Ethiopian Review

Politically-motivated street celebrations in Iran have dissolved, as the country waits in quiet anticipation of Friday’s presidential election.

Public rallies and speeches are forbidden in Iran Thursday, and voting will begin Friday morning.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s final campaign message Wednesday strongly denounced his challengers and confidently asserted he will win re-election. Mr. Ahmadinejad said Iran’s economy continues to grow under his supervision, although he admitted inflation is still a problem.

Iranian television offered the president and his three main opponents an opportunity to answer each other’s criticisms. The state-run network said only Mr. Ahmadinejad took up the offer.

The president’s chief rival, former prime minister Mir Hossein Mousavi, a reformist, has said the president’s confident economic forecast is a lie, and he also has denounced Mr. Ahmadinejad’s contention that the Holocaust is a myth.

Thousands of Mr. Mousavi’s supporters wore his campaign’s trademark color, green, and marched through the streets of Tehran as formal campaigning ended at midnight.

A top official of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard (Yadollah Javani) accused Mr. Mousavi’s supporters of trying to inspire a “velvet revolution” – the term used to describe the non-violent ouster of Czechoslovakia’s Communist government in 1989.

Mr. Mousavi, who was prime minister during the 1980s, made a campaign visit Wednesday to Lorestan province. Iran’s Mehr news agency quoted him as telling supporters that a nation as rich in resources as Iran should not have to live in poverty.

At a rally in Tehran earlier Wednesday, Mr. Ahmadinejad said his opponents were using smear tactics reminiscent of Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.

Another candidate, former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, complained about Mr. Ahmadinejad’s accusation that the Rafsanjani family is involved in corruption.

Reformist cleric Mehdi Karroubi and conservative former Revolutionary Guards commander Mohsen Rezaei also are challenging Mr. Ahmadinejad’s re-election bid.

- VOA