17 people killed in Tehran clashes

Indiana Republican Senator Richard Lugar, one of the Senate's most respected voices on foreign affairs, criticised Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for refusing to give in to demonstrators' demands for a re-run of the disputed June 12 election that returned President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to office.

Mr Lugar told CNN that has laid the ground for a "potentially very brutal outcome at the end of the day".

Iran has imposed strict controls on foreign media covering the unrest, saying correspondents cannot go out into the streets to report.

Reporters Without Borders said 20 journalists were arrested over the past week. The BBC said that its Tehran-based correspondent, Jon Leyne, had been asked to leave the country. The BBC said its office remained open.

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki held a news conference where he rebuked Britain, France and Germany for raising questions about reports of voting irregularities in hardline Mr Ahmadinejad's re-election - a proclaimed victory which has touched off Iran's most serious internal conflict since the revolution.

Mr Mottaki accused France of taking "treacherous and unjust approaches". But he saved his most pointed criticism for Britain, raising a litany of historical grievances and accusing the country of flying intelligence agents into Iran before the election to interfere with the vote. The election, he insisted, was a "very transparent competition".

That drew an indignant response from Foreign Secretary David Miliband, who "categorically" denied Britain was meddling. "This can only damage Iran's standing in the eyes of the world," Mr Miliband said.

An eerie calm settled over the streets of Tehran as state media reported at least 10 more deaths in post-election unrest and said authorities arrested the daughter and four other relatives of ex-President Hashemi Rafsanjani, one of Iran's most powerful men.

The reports brought the official death toll for a week of boisterous confrontations to at least 17. State television inside Iran said 10 were killed and 100 injured in clashes yesterday between demonstrators and black-clad police wielding truncheons, tear gas and water cannons.