Riot police in front of cloud of tear gas as supporters of Mir Hossein Mousavi clash with police, 13 Jun 2009Protesters clashed with police in the streets of Tehran Saturday,following the re-election of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Theviolence broke out Saturday shortly after Iran's interior minister, Sadeq Mahsouli, declared Mr. Ahmadinejad had won 62.6 percent of thevote.  The results give the Iranian president nearly twice the numberof votes as his closest rival, reformist candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi,who won 33.75 percent.

Thousands of Mr. Mousavi's supportersmarched in the streets of Tehran.  Some hurled rocks at police, whoused batons to beat back the demonstrators.

Followingpreliminary results, Mr. Mousavi, a former prime minister, allegedserious voting irregularities and vowed not to surrender to the"charade."

The results also have surprised many analysts who predicted a tight race between the incumbent president and Mr. Mousavi.

Iran'ssupreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, welcomed the results.  He saidthe high voter turnout - at more than 80 percent - and the 24 millionvotes cast for Mr. Ahmadinejad are a "real celebration."

Videos of the demonstrations have been pouring in over social media networks.

Videosreceived by employees of VOA's Persian News Network on their personalaccounts on the social networking site Facebook show thousands ofopposition supporters marching in the streets of Tehran.

Mr.Ahmadinejad's rivals have accused him of badly mismanaging the economyand tarnishing Iran's image, further isolating the country from theWest.  The Iranian president has denied the Holocaust and called forIsrael to be wiped off the map.

Some information for this report was provided by AP and Reuters.