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World Jewish News
Iran opposition: Election result 'unacceptable'
01.07.2009
Iran's embattled opposition leader has branded last month's presidential election "illegitimate" and has demanded the regime release all political prisoners.
Mir Hossein Mousavi's defiance came Wednesday in a new message on his Web site that also called for election reforms and press freedoms.
Mousavi insisted that Iran's disputed June 12 election was riddled with fraud. He contended that he - not incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - was the rightful winner.
But Iran's powerful Guardian Council proclaimed the election results valid earlier this week, and the regime since has stepped up efforts to isolate and discredit Mousavi.
Mousavi said in a statement on his Web site that he was troubled by the bitter, widespread distrust of the people toward the declared election results and the government that caused it.
"It's not yet too late," said Mousavi, who has slipped from public view in recent days. "It's our historic responsibility to continue our complaint and make efforts not to give up the rights of the people."
Mousavi also condemned alleged attacks by security forces on college dormitories where blood was spilled and the youth were beaten, and he called for a return to a more honest political environment in the Islamic Republic.
The semiofficial Fars news agency said the Basij - known as supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's street enforcers - sent the chief prosecutor a letter accusing Mousavi of taking part in nine offenses against the state, including disturbing the nation's security, which carries a maximum penalty of 10 years' imprisonment.
Meanwhile, Iran's leading moderate party echoed Mousavi's sentiment, saying in a statement on the group's Website that the election was a "coup d'etat" and the official result was "unacceptable."
"The election was the result of a year-long coup d'etat ... that harmed the establishment's legitimacy inside and outside Iran ... We openly announce that the result is unacceptable," said the statement of Islamic Iran's Participation Front.
It also urged people, political parties and groups to avoid any move that could be used as a pretext by "violence-seekers" to pave the ground for "dictatorship".
"We are asking the authorities ... that now after establishing what they wanted to, to release all those jailed, innocent people and avoid creating fake cases for them," the statement said.
The party was formed by reformers close to former president Mohammed Khatami, including his brother, after his landslide election win in 1997.
Some members of the party have been arrested following the dispute over the June 12 presidential election, which defeated moderate candidates say was rigged in favor of hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The authorities say it was the "healthiest" election since Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution.
Источник: Haaretz
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