Iran's Guardian Council admits presidential vote was flawed, but won't change results
22 Jun 2009, 1652 Hrs

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London, June 22 Iran's powerful Guardian Council has ruled out changing Iran's presidential election result, but admitted that the vote was flawed.

The calls came as the Guardian Council, the body charged with reviewing the contested election, said it had concluded an investigation but would not be overturning the result.

Its spokesman, Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei, said the number of votes collected in 50 cities was more than the number of eligible voters, but the discrepancy was not sufficient to account for Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's margin of victory, The Telegraph reports.

The admission was made as the main presidential challenger, Mir Hossein Mousavi, implored supporters to renew street protests in Tehran on Monday and defy the threat of a brutal crackdown by the security forces.

Organisers of the campaign to overturn the result of the June 12 election, which gave Ahmadinejad, the incumbent president, a landslide victory said demonstrations must continue after petering out on Sunday.

The campaign called on people to march with black candles or turn on the lights on their cars during an afternoon rally.

Mousavi reiterated his backing of the protests at the end of a tense weekend in which at least 17 people were killed in the Iranian capital.

Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, gave the greet light to the repression when on Friday he declared the protests were illegal.

Meanwhile, Iran's Foreign Ministry lashed out at foreign media and Western governments. Its spokesman Hasan Qashqavi accused them of "a racial mentality that Iranians belong to the Third World." (ANI)

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