Iranian MP Ali Motahari has spoken out against the recent statements made by Ahmad Jannati, the head of Iran’s Guardian Council, at Tehran’s Friday Mass Prayers against MirHosein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, the Iranian opposition leaders who have been under house arrest for more than a thousand days.
In a letter on his website, Motahari condemns Jannati for beating “the drum of division, violence and extremism” and says the Guardian Council’s head is putting forth “fundamentally void” reasoning about the possible execution of Mousavi and Karroubi.
Jannati said in his sermon yesterday that Mousavi and Karroubi should be grateful that the establishment has not imposed the death penalty on them.
Mousavi and Karroubi, both candidates in the 2009 presidential election, challenged the legitimacy of the vote count. This was followed by months of street protests with millions of people asking about their votes.
Ali Motahari writes that the prolonged house arrest of MirHosein Mousavi, Zahra Rahnavard and Mehdi Karroubi is not acceptable and he invites Jannati to live under the confined conditions imposed on these leaders to see if he can endure it.
Jannati claimed the conditions in which Mousavi and Karroubi are being held are very comfortable and said all their needs are being provided for.
Motahari stressed that protesting against the election is a right upheld by the constitution and he accused Jannati of bias in the matter because of his support of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the election.
“Mr. Jannati talks about how these people [Mousavi and Karroubi] caused insecurity in the country, how many people they killed, how many fires and acts of destruction they caused!” Motahari writes. “Mr. Jannati, you should appeal to your conscious and ask who the real perpetrator of these events is: their protest or your response to them?”
Motahari goes on to add that photos of the unrest clearly indicate who were “the identifiable people on motorcycles shooting” at people.
The protests of 2009 were quelled violently by security forces as well as plainclothes forces who attacked and arrested thousands of protesters.
Motahari stressed that the house arrest of these leaders is unjust and has compromised their health, adding that they do not even enjoy the rights of regular prisoners held in a prison.
