Mideast unrest will reach US, Europe: Iran president

Iran's president said Wednesday he is certain the wave of unrest in the Middle East will spread to Europe and North America, bringing an end to governments he accused of oppressing and humiliating people.

"The world is on the verge of big developments. Changes will be forthcoming and will engulf the whole world from Asia to Africa and from Europe to North America," Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told a news conference Wednesday.

The tone of the remarks seemed to draw on the belief by Shiite Muslims that a revered ninth century saint known as the Hidden Imam, will reappear before judgment day to end tyranny and promote justice in the world.

Ahmadinejad, whose own country resorted to violence to disperse an opposition rally earlier this month where two protesters were killed, also condemned Libya's use of force against demonstrators, calling the repression "unimaginable."

"It is unimaginable that someone is killing his citizens, bombarding his citizens," Ahmadinejad said on state television when asked about the situation in Libya.

"How can officers be ordered to use bullets from machine guns, tanks and guns against their own citizens?"

"This is unacceptable. Let the people speak, be free, decide to express their will. Do not resist the will of the people," the hardliner said as he told world leaders to "listen, hear and talk" to their people.

"Of course anyone who does not heed the demands of his own nation will have a clear fate," he added.

A popular uprising against Moammar Gaddafi’s regime in Libya erupted on February 15, after the rulers of neighboring Tunisia and Egypt were ousted in similar revolts.

The world is on the verge of big developments. Changes will be forthcoming and will engulf the whole world from Asia to Africa and from Europe to North America

Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad

Iran's hard-line leaders have sought to claim some credit for the uprisings in Arab nations, saying it is evidence that its 1979 Islamic Revolution, which ousted the U.S.-backed shah, is being replayed.

U.S. President Barack Obama called this ironic as Tehran had "acted in direct contrast to what happened in Egypt by gunning down and beating people who were trying to express themselves peacefully

The embattled opposition movement calling for social and political reforms in Iran has labeled that view hypocritical - and to prove it they tried to stage their own rallies in solidarity with the anti-government protests in Egypt last week. Clashes between security forces and demonstrators left at least two people dead and dozens injured.

The opposition has instead compared the revolts in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya and elsewhere to its own campaign for change.

Iranian police and paramilitary groups brutally put down protests on their own streets after Ahmadinejad's disputed re-election in 2009. The opposition claims the vote was rigged and hundreds of thousands of protesters poured into the streets, posing the most serious challenge to Iran's ruling system since the 1979 revolution.

The opposition says more than 80 demonstrators were killed in the crackdown. The government puts the number of confirmed deaths at 30.

Mir Hossein Mousavi, who claims to have been the real victor in the 2009 vote, said last month that Iran's protest movement was the starting point and that all popular protests in the Middle East aimed at ending the "oppression of the rulers."

Mousavi and Iran's other senior opposition leader, Mehdi Karroubi, have been under house arrest since earlier this month after they called their supporters to attend the Feb. 14 rally.

Security forces also raided Karroubi's house, locking him and his wife in separate rooms and confiscating books and documents, according to Karroubi's website.