Authorities in Iran have announced that 109 people were arrested in Tehran on Wednesday as security forces clashed with supporters of opposition leader Mir-Hossein Mousavi at a rally to mark the anniversary of the seizure of the U.S. embassy.
A report by the official Iranian news agency IRNA quotes the chief of police in Tehran, Azizollah Rajabzadeh, as saying that 109 arrests were made, with those detained said to have "created disorder and disturbed public order and security on the sideline of the rally".
Reuters reports that Mr Rajabzadeh went on to state that 62 of those arrested were in jail,
France 24 notes that 43 men and 19 women are still being detained, with the remainder released on bail.
Foreign nationals were amongst those arrested during the rally, organized by the government in Iran on an annual basis and this year preceded by warnings from the Revolutionary Guards, the Basij militia and the security forces regarding opposition supporters who might be planning to take to the streets to protest against the Iranian regime.
Mehdi Karoubi, another of the candidates for President in the June election that saw Mahmoud Ahmadinejad returned to office, had joined Mr Mousavi in calling on those who want to see reform in Iran to attend the rally marking what was the 30th anniversary of the seizure on November 4 1979 of the U.S. embassy in Tehran by student supporters of what has become known as the Islamic Revolution.
The release of two Germans and a Canadian arrested on Wednesday has been confirmed by Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi, the general prosecutor in Tehran.
Farhad Pouladi, an Iranian who reports for
AFP and contributes to
France 24, was another of those released.
According to
France 24 Mr Pouladi was the passenger on a motorcycle which was stopped on Wednesday by two uniformed security officers and one officer in plainclothes. The security officers apparently took Mr Pouladi's mobile phone/cell phone from him and then led him away.
Iran does not allow the foreign media to cover street protests.
Mr Pouladi's release came on Saturday, although it is not entirely clear when the German nationals and the Canadian national were freed.
The report by
Reuters suggests that a Danish student remains in the custody of the Iranian authorities, with Abbas Jafari Dolatabadi quoted as saying:
We have asked the relevant authorities to provide us with documents explaining the purposes of the Danish student's presence and his mission in Iran
