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Obama urges Iran to 'stop all violent and unjust actions'

Sunday, June 21, 2009, WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama on Saturday called on Iran's government to "stop all violent and unjust actions against its own people," the White House said amid swelling post-election tensions in the Islamic republic. "We call on the Iranian government to stop all violent and unjust actions against its own people," Obama said in a statement as he ramped up the tone of official Washington reaction to the violent unrest playing out in Tehran and other Iranian cities. "The Iranian government must understand that the world is watching. We mourn each and every innocent life that is lost," he added."The universal rights to assembly and free speech must be respected, and the United States stands with all who seek to exercise those rights." Obama also stressed that the Iran's leadership "must respect the dignity of its own people and govern through consent, not coercion." An administration official said that Obama "repeatedly met" in the White House Saturday with senior advisors to discuss the situation in Iran, where thousands clashed with police as they defied an ultimatum from supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for an end to protests over last week's disputed presidential election. Obama quoted Martin Luther King Jr in his statement, repeating the slain US civil rights leader's phrase that "the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.""I believe that. The international community believes that. And right now, we are bearing witness to the Iranian peoples' belief in that truth, and we will continue to bear witness," Obama said.

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