Street fights, record turnout mark Iranian election

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By Iason Athanasiadis

TEHRAN | An election that began with a record number of Iranians peacefully seeking to choose their president ended Saturday in protest demonstrations and a violent crackdown that undermined the legitimacy of the Islamic regime.

Iranian officials - including the Muslim cleric who wields the ultimate power in the country, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - insisted that incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had been re-elected by a margin of more than 10 million votes over his main challenger, Mir-Hossein Mousavi.

Interior Minister Sadeq Mahsouli, an Ahmadinejad ally, declared that the president had been re-elected to a second four-year term with 62.6 percent of the vote, against 33.7 percent for Mr. Mousavi, in a record 85 percent turnout.

Mr. Ahmadinejad, during a press conference on Sunday, said his re-election was "real and free" and cannot be questioned, the Associated Press reported.

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Mr. Mousavi refused to concede, instead charging the regime with massive fraud while his supporters flooded the streets of Tehran.

Trita Parsi, president of the Iranian American Council, a U.S.-based group that has supported better U.S. relations with Iran, said Mr. Mousavi had been put under house arrest and senior members of the reformist movement, including Reza Khatami, the brother of former president Mohammed Khatami, had also been detained by security forces.

Mr. Parsi said Iranian security forces had in effect staged a coup to deny Iranians a new president and that the only hope lay with the 86-member Assembly of Experts, a clerical body that has the power to remove the supreme leader.

"This is a coup," Mr. Parsi said. He said the security forces behind Mr. Ahmadinejad were essentially saying, "'Yes, we cheated and what are you going to do about it?' "