Iran protesters gather at historic square in show of force

Dubai: Hundreds of supporters of the Iran's reformist challenger, Mir Hussain Mousavi, gathered on Wednesday at Haft-e tir Square, in a show of force to oblige the Guardian Council to annul the results of the Friday presidential election.

Mousavi has also called for a gathering of his supporters today to commemorate the killing of eight students from Tehran University. The gathering will convene on the university square in the afternoon.

Haft-e tir Square, means the Square of June 28, to commemorate the 1981 bombing in which the cleric who wrote the constitution of the Islamic Republic, Mohammad Hussain Beheshti, was killed with 72 members of the Islamic Republic Party in an attack planned and executed by People's Mujahideen of Iran.

Witnesses interviewed by Gulf News said Iran had been paralysed since the announcement of the results of the presidential election in which Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won a second term of office.

However, the three candidates who stood against him, including Mousavi, believe that the election was rigged.

Anny Hashemipak, a female activist in her late 40s and a loyal supporter of Mousavi told Gulf News that Iranians would continue their protests bent on seeing Ahmadinejad out of office.

She said the venue of yesterday's march and the date had been chosen to remember leaders killed by the People's Mujahideen of Iran.

She added that the regime had been using religion as a façade to beautify its ugly face and said the way in which the regime had rigged the elections and used force to silence protestors showed that they had lost the spirit of Islam and the morals of the country.

"Iranians see no way of compromising with the current regime," she said.

"The power of people will overthrow them if they do not step down on their own. They know very well that they cannot stop the power of the people [who are] flooding the streets of the major cities in the country, even if they try to disconnect Iranians from the rest of the world," Hashemipak added.

Political analyst Mohsin Al Reda Ali said Iranians had reached a point of no return and the options available to authorities had become very limited and were diminishing each day.

Ali said the Guardian Council's decision to recount samples from the ballot boxes in disputed centres would not bring an end to the uprising.