Tehran – Police Break Up Protest in Iran

Tehran – Iranian police swinging clubs chased protesters and made arrests on Sunday to disperse hundreds of people who gathered in the capital to mark the second anniversary of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s disputed re-election, the opposition said.

Claims of fraud in the June 2009 election sent waves of protesters into streets around the nation for months. The government responded with a deadly crackdown and mass trials of activists and pro-reform politicians. The movement grew into the most serious challenge to Iran’s government since its birth in the 1979 Islamic Revolution, but it was largely swept from the streets after half a year and has failed to regain momentum.

The opposition Web site Kaleme.com said police officers wielding clubs tried to disperse protesters in one part of the capital, but there were few details.

It said the police detained many of the protesters and the authorities ordered shops and public places like movie theaters to close early to prevent more crowds from gathering. Opposition activists based outside the country had called for a silent march on the second anniversary of the election.

Also on Sunday, Kaleme.com said a jailed opposition activist, Hoda Saber, died of heart failure after a week on a hunger strike.

Mr. Saber was also a journalist and a member of the Religious Nationalist Alliance, which seeks peaceful political reform within the Islamic establishment.

He had been imprisoned since August and recently began a hunger strike to protest the death of another activist, Haleh Sahabi, who also died of heart problems after a scuffle with security officers during her father’s funeral earlier this month.

Mr. Saber was taken to a hospital on Friday and died Saturday