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The powerful Guardian Council touched off scattered protests in Tehran Monday night when it formally certified the re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to a second four-year term, saying there was no validity to charges of voting fraud.

As the certification was announced, security and militia forces flooded the streets, and protesters who were already out marching down Tehran’s central avenue, Vali Asr, broke into furious chants. The marchers were quickly dispersed, but other Iranians, urged by opposition Web sites, went to their rooftops to yell “God is great!” in a show of defiance.

Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, the Guardian Council’s secretary, sent a letter to the interior minister saying the panel had approved the election after a partial recount, according to state television. “The Guardian Council, by reviewing the issues in many meetings and not considering the complaints and protest as valid, verifies the 10th presidential election,”

Originally the constitution allowed for the selection of either a single individual to the post of Supreme Leader or a council of appropriate individuals to run the post. The selection process of the Assembly of Experts would be done by continuously reviewing his/their performance (Articles 108 and 111). Later revisions to the constitution removed the potential for a council of individuals, making it so only a single individual could be elected by the Assembly as Supreme Leader.

Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani was elected the chairman of the Assembly of Experts during its morning session on 04 September 2007 [Shahrivar 13, 1386]. Rafsanjani’s election is significant because prior to the meeting of the Assembly of Experts, the conservative supporters of the president tried to advance their own candidates Mohammad Taghi, Mesbah Yazdi, and Ahmad Jannati for the head of the assembly with deliberate and sometimes hidden attacks on Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. Despite these attempts and the positioning of Ahmad Jannati, chairman of the guardian council, as a rival candidate to Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the conservatives failed to achieve their goal.

Iranian leaders say they have obtained confessions from top reformist officials that they plotted to bring down the government with a “velvet” revolution. Such confessions, almost always extracted under duress, are part of an effort to recast the civil unrest set off by Iran’s disputed presidential election as a conspiracy orchestrated by foreign nations, human rights groups say.

Reports on Iranian Web sites associated with prominent conservatives said that leading reformers have confessed to taking velvet revolution “training courses” outside the country. Alef, a Web site of a conservative member of Parliament, referred to a video of Mohammad Ali Abtahi, who served as vice president in the reform government of former President Mohammed Khatami, as showing that he tearfully “welcomed being defrocked and has confessed to provoking people, causing tension and creating media chaos.”

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s representative to the Revolutionary Guards, Mojtaba Zolnour, said in a speech Thursday that almost everyone now detained had confessed — raising the prospect that more confessions will be made public.

Iran said on Friday that some local British embassy staff arrested for allegedly playing a role in post-election violence will be put on trial as the European Union said it was seeking ways to object to Iran's crackdown on opposition.

The head of Iran's powerful Guardians Council, Ahmad Jannati, said embassy staff have "made confessions" and said "in these incidents, their embassy had a presence, some people were arrested. Naturally they will be put on trial."

the EU said it was studying steps to protest at Iran's crackdown on dissent, including a coordinated summoning of Tehran's ambassadors in Europe and visa bans on Iranian officials, diplomats said.

Mir Hossein Mousavi, the leading opposition candidate, had called for a fresh election and he was reported to be reluctant to go along with a recount conducted by the guardian council, a deeply conservative group of Islamic jurists.The council referred to the results declared by Khamenei as ­"provisional", an important symbolic concession. "It is possible that there may be some changes in the tally after the recount," said a spokesman, Abbasali Kadkhodai.

"Based on the law, the demand of those candidates for the cancellation of the vote – this cannot be considered," he told state television.

observers said it was unlikely an establishment body such as the guardian council would rigorously assess how the election was conducted. Half the council is appointed by Khamenei and its ­chairman, Ahmad Jannati, is a hardliner and Khamenei ally. Another council spokesman said the vote had "the least amount of violations reported" of any Iranian election.