one of many Iran election Flickr slideshows

[everything]

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fhashemi/s ... 0748/show/

[mrtoes]

I've been following this one pretty closely as I was in Iran a couple of years back, and have fond memories of the people there. Iranians are amazingly willing to offer their views about their government, and the young especially are deeply frustrated with their lack of freedom. It is incredible to see them out in such numbers, when faced with arrest, beatings and worse. They are also experts at bypassing the crude measures their governments puts in place to attempt to limit the information available to them, hence the activity on sites like twitter/flickr/youtube.

Unfortunately I don't think we'll see another 1979, as the basij and army remain loyal. The government hasn't even used a fraction of the resources they could use to crush the opposition. I hope it doesn't come to that. Fortunately their leaders are far more conscious of the eyes of the world, unlike say Burma.

[Dmitri]

Why does it say "Police" in English, on the shields and uniforms?

[Darth Rock&Roll]

Probably gear they got from regular sales places for police gear?
I'm pretty sure a lot of Iranians speak English as well as Farsi, I would think taht they would also know arabic to some extent of course.