An eerie calm settled over the streets of Tehran yesterday as state media reported at least 10 more deaths in post-election unrest and said authorities arrested the daughter and four other relatives of former Iranian president Hashemi Rafsanjani, one of Iran’s most powerful men.
The reports brought the official death toll for a week of confrontations to at least 19. State TV inside Iran said 10 were killed and 100 injured in clashes on Saturday between demonstrators contesting the result of the June 12 election and black-clad police wielding truncheons, tear gas and water cannons.
The Iranian regime continued to impose a blackout on the country’s most serious internal conflict since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
But fresh images and allegations of brutality emerged as Iranians at home and abroad sought to shed light on a week of astonishing resistance to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The New-York based International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran said scores of injured demonstrators who had sought medical treatment after Saturday’s clashes were arrested by security forces at hospitals in the capital.
It said doctors had been ordered to report protest-related injuries to the authorities and that some seriously injured protesters had sought refuge at foreign embassies in a bid to evade arrest.
“The arrest of citizens seeking care for wounds suffered at the hands of security forces when they attempted to exercise rights guaranteed under their own Constitution and international law is deplorable,” said Hadi Ghaemi, spokesman for the campaign.
“The government of Iran should be ashamed of itself. Right now, in front of the whole world, it is showing its violent actions,” he said.
State-run Press TV reported that Rafsanjani’s eldest daughter, Faezeh Hashemi, and four other family members were arrested late on Saturday. It did not identify the other four. Last week, state TV showed images of Hashemi, 46, speaking to hundreds of supporters of opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi.
Rafsanjani has made no secret of his distaste for Ahmadinejad, whose re-election victory in a June 12 vote was disputed by Mousavi. Ahmadinejad has accused Rafsanjani and his family of corruption.
Rioters set two gas stations on fire and attacked a military post in clashes on Saturday.
Later yesterday, the BBC confirmed that Iran had asked its correspondent in Tehran to leave the country.
“With regret, Jon Leyne, the BBC’s permanent correspondent in Tehran, has been asked to leave by the Iranian authorities,” the British broadcaster said in a brief statement. “The BBC office remains open.”
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