman said. "Allegations that our staff were fomenting unrest are wholly without foundation."
"We will be seeking an urgent explanation from the Iranians."
According to the British government, seven of nine local staff originally detained by the Iranian authorities have now been released.
Iran accused the embassy employees of instigating riots in the unrest that erupted over the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, which was ratified on Monday by the Guardians Council.
Britain has rejected the allegations as baseless and demanded the immediate release of the staff still in detention.
In his first speech since the unrest began, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei slammed Britain as the "most evil" or the Islamic Republic's enemies, which Prime Minister Gordon Brown said was "unfortunate" as tension between the two nations rose.
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[Iran Press TV Latest] A senior Iranian dignitary says Western powers are regretting the inappropriate stance they adopted in the wake of the June 12 presidential election.
"Western countries have now realized their stance on the Iranian elections was undoubtedly out of line," head of the Iranian Parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Alaeddin Boroujerdi said on Friday.
Boroujerdi said British Foreign Secretary David Miliband's recent telephone conversation with his Iranian counterpart Manouchehr Mottaki shows that political heavyweights in Europe are retracting their wrong claims on Iran.
"After three weeks of resentment, [European countries] have a long way to go before rebuilding trust with Iran," said Boroujerdi.
European countries adopted a critical stance toward the events ensuing Iran's June 12 election, despite the Iranian government's stern warning against foreign interference.
"With the main goal of sowing ethnic discord, Western powers have interfered in the election process by dramatizing recent developments," said Foreign Ministry spokesman Hassan Qashqavi on June 23.
Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki has also criticized what he believed to be "irresponsible and intrusive remarks" made by political heavyweights in Europe and the US.
Mottaki said Western countries need to have "a clear picture" of the historic elections, which saw Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad reelected to second term in office.
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#1
Speaking as a Westerner, my only regret is that we didn't throw the full weight and might of the U.S. into toppling the Supreme Leader and his Insane Clown Posse.
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[Beirut Daily Star: Region] The political unrest in Iran over President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's re-election marks a key point in the ideological struggle between ultra-conservatives and reformers, according to analysts. Thirty years after the creation of the Islamic Republic of Iran, the two factions are finding co-habitation increasingly difficult and the show of force in the wake of the disputed elections has unleashed a chain reaction.
