TEHRAN: Iranian riot police clashed with hundreds of pro-reform protesters in central Tehran on Tuesday and detained dozens of them, a witness said, in the latest unrest over last month’s disputed election.
The witness said demonstrators were chanting slogans against President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the government, including: “Ahmadinejad — resign, resign” and “Death to dictators.”
The witness said police beat protesters who had gathered in Tehran’s Haft-e-Tir square in defiance of a ban on such demonstrations following the June 12 election, which the opposition says was rigged in favor of Ahmadinejad.
“Riot police are taking dozens of protesters into their cars and they are taking them away,” the witness said.
“There are hundreds of riot police and plainclothes (security forces), beating people who gathered to support (opposition leader Mir Hossein) Mousavi,” the witness said. Earlier on Tuesday, Iran’s police chief Esmail Ahmadi-Moghaddam accused the opposition of “inciting sedition” and said his force would act firmly to uphold the law. His deputy Ahmad-Reza Radan separately said there were rumors of new “illegal gatherings” in Tehran but that the security forces would firmly confront any such protests, the semi-official Fars news agency reported.
In a related development, a senior member of Parliament said Tuesday supreme leader Ali Khamenei wants Ahmadinejad to dismiss a senior official who has said Iran was friends with everyone, even the people of Israel. Ahmadinejad has come under fire from fellow conservatives and hard-liners for appointing Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie last Thursday as his first vice president. Khamenei’s view that Mashaie should be dismissed “has been conveyed in writing to the president,” said Mohammad-Hassan Aboutorabi-Fard, Parliament’s first vice speaker.
