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 TEHRAN (Reuters) - A senior Shi'ite Muslim cleric who has challenged
Iran's system of clerical rule was arrested on Sunday after his supporters
clashed with police outside his house in the Iranian capital, Iranian news
agencies reported.
Ayatollah Mohammad Kazemeini Boroujerdi
was detained with several supporters, Iran's
student news agency ISNA quoted the deputy governor of Tehran, Abdollah
Rowshan, as saying.
The Iranian authorities are wary of any challenge, particularly from top
clerics, to the system of clerical rule that was established after the 1979
Islamic revolution by revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah
Khomeini.
More than 200 of Boroujerdi's supporters clashed
with police using teargas on Saturday during a protest outside his house,
newspapers reported. Some reports said his followers feared the cleric was
in imminent danger of arrest.
"All the people, including Boroujerdi, who
... caused this issue, were arrested," Rowshan,
who is in charge of security and political affairs, was quoted by ISNA as
saying.
Another news agency, ILNA, quoted Rowshan casting
doubt on Boroujerdi's credentials, saying he was
not an ayatollah, one of the highest ranks in Shi'ite
religious hierarchy.
Police arrested some of the protesters for carrying knives and guns, the
office of the Tehran
governor said in a statement.
The daily Seday-e Edalat
said some protesters had carried knives and lit fires around Boroujerdi's house in southern Tehran to prevent police approaching. A
picture showed police in riot geared lined up near a crowd of people and
smoke rising up.
Officials could not be reached for comment.
"We believe that our nation is tired of political religion and they
want to return to traditional religion," Boroujerdi
told Iran's
labour news agency ILNA on Saturday.
He said he had written to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi
Annan, European Union foreign policy chief Javier
Solana, Pope Benedict and other leaders asking them "to make efforts
to spread traditional religion", ILNA reported.
Iran
has an elected president and parliament, but final authority lies with the
supreme leader, currently Ayatollah Ali Khamenei,
according to "velayat-e faqih",
the system of rule by a religious legal scholar that was propounded by
Khomeini.
The supreme leader is chosen by an assembly of elected clerics.
Some traditional Shi'ite Muslim clerics hold that
religious leaders should not have a political role.
A senior police officer was quoted as saying Boroujerdi
had said he was a representative of the "hidden" 12th Imam, who Shi'ite Muslims revere, and this prompted some people
to make donations.
"This is misinterpreting religion and is sheer lies," the police
officer was quoted by Seday-e Edalat
as saying.
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