Iran's Supreme Leader Praises Vote Results

FARNAZ FASSIHI

Reuters

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei delivers a sermon during Friday prayers at Tehran University on Friday.

TEHRAN, Iran -- Iran's supreme leader said Friday there was "definitive victory" and no rigging in disputed presidential elections, offering no concession to protesters demanding the vote be canceled and held again.

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Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in a rare speech at Friday prayers at Tehran University, said the election dispute was nothing more than a family disagreement within the frame of the Islamic Republic. He added that the legitimacy of the regime was never at question and all candidates had a shinning track record of serving the Islamic Republic.

Demonstrating savvy diplomacy, Mr. Khamenei criticized both sides for attacking each other. He defended President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad by saying his rivals had unfairly called him a liar and questioned his policies. He also slapped the president for accusing some high-level clerics, such as Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, of being corrupt and said Mr. Rafsanjani had given his life to serving the regime and accusations of his financial corruption were baseless rumors.

Mr. Khamenei firmly called for a stop to the recent street demonstrations by Mr. Ahmadinejad's rivals and said vote disputes must be settled legally, not in the streets. He also said if the demonstrations didn't stop there might be chaos and bloodshed, and that rival candidates calling for protests would be blamed.

Pro-Mousavi Web sites had no immediate reaction to Mr. Khamenei's warning. They did not announce changes in plans for a march Saturday from Revolution Square to Freedom Square, site of a massive rally Monday that ended with fatal clashes between protesters and a pro-government militia.

Later, though, Tehran residents took to their roofs and cried "God is Great!" in open defiance of Iran's supreme leader, according to the Associated Press. The late-night cries of "Allahu Akbar!" and "Death to the Dictator!" throughout Tehran came hours after Mr. Khamenei's warning against protest.

President Barack Obama said Friday he is very concerned by the "tenor and tone" of comments by Mr. Khamenei. In an interview with CBS News, Mr. Obama said that Iran's government should "recognize that the world is watching."

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Men shouted slogans outside Tehran University as they listened to the Friday prayer sermon delivered by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Mr. Khamenei, in his speech, blamed the U.K., U.S. and Iran's enemies for the unrest, vigorously defending the ruling system in his first public comments since supporters of challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi flooded the streets of Tehran.

"The U.S. president said 'We were waiting for a day like this to see people on the street,' " Mr. Khamenei said. "They write to us and say they respect the Islamic Republic and then they make comments like this ... . Which one should we believe?"

The Friday prayer was televised live on state-run Channel One. The camera showed Mr. Ahmadinejad sitting in the front row and conservative candidate Mohsen Rezaei a few rows back. It wasn't clear whether Mr. Mousavi or Mehdi Karroubi had accepted the leader's invitation to come to the prayers.

Meanwhile, both houses of the U.S. Congress have voted to condemn Iran's crackdown on anti-government demonstrators. The resolution -- approved by the House and then the Senate -- condemns "the ongoing violence" by the government and the Iranian government's suppression of the Internet and cell phones. It also expressed support for Iranian citizens who embrace freedom.

The resolution was initiated by Republicans as a veiled criticism of Mr. Obama, who has been reluctant to speak too strongly about the disputed elections. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs says the resolution is consistent with the president's message condemning the violence in Iran.