Red Alert: Iran’s Election Results
Red Alert: Iran’s Election Results
Stratfor Today June 12, 2009
The Iranian election is currently in turmoil. Both Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi are claiming to be ahead in the vote. Preliminary results from the presidential vote show Ahmadinejad leading; Iranian Election Commission chief Kamran Danesho held a press conference at 11:45 p.m. local time and announced that with some 20 percent of the votes counted, the president was leading with 3,462,548 votes (69.04 percent), while his main challenger, Mousavi, had 1, 425,678 (28.42 percent). Sources tell STRATFOR that these preliminary numbers pertain to the votes from the smaller towns and villages, where the president has considerable influence, as he has distributed a lot of cash to the poor.
However, Iran’s state-run Press TV is saying that only 10 million of 24 million votes, or around 42 percent of the vote, have been counted. At the same time, they are also claiming that 69 percent of the vote has been counted. Obviously the numbers are not adding up, and the agencies themselves appear to be in chaos.
Prior to the announcement of the results, Mousavi held a press conference in which he said he was the winner of the election. The opposition camp is greatly concerned about fraud, and STRATFOR has been told that Mousavi has vowed to resist any fraud, even if it entails taking to the streets. This means there is considerable risk of unrest should Ahmadinejad emerge as the winner. But so far there is no evidence that the government is mobilizing security forces to deal with any such eventuality.
The situation is being monitored carefully, as it is potentially explosive.
http://www.stratfor.com/memberships/140064/analysis/20090612_iran_election_update_2More
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/supporters-of-ahmadinejad-mousavi-clash-in-tehran/article1181230/
Supporters of Ahmadinejad, Mousavi clash in Tehran
Hundreds of supporters of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and moderate challenger Mirhossein Mousavi clashed in Tehran on Saturday after a landslide victory for Mr. Ahmadinejad in a presidential election, a Reuters witness said.
Police using batons moved to disperse the demonstrators who were staging a sit-in to protest against Mr. Ahmadinejad's victory. They were chasing and arresting some of the protesters.
The witness saw two men being carried away from the scene at Vanak square in the Iranian capital. Some people were having fistfights.
The violence broke out as Iran's Interior Minister announced that Mr. Ahmadinejad had won Friday's election, gaining 62.6 per cent of the vote in an election which Mr. Mousavi has criticized for violations.
Up to 2,000 Mousavi supporters then staged a sit-in in the middle of the road, clapping hands and chanting: “Mousavi take back our vote What happened to our vote?”. They also chanted at security forces: “Police, brother, you're one of us“.
Dozens of riot police were standing nearby.
Excerpt
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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1192316/Clashes-rock-Tehran-thousands-protest-rigged-election.html
Excerpt:
Riot police beat protesters with truncheons as violence flared yesterday following Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s landslide re-election – amid allegations of widespread ballot-rigging. Tehran saw the worst public uprising since the country’s Islamic student revolution 30 years ago. Thousands of protesters wrecked cars and set up barricades of burning tyres after the Iranian Electoral Commission declared Mr Ahmadinejad had won 62.6 per cent of the 30million votes against 33.8 per cent for his rival, Mir Hossein Mousavi.
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The BBC says clashes between demonstrators and police in Tehran are the most violent in a decade.
Thousands of Iranians chanting "Death to the Government."
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"Grand Ayatollah Sanei in Iran has declared Ahmadinejad's presidency illegitimate and cooperating with his government against Islam. There are strong rumors that his house and office are surrounded by the police and his website is filtered. He had previously issued a fatwa, against rigging of the elections in any form or shape, calling it a mortal sin."
http://tinyurl.com/lo56ga
Quality entertainment. You can't beat it.
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Maybe we can get Ayatollah Sanei to issue a similar fatwa in the U.S.!
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If he did, would you display his picture right above the picture of Dr. Keyes?
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I think I know what you are asking. The people that got displayed on DOF were people that got hurt in the DOFF debacle. Displaying them was my way of throwing traffic back to them.
Dr. Keyes is a type of person I would support in an election; but he is not the candidate I supported and worked for in the 2008 elections. My candidate didn't make it out of the primaries.
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Andrew Sullivan is doing some great reporting on the Iranian election and aftermath. I don't think we can say with certainty the election or the count was rigged at this point. Let's let things sort out and we will see. The signs are certainly there that something is rotten in Denmark.
My BS detector is on high alert at times like these because news folks like to go for hyperbole and fabrication when there is a dearth of hard facts.
We may be seeing the beginning of the second Iranian revolution but who knows?
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8102400.stm
Iran's powerful Guardian Council says it is ready to recount disputed votes from Friday's presidential poll.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/23/world/middleeast/23iran.html?ref=middleeast
Excerpt:
TEHRAN — Locked in a continuing bitter contest Monday with Iranians who say the presidential elections were rigged, the authorities here acknowledged that the number of votes cast in 50 cities exceeded the actual number of voters, state television reported following assertions by the country’s supreme leader that the ballot was fair.
But the authorities insisted that discrepancies, which could affect three million votes, did not violate Iranian law and the country’s influential Guardian Council said it was not clear whether they would decisively change the election result.
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http://business.maktoob.com/20090000007121/Khamenei_ordered_Iran_election_fraud/Article.htm
Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is personally behind the alleged fraud in the June 12 presidential election, former Iranian president Abolhassan Banisadr claimed in Vienna late on Monday.
"Khamenei ordered the fraud in the presidential elections and the ensuing crackdown on protestors," Banisadr said at a symposium marking the 20th anniversary of the murder of three Kurdish opposition leaders in Vienna.
"The regime is edging closer to the abyss and is holding on to power solely by means of violence and terror," said Banisadr, who was Iran's first elected president following the 1979 Islamic revolution.
The regime wanted to keep the population in a permanent state of uncertainty and fear and so systematic terror was institutionally organised and controlled by the regime and Khamenei, he added.
"They don't want Iranians to be able to even think about protests in their own homes."
Intellectuals and students were the main targets since they were regarded as the driving force behind the resistance, Banisadr continued. "Reformers and liberal pragmatists are to be wiped out."
Islam played almost no role any more in the ideology of the regime and was now simply used as a "justification for violence, lies and oppression," he said.
Khamenei and his "financial mafia are simply out for their own advantage", while the general population lived in poverty.
Banisadr was in Vienna for a symposium on the 1989 murders of three leading Kurdish opposition figures: Abdul Rahman Ghassemlou, Abdullah Ghaderi-Azar amd Fadel Rasoul.
Ghassemlou, the leader of the Democratic Party of Kurdistan - an Iranian opposition party outlawed by Tehran - was killed on July 13, 1989.
Bani Sadr was elected president in January 1980 soon after the previous year's Islamic revolution, but he was ousted by revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in June 1981.
Banisadr has lived in exile in France since 1981.
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When the dust finally settles, then we will deal with whomever we have to deal with. Until then.....
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