Everett, Wash.
Published: Tuesday, June 16, 2009

At least seven die in Iranian protests

Supreme leader Khamenei reverses course and promises a probe of the presidential election in which the opposition lost.

The Washington Post

 TEHRAN, Iran -- Hundreds of thousands of Iranians defied a ban by the Interior Ministry and marched through the capital on Monday in support of opposition presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi. At least seven protesters were killed.

Hours before the march -- the largest unofficial demonstration in Iran since the 1979 Islamic revolution -- the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, abruptly reversed course and promised an investigation into allegations of election fraud. Khamenei previously had blessed President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's victory.

"Offenses in elections are not out of the ordinary. We do not want to exaggerate and say that no violation has taken place," a spokesman for the investigating body, the Guardian Council, said on television.

"Bear with us," pleaded the spokesman, Abbas Ali Kadkhodai. "We will investigate and announce the result."

Though the afternoon march was peaceful, at least seven were killed and several were wounded by nightfall. One man died when members of the Basij, a volunteer militia allied with the government of Ahmadinejad, fired from a rooftop into a crowd outside the Basij headquarters in downtown Tehran.

Young Basij members on motorcycles have harassed and beaten protesters since Friday's election, in which the government says Ahmadinejad defeated Mousavi by a 2-1 margin.

Later, a radio report said seven died in a shooting after people "tried to attack a military location." It was not clear Monday night if the shooting was separate from the earlier one or if a total of seven or eight people were dead.

Mousavi on Monday told the cheering marchers that he did not put much faith in the independence of the Guardian Council, a panel of 12 Islamic clerics and jurists selected by Khamenei, the head of the judiciary and Iran's parliament.

"I have appealed to the Guardian Council, but I'm not very optimistic about their judgment," he said. "Many of its members during the election were not impartial and supported the government candidate."

Mousavi added that he was "ready to pay any price" in his fight for an honest election. "I came here to invite everyone to defend their rights calmly," he said as thousands of supporters -- most of them wearing green, the signature color of his campaign -- chanted "Mousavi, we will help you!"

Protests were reported in other cities, including Isfahan, Mashad and Shiraz.
© 2009The Daily Herald Co., Everett, WA