At least 10 people were killed in the latest unrest to shake Tehran, state television said Sunday, as Iranian leaders took aim at Western “meddling” in the post-election tumult that has triggered the worst crisis since the 1979 revolution. Authorities arrested the daughter and four other relatives of ex-president Hashemi Rafsanjani, one of Iran's most powerful men as the opposition stepped up its challenge to the country's rulers, with defeated presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi firing off an unprecedented criticism of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. State television said 10 people were killed and more than 100 wounded in Tehran Saturday, blaming “terrorists” with firearms and explosives, bringing the overall toll reported by state media in a week of violence to at least 19. But fresh images and allegations of brutality emerged as Iranians at home and abroad sought to shed light on a week of astonishing resistance to hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The New-York based International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran said scores of injured demonstrators who had sought medical treatment after Saturday's clashes were arrested by security forces at hospitals in the capital. It said doctors had been ordered to report protest-related injuries to the authorities, and that some seriously injured protesters had sought refuge at foreign embassies in a bid to evade arrest. Struggling to contain the massive street protests unleashed since the disputed June 12 election that returned Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to office, Iranian leaders lashed out at Western nations, foreign media and the exiled opposition. World leaders have voiced mounting alarm over the unrest, which has jolted the pillars of the regime and raised concerns over the future of the Shiite Muslim powerhouse. The foreign media has been barred from covering the demonstrations as part of tight new restrictions on their work. Ahmadinejad bluntly told the United States and Britain to stop interfering after Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki accused London of plotting for the past two years to sabotage the election. “By making hasty comments, you will not have a place in the circle of the Iranian nation's friends. Therefore, I recommend you to correct your interfering positions,” Ahmadinejad said in a statement. Parliament speaker called for ties with Britain, France and Germany to be reconsidered in view of their “shameful” statements. Speaker Ali Larijani made the comment in a speech to parliament, a report said. “He called the stances of the United States, Britain, Germany and France toward Iran's presidential election shameful and called on parliament's foreign and security policy commission to put the reconsideration of ties with the three European countries on its agenda,” it said. Mousavi, leading the massive wave of public opposition to the vote that returned Ahmadinejad to power, Saturday accused the country's rulers of “cheating” and warned of a dangerous path ahead. He unleashed his broadside against Iran's all-powerful leader, after police firing tear gas and water cannon clashed with thousands of protesters who defied an ultimatum from Khamenei for an end to their street protests. Mousavi lashed out at Khamenei in an unprecedented challenge to the man who has ruled over Iran for 20 years. – AgenciesWhat might happen next• ARE IRANIANS LIKELY TO OBEY KHAMENEI'S ORDERS? Based on what happened on Saturday night, just a day after Khamenei's speech, street protests will continue unless Iran imposes a state of emergency or martial law. • HAS THE REGIME LOST LEGITIMACY? The street protests, in open defiance to Khamenei, have undermined the establishment's legitimacy. Before the election, protesters aimed to encourage Iranians to unseat Ahmadinejad but now, the whole system and the leader himself are implicated. That is unprecedented. • WILL OBAMA ABANDON HIS POLICY OF ENGAGEMENT? Iranian leaders' reaction to US President Barack Obama's remarks hints that there will be no engagement in the near future. The supreme leader Friday for the first time said his views were more similar to the anti-Western president than others who seek a policy of detente with the West.
