Ahmadinejad rival takes charge of Friday Prayers

A significant development in the ongoing crisis in Iran came to the fore with the appointment of Ayatollah Kazem Seddighi, a rival of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad who took temporary charge as a Friday prayer leader in Tehran University.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was the significant other speaker in attendance, coming just days after Ayatollah Ali Khamenei denied the charges against former government officials, journalists and academics of collaborating with foreign governments to overthrow the regime.

In growing signs of the division between the president and the supreme leader, Ahmadinejad for the first time called for opposition leaders to be prosecuted over the post-election turmoil, bringing his views in line with hard-line politicians, clerics and commanders of the powerful Revolutionary Guard whose demands include the arrest of opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi and his top allies.