TEHRAN: Tens of thousands of clerics took part in state-sponsored rallies across Iran on Saturday in support of the country’s supreme leader, after opposition students burned photos of him.
Pictures of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei were burned in last week’s protests and students denounced him as an “oppressor,” taboo-shattering actions rarely seen in Iran. “Long live Khamenei, our leader,” clerics shouted in Shiraz, southern Iran. And “death to opponents of the rule of the jurist (Khamenei),” shouted clerics in the holy city Qom, south of the capital Tehran.
The rallies were broadcast live on state television.
Khamenei, who holds final say in all state matters, has become a focus of opposition protests after he approved President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s re-election in the disputed June presidential vote.
Opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi claims Ahmadinejad won through massive vote fraud and that he was the rightful winner of the elections.
Saturday’s rallies were held in the name of supporting the late Ayatollah Khomeini, founder of Iran’s 1979 revolution that toppled the US-allied shah, after state TV picked up an isolated case of few men tearing up a photo of Khomeini.
State TV aired footage of the pictures being burned and suggested that it was done by Mousavi supporters.
Mousavi and other reformists have denounced the allegations, saying ruling hard-liners have lost legitimacy and now were hiding behind Khomeini, a highly respected figure, to turn Iranians against the opposition.
