Clerics join chorus of dissent

Mounting opposition from Iranian clerics to the president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s disputed re-election is torpedoing the regime’s attempts to blame his purportedly defeated rivals and western powers, in particular Britain, for the Islamic republic’s worst crisis in its 30-year history.

A prominent association of religious leaders in Qom, Iran’s clerical nerve centre, said the new government would be “illegitimate” and condemned the force used to crush huge pro-democracy demonstrations after the June 12 elections.

The statement by the Assembly of Qom Seminary Teachers and Researchers directly challenges the authority of Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has ordered Iranians to accept his president’s “divine” victory or face the consequences. Read more at www.thenational.ae