He made his statements in a televised appearance translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) just before the government affirmed results of recent elections that showed he defeated his opponent, Mir Hossein Mousavi, in a landslide.
The United States “remembers the days the world was ruled by emperors in the Middle Ages. Those days are over. Open your eyes. The world has changed…. I inform them for the umpteenth time that the nearly 40 million people who participated in the elections are not comfortable with their (the Americans') conduct. They will stand against them.”
Millions of Ahmadinejad‘s opponents took to the streets to protest the election results, which they said were rigged, but the Iranian military and police forces apparently have taken extreme measures to silence demonstrators. Following a media blackout and a brief victory by opponents who used Twitter to reveal police violence, reports have filtered out that hundreds of opponents have “disappeared,” either executed or imprisoned.
The Paris-based Federation of Human Rights has alleged that at least 2,000 people have been arrested. Associated Press reported Wednesday that the authorities banned one newspaper that denounced the government as “illegitimate.”