Iranian Guard threatens election protesters
Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guard today threatened to crush any further opposition protests over the disputed presidential election.
The country’s most powerful security force warned demonstrators to prepare for a “revolutionary confrontation” if they take to the streets again.
The country’s highest electoral authority, the Guardian Council, acknowledged voting irregularities in 50 electoral districts in the June 12 vote, the most serious official admission so far of problems in the election that the opposition has labelled a fraud.
But it insisted the problems did not affect the outcome of the vote. The electoral council said President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won by a landslide.
The Revolutionary Guard warned protesters to “be prepared for a resolution and revolutionary confrontation with the Guards, Basij and other security forces and disciplinary forces” if they continue their near-daily rallies.
The Basij, a plainclothes militia under the command of the Revolutionary Guard, have been used to quell streets protests that erupted after the election result was announced. At least 17 protesters have been killed.
The Guard statement ordered demonstrators to “end the sabotage and rioting activities” and said their resistance is a “conspiracy” against Iran.
Opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi vowed yesterday to keep up the protests, saying the election was a fraud. The 67-year-old, who heads a youth-driven movement for reform, claims he was the true winner of the election.
His statement was in defiance of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who holds ultimate power in Iran. In a sermon to tens of thousands on Friday, Khamenei said demonstrators must stop their street protests or face the consequences and he firmly backed Mr Ahmadinejad’s victory.
“The country belongs to you,” Mr Mousavi’s latest statement said. “Protesting lies and fraud is your right.”
He also called for supporters to turn on their car headlights in the late afternoon as a sign of protest.
Mr Mousavi’s latest statements also warned supporters of danger ahead, and said he would stand by the protesters “at all times.” But he said he would “never allow anybody’s life to be endangered because of my actions” and called for pursuing fraud claims through an independent board.
The former prime minister, a long-time supporter of the Islamic government, also called the Basij and military “our brothers” and “protectors of our revolution and regime.” He may be trying to constrain his followers’ demands before they pose a mortal threat to Iran’s system of limited democracy constrained by Shiite clerics, who have ultimate authority.
Police said today that 457 people were arrested in demonstrations on Saturday alone, but did not reveal how many have been arrested throughout the week of turmoil.
The Guardian Council, agreed last week to investigate some opposition complaints of problems in the voting.
It said today it found irregularities in 50 voting districts, but that had no effect on election outcome.
The government has intensified a crackdown on independent media – expelling a BBC correspondent, suspending the Dubai-based network Al-Arabiya and detaining at least two local journalists for US magazines.
English-language state television said an exile group known as the People’s Mujahedeen had a hand in the street violence and broadcast what it said were confessions of British-controlled agents in an indication that the government was ready to crack down even harder.
The Foreign Ministry lashed out at foreign media and Western governments, with ministry spokesman Hasan Qashqavi accusing them of “a racial mentality that Iranians belong to the Third World”.
