WATCH: YouTube video appearing to show street fighting between Iranian riot
police and protesters in Tehran on December 27.
Opposition and other unofficial sources claim at
least eight protesters have been killed and many others injured in clashes
between government critics and security forces in Iran.
A nephew of opposition leader Mir Hossein Musavi was said to be among those
killed.
The police chief in Tehran, where at least four deaths were being reported,
insisted in the afternoon that no deaths had occurred.
The opposition "Rahe Sabz" website reported that three protesters had been shot
dead by security forces in the middle of the Iranian capital's central Enghelab
Street. A Tehran-based human rights activist told RFE/RL that a fourth protester
apparently had died after being hit on the head with truncheon by security
forces.
"So far there have been no reports of killings, and no one has been killed up to
now," Reuters quoted Tehran police chief Azizollah Rajabzadeh as saying in the
afternoon, based on an ISNA report.
Later, the opposition "Jaras" website claimed that "at least four protesters
were killed in [the northwestern Iranian city of] Tabriz and many others were
wounded," Reuters reported.
Jarring Images
Protesters wipe the bloodied face of a man who was allegedly shot during an
antigovernment protest in Tehran on December 27.
The reports of deaths, as well as a YouTube video
purporting to show demostrators
carrying a gunshot
victim, could not be immediately verified.
The "Parlimannews"
website -- which has ties to reformists in Iran's parliament -- reported that
Seyed Ali Musavi, the opposition leader's nephew, had been killed during a
confrontation with security forces. The report said the younger Musavi had been
"shot in the heart" during "Ashura Day events" and died en route to a hospital.
A Musavi aide who requested anonymity after being contacted by RFE/RL's Radio
Farda confirmed the report of the relative's death.
Musavi's "Kaleme" website later quoted adviser Alireza Beheshti expressing his
"regrets and deep condolences over the martyrdom of your [Musavi's] nephew Ali
Habibi Musavi," according to Reuters.
The violence in Shi'a-dominated Iran is especially jarring as it comes on one of
the holiest days on Shi'ite Islam's calendar, Ashura, commemorating the
seventh-century martyrdom of Imam Hussein.
As evening approached in Iran, government critics have vowed to continue the
protests. Eyewitnesses said that appeared to be the case.
A pro-opposition website, "Jaras," said the opposition was organizing more
protests in major public parks and in Tehran's Enghelab, Mohseni, Tajrish, and
Vanak squares.
Tear Gas And Reported Gunfire
Iranian authorities have banned foreign journalists from many events and imposed
tight strictures on domestic media.
Around midday, an eyewitness told Radio Farda by telephone from Tehran that
security forces were using tear gas and pepper gas against opposition supporters
to try to disperse them from the city center.
She reported "a big crowd of people" at the intersection of Bozorgmehr and Vali
Asr streets.
"The [security forces] on motorbikes attacked [the crowd]. I can see about 100
or 150 of them," the witness told Radio Farda. "People have set fire to several
garbage cans. They're trying to chant slogans against the leader of the Islamic
Republic [Ayatollah Ali Khamenei] and the dictatorship."
protesters run from the security forces in Tehran on December 27.
photo by www.kosoof.com
The witness, who did not want to be named for
security reasons, added that she saw blood on some of the sidewalks in central
Tehran.
Other reports, mostly from websites sympathetic to the opposition, reported
occasional sounds of gunfire.
Today's protest and bloody clashes come seven days after the death of Iran's
longtime dissident cleric, Grand Ayatollah
Hossein Ali Montazeri. Montazeri was once in line to
succeed revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini but had a falling-out
that led to jail time and internal exile.
Montazeri is widely considered the spiritual father of Iran's opposition Green
Movement, although two unsuccessful presidential candidates, Mir Hossein Musavi
and cleric Mehdi Karrubi, have been the political faces of the resistance that
began after the disputed June presidential election.
Witnesses told RFE/RL many of the chants targeted Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei.
Energized Reform Movement?
Montazeri's death has appeared to reenergize the opposition movement, which
turned his funeral in the holy city of Qom a week ago into a huge antigovernment
protest.
WATCH: YouTube video shows
opposition supporters taking to the streets in the Iranian capital on December
27 to protest the disputed June election and the authorities' subsequent
clampdown:
Since Montazeri's death last week, protests have taken place in several cities
including Tehran, Isfahan, Najafabad and Zanjan.
Protests are also reported today in Isfahan, Montazeri's hometown of Najafabad,
Shiraz, and Qom.
On Ashura, Iranians usually march in the streets and beat their chests in memory
of the death of the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, Imam Hossein.
This year, however, many of the Ashura ceremonies in Iran have turned into
protests against the Iranian establishment.
A speech on December 26 by former reformist President Mohammad Khatami at the
home of the founder of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Khomeini, was disrupted
by hard-liners.
Khatami, who backed Musavi ahead of the disputed June presidential election as
is regarded as a leader of the reform movement, was reportedly drawing parallels
between Iran's opposition movement and the struggle of the grandson of the
Prophet Muhammad, Imam Hussein, whose martyrdom is being commemorated today in
one of Shi'a Islam's holiest days.
WATCH: YouTube video of a
crowd of presumed hard-liners forcing their way into a mosque complex where
Khatami was addressing a crowd of Montazeri mourners on December 26:
The incident led to protests for several hours
until riot police were deployed and dispersed the crowd.
Iran has been rocked by a series of street protests since the June 12
presidential vote and the reelection of President Mahmud Ahmadinejad, which the
opposition insists was the result of massive fraud.
Radio Farda broadcasters Mohammad Reza Kazemi and Roozbeh Bolhari contributed to
this report
