Iran’s supreme leader said yesterday that Iran’s disputed presidential vote had not been rigged, sternly warning protesters to halt massive demonstrations demanding a new election or be held responsible for creating chaos.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei sided with hard-line Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and offered no concessions to the opposition. He effectively closed any chance for a new vote by calling the June 12 election a “definitive victory.”
The speech created a stark choice for candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi and his supporters: Drop their demands for a new vote or take to the streets again in blatant defiance of the man endowed with virtually limitless powers under Iran’s Constitution.
Khamenei accused foreign media and Western countries of trying to create a political rift and stir up chaos in Iran.
“Some of our enemies in different parts of the world intended to depict this absolute victory, this definitive victory, as a doubtful victory,” he said, according to an official translation on state TV’s English-language channel. “It is your victory. They cannot manipulate it.”
Khamenei said the 11 million votes that separated Ahmadinejad from his top opponent, Mousavi, was proof that fraud did not occur.
“If the difference was 100,000 or 200,000 or 1 million, one may say fraud could happen. But how can one rig 11 million votes?” Khamenei asked during yesterday’s prayers at Tehran University.
Mousavi and his supporters have staged massive street rallies in recent days that have posed the greatest challenge to Iran’s Islamic ruling system since the 1979 Islamic Revolution that brought it to power.
So far, the government has mostly allowed the protests to take place. But Khamenei opened the door for a much harder crackdown.
“It must be determined at the ballot box what the people want and what they don’t want, not in the streets,” he said. “I call on all to put an end to this method. ... If they don’t, they will be held responsible for the chaos and the consequences.”
Khamenei blamed the United Kingdom and Iran’s external enemies for fomenting unrest and said Iran would not see a second revolution like those that transformed the countries of the former Soviet Union.
He remained staunch in his defense of Ahmadinejad, who attended yesterday’s prayers, saying his views were closer to the president’s than to those of former Iranian president Hashemi Rafsanjani, a powerful patron of Mousavi.
Khamenei’s address was his first since hundreds of thousands of Mousavi supporters flooded the streets in Tehran and elsewhere in the country in rallies evoking the revolution that ended Iran’s US-backed monarchy.
On Thursday, supporters dressed in black and green flooded downtown Tehran in a somber, candlelit show of mourning for those who have been killed in clashes since last Friday’s vote.
Also See: Middle East keeps wary eye on Iran
‘UNITED FRONT’: The married couple allegedly produced talk show videos for platforms such as Facebook and YouTube to influence Taiwan’s politics A husband and wife affiliated with the China Unification Promotion Party (CUPP) were indicted yesterday for allegedly receiving NT$74 million (US$2.32 million) from China to make radio and digital media propaganda to promote the Chinese government’s political agenda and influence the outcome of Taiwan’s elections. Chang Meng-chung (張孟崇) and his wife, Hung Wen-ting (洪文婷), allegedly received a total of NT$74 million from China between 2021 and last year to promote candidates favored by Beijing, contravening the Anti-Infiltration Act (反滲透法) and election laws, the Chiayi District Prosecutors’ Office said. The couple acted as Beijing’s propaganda mouthpiece by disparaging Hong Kong democracy activists
A Control Yuan member yesterday said he would initiate an investigation into why the number of foreign nationals injured or killed in traffic incidents has nearly doubled in the past few years, and whether government agencies’ mechanisms were ineffective in ensuring road safety. Control Yuan member Yeh Ta-hua (葉大華) said in a news release that Taiwan has been described as a “living hell for pedestrians” and traffic safety has become an important national security issue. According to a National Audit Office report released last year, more than 780,000 foreign nationals were legally residing in Taiwan in 2019, which grew to more than
‘SOMETHING SPECIAL’: Donald Trump vowed to reward his supporters, while President William Lai said he was confident the Taiwan-US partnership would continue Donald Trump was elected the 47th president of the US early yesterday morning, an extraordinary comeback for a former president who was convicted of felony charges and survived two assassination attempts. With a win in Wisconsin, Trump cleared the 270 electoral votes needed to clinch the presidency. As of press time last night, The Associated Press had Trump on 277 electoral college votes to 224 for US Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic Party’s nominee, with Alaska, Arizona, Maine, Michigan and Nevada yet to finalize results. He had 71,289,216 votes nationwide, or 51 percent, while Harris had 66,360,324 (47.5 percent). “We’ve been through so
The US will continue its friendly approach toward Taiwan in the next US administration and Taiwan would work to prevent China “making trouble” during the transition, a senior Taiwanese security official said yesterday. Former US president Donald Trump, the Republican candidate who claimed victory in Tuesday’s vote against US Vice President Kamala Harris of the Democratic Party, made comments on the campaign trail that Taiwan should pay to be protected and also accused the nation of “stealing” American semiconductor business. Taiwan has faced military pressure from Beijing over the past five years, including four major rounds of war games in the past