TEHRAN, 23 February 2004 — Eight people died in clashes with police in two towns in southern Iran over disputed results for a parliamentary election in which conservatives secured a big victory over reformists, local officials said yesterday.
Final figures for the vote, which was boycotted by leading reformists after hundreds of candidates were barred from standing, showed a turnout of 50.6 percent of Iran’s 46 million eligible voters, the Interior Ministry said.
“A faction with the minimum backing of the people is going to take control of Parliament,” said Mostafa Tajzadeh, a senior member of the pro-reform Islamic Iran Participation Front.
Iran’s clerical establishment hailed the election as a great success and said the turnout shocked doomsayers and “enemies” abroad who had predicted a much smaller vote.
Analysts said many people stayed away from the polls as much out of frustration with President Mohammad Khatami’s failure to deliver as due to a boycott by his reformist allies.
Four people, including a policeman, died in clashes on Saturday in Firouzabad in the southern Fars province after the governor’s office declared an unexpectedly high turnout in a tight race between a reformist and an conservative candidate, a local official told Reuters.
Another four were killed in the southwestern Khuzestan province when police clashed with a group of people protesting election results in the town of Izeh, the ISNA student news agency reported, citing an unnamed official.
Interior Ministry figures showed conservatives made up 124 of the 194 members elected so far. A total of 289 seats were at stake.
