Despite warnings from the Iranian government and the powerful Revolutionary Guard of a tough crackdown, demonstrations have continued today in Iran in response to the result of the recent presidential election.
Iranian authorities have maintained reporting restrictions on foreign media, limiting their ability to move freely and banning them from reporting from 'illegal rallies'. The government has already expelled many foreign journalists including the BBC's permanent Tehran correspondent, Jon Leyne. As a result the internet and social media sites are the main sources of information from Iran.
Twitter has seen the 'hashtag' #iranelection 'trending' for over a week and the topic receives around 200,000 tweets per hour. Several twitter users have been regularly posting from Iran at great personal risk, reports say that the Iranian authorites are using the internet to track down 'cyber-dissents'. As a result the sources in our reports are kept anoynmous.
One source using twitter has recently 'tweeted' these reports. "We are having difficulty getting updates to you as so many of our contacts been arrested - life here is very very dangerous now...also one of us is badly injured and we cannot take to hospital - treating with trusted doctor contacts but needs hospital". Speaking of events yesterday our source said "yesterday we saw a 10 years old child die from
teargas in his face...could not film because militia everywhere". Our source also commented on the current situation in Tehran, "travelling through Tehran now is worse than Bagdad - any moment you can be beaten or arrested" and they added "some embassys provided protection before but now they are all surrounded by militia - also if you are injured then they arrest you".
The source also report that a protest was planned in Tehran's Baharestan Square at 4pm on Wednesday. They also said that "Mousavi will attend too" and cited Mousavi's own facebook page as their source. The also added that "tomorrow Mousavi will annouce start of a new type of protests - peaceful and silent - soon there will be strikes". Another source in Tehran last posted "I'm going to sleep a little before joining with the others, please pray for all people of Iran & wish us peace & freedom" at 5.55am (GMT) 20th June after over a week of regular posting, many other twitter users have raised councerns of the whereabouts of the user.
In other developments tensions have escalated between the UK and Iran after Iran expelled two British diplomats. The British government responded, this afternoon, by also expelling two Iranian diplomats from London.
British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, commented that allegations made against embassy staff were "without foundation". This comes just days after Ayatollah Ali Khamenei described the UK as "evil" in his speech at Friday prayers in Tehran University. His remarks sparked condemnation from the British foreign office and led to them calling in the Iranian ambassador to discuss the comments. The UK's foreign office has also told British nationals to avoid all non-essential travel to Iran in light of the recent protests but has said that they do not yet advise that Britsh nationals leave Iran. BOOZHOOZ NEWS WOULD LIKE TO THANK ALL THE BRAVE INTERNET USERS WHO HAVE HELPED MAKE OUR REPORTS ON THE CURRENT SITUATION IN IRAN POSSIBLE.
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