Tehran, November 04: Thousands of Iranians staged a noisy anti-US policies rally in Tehran Wednesday to mark the 30th anniversary of the storming of the American embassy by students.
US President Barack Obama meanwhile said in a statement marking the anniversary of the event that Iran “must choose” whether to open the door to opportunity and prosperity.
Huge crowds from early morning descended on the embassy complex in central Tehran.
The crowd was constantly being swelled by people arriving on foot and by bus, witnesses said.
Meanwhile, about a kilometre (mile) away at Haft-e-Tir square in the heart of the capital, riot police armed with batons and firing teargas moved in as several hundred opposition supporters attempted to stage an anti-government protest.
Witnesses said the protesters refused to disperse and dozens were beaten arrested.
Opposition supporters have since June been staging protests at every opportunity in Tehran against the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in a presidential vote they claim was massively rigged.
Wednesday’s anniversary, which has turned into a cornerstone of Tehran, event marks the capture by students of the US embassy compound on November 4, 1979 — just months after the Islamic revolution toppled the US-backed shah.
The students, who took 52 American diplomats hostage and held them for 444 days, said they were responding to Washington’s refusal to hand over the deposed shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.
“We have heard for 30 years what the Iranian government is against; the question, now, is what kind of future it is for,” Obama said.
“It is time for the Iranian government to decide whether it wants to focus on the past, or whether it will make the choices that will open the door to greater opportunity, prosperity and justice for its people.”
Leading Iranian dissident cleric Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri said meanwhile the capture of the US embassy was a mistake.
“The occupation of the American embassy at the start had the support of Iranian revolutionaries and the late Imam Khomeini and I supported it too,” he said.
“But considering the negative repercussions and the high sensitivity which was created among the American people and which still exists, it was not the right thing to do,” Montazeri said in a statement posted on his website.
The anniversary comes at a time when Washington is backing a sensitive nuclear fuel deal for Tehran brokered by the UN atomic watchdog, but US threats and rants have caused friction with Iran which wants to further discuss the nuclear deal but is pressed by Washington to just accept it.
US-Iranian relations deteriorated even further during the tenure of former US president George W. Bush, who lumped Iran into an “axis of evil” along with North Korea and Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.
Khamenei said Iran still distrusts the United States.
“Every time they have a smile on their face, they are hiding a dagger behind their back,” he said on Tuesday.
“They are telling us to negotiate, but alongside the negotiation there is a threat… We do not want any negotiation, the result of which is pre-determined by the United States,” he said.
“Iran will not be fooled by the superficial conciliatory tone of the United States,” he said.
“This new American president repeatedly sent us oral and written messages to come and change the page… to come and cooperate in solving the problems of the world. We said we will not pre-judge. We will see their action and see what they do about the change,” Khamenei said.
“But in the past eight months what we have seen is contradictory to what they say. They are telling us to negotiate, but alongside the negotiation there is a threat that if the negotiation does not bear the desired results, then we will do this and we will do that.
“We do not want any negotiation, the result of which is pre-determined by the United States,” he said, adding that Tehran will always pursue its “scientific and technological rights and freedom.”
Iran insists it has the right to develop nuclear technology, which it says is aimed at generating energy for its growing population.
Although Iran has oil, it is still dependent on petrol imports to meet about 40 percent of domestic consumption.
Israel is the only country in the Middle Ease that actually has nuclear weapons.
Observers say due the strong Jewish and pro-Israel lobbies in the US and some European countries, these countries have taken a hypocritical stance in relation to nuclear issues in the region.
Tehran had repeatedly protested against Israeli and US war threats, warning them that it would retaliate in the event of any strike against Iran.
Iran and the United States have not had diplomatic relations since 1979 Iranian revolution, which toppled the ruthless US-backed dictator, the shah.
Tehran never forgave Washington for supporting the shah.
Obama admitted US involvement in the 1953 coup which overthrew the democratically elected Iranian government of Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh.
It was the first time a serving US president had publicly admitted American involvement in the coup.
The US Central Intelligence Agency, with British backing, masterminded the coup after Mossadegh nationalised the oil industry.
For many Iranians, the coup demonstrated duplicity by the United States, which presented itself as a defender of freedom but did not hesitate to use underhand methods to get rid of a democratically elected government to suit its own economic and strategic interests.
Washington went on to become the major backer of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, a brutal and ruthless dictator who was overthrown by the Islamic revolution of 1979.
—Agencies