Senator Joe Lieberman Explains (on first video below) How Congress Plans To Help Stop Iran's Unacceptable Regime & Violation of Human Rights.
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Iran’s Show Of Force Quashes Protest Attempts
A massive Iranian security presence, including riot police and gangs of motorbike-riding militia, appeared to snuff out attempts Thursday by anti-government protesters to orchestrate counter-demonstrations on the anniversary of the revolution that created Iran's Islamic republic.
Police clashed with protesters in several sites around Tehran, firing tear gas to disperse them and paintballs to mark them for arrest. Gangs of hard-liners also attacked senior opposition figures as they tried to attend the rallies — including the wife of the head of the reform movement.
Plainclothes Basiji militiamen beat 65-year-old Zahra Rahnavard with clubs on her head and back until her supporters formed a human ring around her and whisked her away, according to the Web site of her husband, Mir Hossein Mousavi.
Foreign media, including NBC News, were only allowed to cover the official ceremonies in Freedom Square, where hundreds of thousands of Iranians gathered to mark the revolution's 31st anniversary.
NBC's Ali Arouzi reported that he and the handful of other accredited reporters in Iran were bused into the official rally in Freedom Square, penned into a certain section, barred from talking to even the government supporters and then bused out of the area. He said they were told that they were absolutely prohibited from going out independently to film activities on the streets of Tehran.
The anniversary celebrations were an opportunity for Iran's clerical regime to tout its power in the face of the opposition movement, which has persisted in holding mass street protests since disputed presidential elections in June in defiance of a fierce months-long crackdown.
Based on the reports out of Tehran, the security clampdown appeared to have succeeded in preventing a major opposition turnout. Their numbers were not immediately known — but opposition Web sites spoke of groups of protesters in the hundreds, compared to thousands in past demonstrations.
Official media made no mention of clashes or arrests and state television said "tens of millions of people" attended rallies in support of the revolution across the country of 70 million.
One protester told The Associated Press she had tried to join the demonstrations but soon left in disappointment. "There were 300 of us, maximum 500. Against 10,000 people," she told an AP reporter outside Iran.
"It means they won and we lost. They defeated us. They were able to gather so many people," she said. "But this doesn't mean we have been defeated for good. It's a defeat for now, today. We need time to regroup." She spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation by authorities, who have jailed protesters for talking to foreign media.
Internet disruptions
Tehran residents also reported Internet speeds dropping dramatically and e-mail services such as Gmail being blocked in a common government tactic to foil opposition attempts to organize.
Heavy numbers of riot police, members of the Revolutionary Guard and Basij militiamen deployed at key squares and major avenues in the capital to prevent protests from marring the annual mass rallies for the revolution's anniversary.
State television showed images of thousands upon thousands carrying often identical banners marching along the city's broad avenues toward the central Azadi, or Freedom, Square. There, the massive crowds waved Iranian flags and carried pictures of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic state, and his successor as supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
In a nationally televised address in the square, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad proclaimed that Iran has produced its first batch of uranium enriched to a higher level, reiterating that Iran is now a "nuclear state."
'Death to the dictator'
Ahmadinejad made no mention in his speech of Iran's political turmoil.
For days ahead of the anniversary celebrations, anti-government Web sites and blogs have called for a major turnout in counterprotests. Groups of opposition protesters gathered Thursday in several locations around Tehran, wearing green clothes and waving green balloons — the opposition's signature color.
Meantime, opposition Web sites sought to gather as much information as possible from the protests.
* "Security forces fired tear gas to disperse a group of protesters who were trying to march toward Azadi Square as they chanted 'death to the dictator,'" the Web site Rahesabz said, reporting an unknown number of arrests. Police and Basijis on motorbikes swept toward central Tehran, where protesters and security forces clashed in several locations, it and other opposition Web sites reported.
* The Web site, Iran's Green Voice, said security forces fired shots and teargas at supporters of opposition leader Mirhossein Mousavi staging a rally in central Tehran. Mousavi and his wife attended one of the rallies, it said.
* Another opposition site, Norooz, said 30 people were arrested in one Tehran square.
* The various sites, many run from outside of Iran, also featured videos allegedly taken during protests. The Website, IranNewNow, had a live blog based on reports from the streets with many of the uploaded YouTube videos.
While msnbc.com can not confirm the provenance, date and other information about these clips, we are posting some here as there is no other source of video from the street protests.
Security forces also briefly detained the granddaughter of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the architect of the 1979 Islamic Revolution, and her husband, who are both senior pro-reform politicians, according to the couple's son, Ali.
The granddaughter, Zahra Eshraghi, and her husband Mohammad Reza Khatami, who is the brother of a former pro-reform president, were held for less than an hour before being released, their son told the AP.
Text messaging, Internet service hobbled
Iranian authorities again tried to squeeze off text messaging and Web links in attempts to cripple protest organizers. Internet service was sharply slowed, mobile phone service widely cut and there were repeated disruptions in popular instant messaging services such as Google chat, though some were sporadically accessible.
Many Internet users said they could not log into their Gmail account, Google's e-mail service, since last week.
"We have heard from users in Iran that they are having trouble accessing Gmail," Google said in a statement. "We can confirm a sharp drop in traffic and we have looked at our own networks and found that they are working properly."
Opposition members went on roof tops late Wednesday and shouted Allah-u-Akbar ("God is greatest") in protest — echoing similar cries after the disputed June election as well as anti-shah protests more than three decades ago.
The opposition claims that Ahmadinejad's victory in the June 12 election was fraudulent and that the true winner was pro-reform leader Mir Hossein Mousavi. Hundreds of thousands marched in the streets against the government in the weeks after the vote, prompting a massive wave of arrests.
Sources: AP, Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, Youtube
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