Witnesses said around 300 to 400 riot policemen and members of the Islamic volunteer Basij militia fanned out in the area as people began taking to the streets. -- PHOTO: AP
TEHERAN - IRANIAN police fired tear gas on Monday as about 1,000 opposition demonstrators gathered in central Tehran in defiance of a ban by the authorities, witnesses said.
One witness said police in helmets and wielding clubs fired at least seven rounds of tear gas to disperse a group of about 200 protesters as they started to chant Allahu Akbar (God is Greatest).
Police also arrested several protesters and at least 10 were rounded up and placed in a police pick-up truck, the witness said.
The protesters were gathering in the capital's Haft-e Tir square - a popular shopping destination in Tehran and one of the capital's biggest squares - on the latest day of demonstrations over the disputed presidential election.
Witnesses said around 300 to 400 riot policemen and members of the Islamic volunteer Basij militia fanned out in the area as people began taking to the streets.
'There are about 1,000 people gathering around the square,' one witness told AFP. 'Riot police are taking position to charge.'
A call to rally at Haft-e Tir was issued on some social networking sites, including Twitter, to pay tribute to a woman known by her first name Neda, allegedly killed by gunfire on Saturday.
A video, viewed by hundreds of thousands around the globe, showed a bloodstained young woman said to be Neda after she was reportedly killed by a bullet in Tehran during confrontations between protesters and police.
The foreign media is banned from covering demonstrations, effectively keeping their journalists off the streets, but Iranians have been sites such as Twitter and YouTube to get news and video footage to the outside world. -- AFP
