BICOM

Two people are reported to have been killed and hundreds injured in a new outbreak of protests in Iran. Demonstrators in the Iranian capital Teheran chanted slogans saying that following the departure of the Tunisian and Egyptian dictators, it was now the turn of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei to resign. Dozens of opposition supporters are reported to have been arrested. Clashes also took place in Isfahan, Iran’s third biggest city. Security forces have surrounded the houses of opposition leaders Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi.

Both President Barack Obama and British Foreign Secretary William Hague have criticised Iran for its ‘hypocrisy’. Teheran welcomed the toppling of President Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, but appears willing to employ harsh measures to repress dissent in Iran itself. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, for his part, dismissed the protests.