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MULLAHS MULL AX FOR A’JAD, AYATOLLAH

Iran’s powerful mullahs are considering replacing the nation’s hard-line “supreme leader” or forcing the resignation of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in hopes of ending the 10 days of angry protests by pro-democracy demonstrators, it was reported yesterday.

A committee of religious leaders would take over for Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, according to the plan secretly under review by members of Iran’s Assembly of Experts, sources in the holy city of Qom told Al Arabiya TV.

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Another option to end the crisis is the resignation of Ahmadinejad, the news channel said.

The report came as riot police attacked hundreds of demonstrators with tear gas and fired bullets in the air to disperse a rally in central Tehran.

About 1,000 supporters of reform candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi gathered in Haft-e Tir square yesterday despite a vow by the Revolutionary Guards to “firmly confront” any “rioters.”

In other developments:

* A British think tank found anomalies in Iran’s election that cast grave doubt on Ahmadinejad’s alleged landslide. The study by Chatham House found that in Lorestan province, he received 677,829 votes, nearly 10 times what he got there in the last election, in 2005.

* Iran’s Guardian Council, which is supposed to serve as an election watchdog, said that in 50 cities, the number of votes exceeded the number of voters.

But the council said that wasn’t unusual because Iranians can vote outside their districts.

A spokesman for the Council also was quoted by Iran’s state-run English language Press TV as saying today the organization had found “no major fraud or breach in the election” and that the results would not be annulled.

* The office of Tehran’s prosecutor general blamed the death of at least 10 demonstrators Saturday on “unknown vandals” who had opened fire on them.