The election department of the regime’s interior ministry issued its 9th statement on the matter, ordering officials at polling stations to prevent monitors from the state inspection organization and provincial inspection organizations from entering. The statement added that all requests for figures and information by these inspection organizations or requests for them to set up base at polling stations are illegal. Thus, in order to have a free hand to rig the votes, the regime’s ruling faction is preventing other institutions from within the regime from being able to monitor the polling stations.
In a separate development, at 11 am (Tehran time), three hours after the polls opened, the regime’s interior minister Sadegh Mahsouli announced that until that time four million people had taken part in the vote across the country. The social department of the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK) announced that according to eye witnesses reports from 25,000 polling stations across Iran, Mahsouli had inflated the figure by 4.5 times. All the signs show that in the first three hours, no more than 900,000 people went to the polls.
Scenes repeatedly aired since the morning from pre-designated voting stations in certain specified spots by state television are also indicative of this.
As in previous years, the regime’s interior ministry is inflating voter participation by 4 – 5 times.
Secretariat of the National Council of Resistance of Iran
June 12, 2009