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http://www.arabnews.com/?page=4§ion=0&article=129987&d=22&m=12&y=2009
Tuesday 22 December 2009 (05 Muharram 1431)
Violence marks Montazeri funeral
Reuters
Opposition supporters and pro-government demonstrators scuffle
during the funeral ceremony of Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri in the
Iranian city of Qom on Monday. (AP)
TEHRAN: Huge crowds of Iranians turned out for the funeral of leading
dissident leader Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri in Qom on Monday and
some chanted anti-government slogans, websites reported.
Montazeri, who died late on Saturday aged 87, was viewed as the spiritual
patron of a pro-reform opposition movement that blossomed after a disputed
presidential election in June and has proved resilient despite repeated efforts
to suppress it.
Violence flared when security forces around Montazeri's house clashed
with stone-throwing protesters, the reformist website Norooz said. There was no
immediate official comment.
The report could not be verified independently since foreign media were
banned from reporting directly on protests and were told not to travel to Qom
for Montazeri's funeral. However, pictures obtained by Reuters showed scuffles
apparently between government and opposition supporters.
The reformist website Jaras said hundreds of thousands of people joined a
procession for Montazeri, a pillar of Iran's 1979 revolution. He later became a
fierce critic of its hard-line leadership and a staunch defender of reformists.
"Innocent Montazeri, your path will be continued even if the dictator
should rain bullets on our heads," the crowd chanted. Iran's internal unrest,
highlighted by Montazeri's arguments that the leadership had lost its
legitimacy, has complicated the dispute over the Iranian nuclear program, which
the West believes may have military ends, not just civilian purposes.
Opposition leaders Mirhossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi were
photographed paying their condolences at Montazeri's house.
Reformist websites said security forces arrested some opposition
supporters trying to reach Qom and turned others away.
The cleric's death occurred in the tense run-up to Ashura, a politically
laden Shiite religious commemoration that offers the opposition another
opportunity to show its strength. Shouts of "Oh Hossein, Mirhossein" also rose
from mourners near Iran's second holiest shrine, many wearing green wristbands
to show support for Mousavi.
Their cries echoed traditional Ashura laments for Hossein, a grandson of
the Prophet Mohammad, killed in a 7th-century battle that sealed the schism
between Sunni and Shiite Muslims.
Ashura, a key occasion in the Islamic Republic's calendar, will coincide
with the seventh day of mourning for Montazeri, making it harder for
authorities to keep people off the streets.
Riot police were out in force in Qom, 125 km south of Tehran, for the
funeral of the senior Shiite cleric who had been a thorn in the establishment's
side.
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