Iran Election Results

As our colleagues in Iran, Robert Worth and Nazila Fathi, continue to update their news article with the latest developments on the aftermath of Friday’s disputed Iranian presidential election, The Lede is tracking the debate unfolding on the Web on Saturday as to what the election results mean. We will bring you updates throughout the day and encourage Iranian readers to share their thoughts and experiences with us.

Writing on The Guardian’s Web site Abbas Barzegar, a graduate student in religious studies at Emory University, says that the election result only proves that residents of the wealthier parts of Tehran and the Western media engaged in “wishful thinking” in the days leading up to the vote. Mr. Barzegar writes: I have been in Iran for exactly one week covering the 2009 Iranian election carnival. Since I arrived, few here doubted that the incumbent firebrand President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad would win.

Of course, the rather real possibility of voter fraud exists and one must wait in the coming weeks to see how these allegations unfold. But one should recall that in three decades of presidential elections, the accusations of rigging have rarely been levied against the vote count. Elections here are typically controlled by banning candidates from the start or closing opposition newspapers in advance.