Tehran to crack down on opposition protests

Tehran: Iranian authorities will crack down this week on any public protest against the year-long house arrest of opposition leaders, Mir Hussain Mousavi and Mahdi Karoubi, an official was quoted as saying yesterday.

Iran, at odds with the West over its disputed nuclear programme, holds a parliamentary election on March 2, its first national poll since Mousavi and Karoubi were beaten by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in a 2009 vote they said was rigged.

The government denied any fraud in the election, which ignited eight months of street protests, prompting a violent state response and deep splits in the ruling establishment.

The two leaders were put under house arrest on February 14 last year after urging supporters to join a rally supporting popular uprisings across the Arab world.

Tehran provincial governor Morteza Tamaddon said a call by reformists for a rally on Wednesday to mark the anniversary of the curbs imposed on Mousavi and Karoubi was a "publicity stunt" by opponents of Iran's Islamic Revolution .