Protest rallies in Tehran against Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

PanARMENIAN.Net - The victory of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad triggered mass opposition protests and furious complaints of cheating from his defeated rivals, AFP reports.



Riot police clashed with protestors in unrest not seen for a decade as thousands of supporters of main challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi took to the streets shouting "Down with the Dictator" after final results showed Ahmadinejad winning almost 63 percent of the vote.



Moderate ex-premier Mousavi cried foul over election irregularities and warned the vote could lead to "tyranny," as some of his supporters were beaten by baton-wielding police.



The interior minister said Mousavi had won less than 34 percent of the vote, giving Ahmadinejad another four-year term in a result that dashed Western hopes of change and set the scene for a possible domestic power struggle.



Iran's all-powerful supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei hailed Ahmadinejad's victory and urged the country to unite behind him after the most heated election campaign since the Islamic revolution,



The vote outcome appears to have galvanised a grass-roots movement for change after 30 years of restrictive clerical rule in a country where 60 percent of the population was born after the revolution.



The international community had also been keenly watching the election for any signs of a shift in policy after four years of hardline rhetoric from the 52-year-old Ahmadinejad and a standoff over Iran's nuclear drive.



Mousavi protested at what he described as "numerous and blatant irregularities" in the vote which officials said attracted a record turnout of around 85 percent of the 46 million electorate.



In the heart of Tehran, thousands of angry Mousavi supporters voiced their disbelief and frustration at the results, with some pelting stones at police who struck back with batons.



Reformist candidate Mehdi Karroubi, who came a distant fourth with less than one percent of the vote after ex-Revolutionary Guards chief Mohsen Rezai in third, also declared the result "illegitimate and unacceptable".



Ahmadinejad's supporters had earlier taken to the streets in triumph, honking their horns and waving Iranian flags.



The election highlighted deep divisions in Iran after four years under Ahmadinejad, who had massive support in the rural heartland, while in the big cities young men and women threw their weight behind Mousavi.