Mousavi, Defiant, Calls for More Rallies

Mousavi, Defiant, Calls for More Rallies

Reformist presidential aspirant Mir Hosain Mousavi called Monday morning for another round of big street protests by his supporters against the attempt of the regime to steal the election for hard liner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps has replied by warning it will crush any further street protests with a "revolutionary confrontation."

FT points out that given Mousavi's continued challenge to Khamenei's decisions, the regime may well arrest him, feeling the step is necessary to remove his freedom of action. Of course, Iranian Shiites all know the pitfalls of creating martyrs, since the religion is all about resisting the tyrants in history who made the martyrs. An arrest of Mousavi would either push Iran over the brink or would indeed consolidate power for the time being in the hands of the hard liners.

There were no large rallies on Sunday, which the BBC attributes to the security forces fanning through the streets. But the security forces had fanned through the streets on Saturday, too. More likely, the reformists were regrouping after the violence and clamp down on Saturday, which left up to 13 dead. Those 13, including the unarmed young woman known as Neda Agha Sultan (1983-2009)--whose murder by a Basiji was caught on camer-- need to be mourned. The authorities cancelled memorial service for her at Nilufar Mosque. Likely it will now be held in the streets.

The Guardianship Council has admitted that more votes were counted in 50 cities across Iran than there were voters-- the difference could be as much as 3 million questionable ballots. (See below for why the over all vote tallies are anyway implausible.)