Top Iran Reformist Tells Trial Ahmadinejad Win Was Clean
01/08/2009 Top Iranian reformist Sayyed Mohamad Ali Abtahi, accused of taking part in deadly riots after the June election, reportedly testified before a Tehran court on Saturday that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's victory came after a clean vote.
In a blow to the so-called opposition movement which claims that his re-election as president was because of massive vote rigging, Sayyed Abtahi said there had been no fraud in the June 12 poll, the Fars news agency reported.
Abtahi, a close aide of reformist ex-president Mohammad Khatami, said the reformists and opposition leaders had also betrayed Iran's all-powerful supreme leader Ayatollah Sayyed Ali Khamenei, the agency said. "The 10th (presidential) election was different and it took two or three years to work on it. I think reformists took action to sort of restrict the (supreme) leader," Abtahi told a revolutionary court in which he and around 100 people face charges of rioting after the disputed poll.
"I say to all my friends and all friends who hear us, that the issue of fraud in Iran was a lie and was brought up to create riots so Iran becomes like Afghanistan and Iraq and suffers damage and hardship... and if this happened, there would be no name and trace of the revolution left."
Abtahi said opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi, Khatami and powerful cleric and former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani had taken an "oath" not to abandon each other. "Mousavi probably did not know the country, but Khatami, with all due respect... knew all the issues. He was aware of the capability and power of the leader, but he joined Mousavi and this was a betrayal," the cleric said, adding that Rafsanjani sought to avenge his 2005 presidential defeat to Ahmadinejad. "It was wrong of me to take part in the rallies, but Karroubi told me that we cannot call the people onto the streets with such a meager number of votes, so we had better go to the streets ourselves to demonstrate our protest," he was quoted as saying.
Mehdi Karroubi, a reformist ex-parliament speaker, won just 333,635 votes or 0.85 percent in the presidential ballot. Abtahi was one of his advisers before the election. Mousavi and Karroubi are spearheading a massive anti-Ahmadinejad campaign in which their supporters have staged street protests over the President's win.
Abtahi was among around 100 people, including other top reformists and aides to opposition leaders, facing charges on Saturday of rioting after the election. Media said the accused are accused of having "participated in riots, acting against national security, disturbing public order, vandalizing public and government property, having ties with counter-revolutionary groups and of planning to launch a velvet revolution."
The defendants include Mohsen Aminzadeh and Mohsen Safai-Farahani, deputy ministers under the government of Khatami, and Mohsen Mirdamadi, current head of the Islamic Iran Participation Front. Prominent reformists Behzad Nabavi of the Islamic Republic Mujahedeen Organization and Mohammad Atrianfar of the Executives of Construction are also on trial.
Fars reported Abtahi, a cleric, as testifying that he "agreed" with the prosecution charges. "But I want to say something, about the velvet revolution part... I think the capacity for such a thing to happen exists in the country, but I don't know if there was a real intention to do it."
Fars said the accused, if proven guilty, could face a maximum jail term of five years, unless they are charged with being a "mohareb" or enemy of God, which can carry the death penalty.
01/08/2009 Top Iranian reformist Sayyed Mohamad Ali Abtahi, accused of taking part in deadly riots after the June election, reportedly testified before a Tehran court on Saturday that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's victory came after a clean vote.
In a blow to the so-called opposition movement which claims that his re-election as president was because of massive vote rigging, Sayyed Abtahi said there had been no fraud in the June 12 poll, the Fars news agency reported.
Abtahi, a close aide of reformist ex-president Mohammad Khatami, said the reformists and opposition leaders had also betrayed Iran's all-powerful supreme leader Ayatollah Sayyed Ali Khamenei, the agency said. "The 10th (presidential) election was different and it took two or three years to work on it. I think reformists took action to sort of restrict the (supreme) leader," Abtahi told a revolutionary court in which he and around 100 people face charges of rioting after the disputed poll.
"I say to all my friends and all friends who hear us, that the issue of fraud in Iran was a lie and was brought up to create riots so Iran becomes like Afghanistan and Iraq and suffers damage and hardship... and if this happened, there would be no name and trace of the revolution left."
Abtahi said opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi, Khatami and powerful cleric and former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani had taken an "oath" not to abandon each other. "Mousavi probably did not know the country, but Khatami, with all due respect... knew all the issues. He was aware of the capability and power of the leader, but he joined Mousavi and this was a betrayal," the cleric said, adding that Rafsanjani sought to avenge his 2005 presidential defeat to Ahmadinejad. "It was wrong of me to take part in the rallies, but Karroubi told me that we cannot call the people onto the streets with such a meager number of votes, so we had better go to the streets ourselves to demonstrate our protest," he was quoted as saying.
Mehdi Karroubi, a reformist ex-parliament speaker, won just 333,635 votes or 0.85 percent in the presidential ballot. Abtahi was one of his advisers before the election. Mousavi and Karroubi are spearheading a massive anti-Ahmadinejad campaign in which their supporters have staged street protests over the President's win.
Abtahi was among around 100 people, including other top reformists and aides to opposition leaders, facing charges on Saturday of rioting after the election. Media said the accused are accused of having "participated in riots, acting against national security, disturbing public order, vandalizing public and government property, having ties with counter-revolutionary groups and of planning to launch a velvet revolution."
The defendants include Mohsen Aminzadeh and Mohsen Safai-Farahani, deputy ministers under the government of Khatami, and Mohsen Mirdamadi, current head of the Islamic Iran Participation Front. Prominent reformists Behzad Nabavi of the Islamic Republic Mujahedeen Organization and Mohammad Atrianfar of the Executives of Construction are also on trial.
Fars reported Abtahi, a cleric, as testifying that he "agreed" with the prosecution charges. "But I want to say something, about the velvet revolution part... I think the capacity for such a thing to happen exists in the country, but I don't know if there was a real intention to do it."
Fars said the accused, if proven guilty, could face a maximum jail term of five years, unless they are charged with being a "mohareb" or enemy of God, which can carry the death penalty.
1 comment:
Us Iranians who know our country and exactly what goes on in there, will only see this as another useless attempt by a corrupt regime to revive its failed agenda. If they wanted the opinion of the reformists in Iran why did they need to arrest their more junior members first "look after" them for 5 weeks in notorious prisons and then get them to make a "statement". No one beyond primary school is going to see this as anything else other than one more crime committed by the Khamenei/Ahmadinejad gang, backed by the Taliban of Iran.
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