The three top leaders of Iran's opposition joined forces on Tuesday and their supporters began a three-day national strike, signaling a resurrection of protests even as Iran's president announced to the nation that the postelection turmoil was over.
Opposition candidates Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, joined by former President Mohamad Khatami, met to plot strategy and issued their first-ever joint statement, calling for an end to the government's arrests and what they called "savage, shocking attacks" on their advisers and supporters.
Meanwhile, hundreds of opposition supporters quietly flocked to mosques or retreated to their homes to begin an unusual form of three-day strike boycotting workplaces, banks and the baazar.
In a novel attempt to outflank government restrictions, opposition supporters alerted one another to take advantage of an Islamic tradition rarely practiced in Iran called Etekaf. It calls for a retreat from worldly activities during these three days in the month of Rajab in the Islamic calendar.
The strikes come just ahead of a protest planned for Thursday to commemorate 18 Tir, the 1999 student uprisings that led to dozens of students getting killed. "By staying away from workplace, the brave people of Iran can show they will never accept this illegitimate government," wrote an Iranian columnist in Iran on a news Web site.
RTWT.
M&G: Khamenei ordered Iran election fraud, says ex-president
Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is personally behind the alleged fraud in the June 12 presidential election, former Iranian president Abolhassan Banisadr claimed in Vienna late on Monday.
"Khamenei ordered the fraud in the presidential elections and the ensuing crackdown on protestors," Banisadr said at a symposium marking the 20th anniversary of the murder of three Kurdish opposition leaders in Vienna.
"The regime is edging closer to the abyss and is holding on to power solely by means of violence and terror," said Banisadr, who was Iran's first elected president following the 1979 Islamic revolution.
The regime wanted to keep the population in a permanent state of uncertainty and fear and so systematic terror was institutionally organised and controlled by the regime and Khamenei, he added.
"They don't want Iranians to be able to even think about protests in their own homes."
Intellectuals and students were the main targets since they were regarded as the driving force behind the resistance, Banisadr continued. "Reformers and liberal pragmatists are to be wiped out."
IT AIN'T OVER.
IT WOULD BE NICE IF THE POTUS SUPPORTED THE REBELLION.
IT'S SHAMEFUL AND SICKENING THAT OBAMA DOESN'T.
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