3 August 2009 (12 Mordad 1388): Khamenei officially recognizes Ahmadinejad as president, protests start

Monday, August 03, 2009

You can see a video of the ceremony and Ahmadinejad's awkward kiss to Khamenei's shoulder here.

There were much fewer people at the ceremony today than in 2005, as can be seen here, when people like Rafsanjani and Khatami were in attendance. As I noted in the post previous to this one, this ceremony as well was attended by dignitaries from other countries such as the Japanese ambassador, and I'm not sure who else but the article there mentioned that a number of European countries decided to send in their deputy ambassadors instead as a mild form of protest.

Very happy to see that Angela Merkel will not send Ahmadinejad a letter of congratulations (auch hier auf deutsch). Germany is Iran's largest trading partner after China, and Germany plus the EU is their largest trading partner if you calculate the Union as a whole. Go here if you want to send the German government a thank-you note for this. Leave the first part of the form as is (Ihre Meinung sagen = say your opinion), in Betreff write the subject, then write what you want, add your name and email address below, hit abschicken (send), and you're done.

Now it's 7 pm in Iran and there are reports of a few thousand people gathering on Valiasr Avenue, and that Vanak Square is heavily guarded at the moment.

Just noticed a link here from Twitter in Persian now referencing Fars News, which says that Karroubi is participating in today's protests too.



Here's CNN on the protests so far today.



Also a quick video here with some of the protests. People sound angry.

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