Tehran, January 01: Iranian opposition leader Mirhossein Mousavi said on Friday he was ready to die for his reformist campaign after a disputed election in June, defying hardline calls for his execution.
“I’m not afraid of being one of the martyrs who lost their lives in their fight for their rightful demands since the vote,” Mousavi said on his website, five days after his nephew and seven other pro-reform protesters were killed during a rally.
Mousavi, whose allegation that the June presidential vote he lost to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was rigged set off a wave of unrest, said in the statement the Islamic Republic was in “serious crisis”.
In his most outspoken remarks of recent months, Mousavi declared that “arresting or killing Mousavi, (or fellow opposition leader Mehdi) Karoubi … will not calm the country”.
The remarks on his Kaleme website were a new challenge to the authorities, who have intensified their crackdown on the reform movement since last Sunday when eight people — including a nephew of Mousavi’s — were killed in protests on the day of the Shi’ite Muslim ritual of Ashura.
Hardliners have accused opposition leaders of igniting unrest, labelling them “mohareb” (enemies of God), a crime punishable by death under Iran’s Islamic law.
Such threats have apparently failed to silence Mousavi, who said he was ready to die for his cause.
“Such harsh remarks … will create internal uprising … My blood is not redder than that of other martyrs,” he said.
The anti-government protests, which have flared repeatedly since the election, have plunged Iran into the most serious internal crisis in the Islamic Republic’s 30-year history.
Mousavi supporters have defied government warnings against holding “illegal rallies”, using Muslim festivals and official days of commemoration as a cover for street gatherings.
Opposition leaders say the presidential vote was rigged to secure Ahmadinejad’s re-election. The country’s highest authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said it was the healthiest in three decades.
Hardline cleric Ahmad Khatami criticised Mousavi’s statement, saying “he is repeating his past mistakes”, state radio reported.
–Agencies