Iranian protesters clash with police officers during an anti-government demonstration in Tehran. (AP)

Beirut, Dec. 28: Police officers in Iran opened fire into crowds of protesters yesterday, killing at least 10 people, witnesses and Opposition websites said, in a day of chaotic street battles that threatened to deepen the country’s civil unrest.

Today, Iran’s Supreme National Security Council said eight people were killed in anti-government protests across Iran. The health ministry said over 60 people had been injured in Tehran.

The protests, during Muharram, were the bloodiest and among the largest since the uprisings that followed the disputed presidential election last June, witnesses said. Hundreds of people were reported wounded in cities across the country, and the Tehran police said they had made 300 arrests.

News agencies, citing an Opposition website, said that Ibrahim Yazdi, a former foreign minister and pro-democracy leader, and Emad Baghi, a prominent human rights activist, were arrested early today. Yazdi was an adviser to the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who led the Iranian revolution in 1979.

Mehdi Karroubi, an Opposition leader who was among the losing candidates in the June election, was quoted today as saying on a website that the government’s actions in suppressing the protests yesterday were even more brutal than the regime that was overthrown in the revolution, news agencies reported.

One of the dead yesterday was Ali Moussavi, a 43-year-old nephew of the Opposition leader Mir Hussein Moussavi.

The decision by the authorities to use deadly force on the Ashura holiday infuriated many Iranians, and some said the violence appeared to galvanise more traditional religious people who have not been part of the protests so far.

NEW YORK TIMES NEWS SERVICE