Tens of thousands of mourners attended the funeral of Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, the religious leader of Iran's opposition movement, and many turned it into an anti-government protest, marred by sporadic violence, according to reports from the Shiite Muslim holy city of Qom.
Groups of vigilantes clashed with several of the mourners, and both groups threw stones and other objects at each other, witnesses and opposition Web sites reported. The reports could not be independently verified. Authorities denied foreign correspondents permission to travel to Qom, which is about 90 miles south of Tehran.
About 100 members of the pro-government Basij militia attacked the house of the late ayatollah and tore up a banner displaying his portrait, his son Saeed Montazeri said in a telephone interview from Qom.
"They attacked, they lost all control," Montazeri said, calling from the house. "They started to throw stones at people and tore down the mourning banner of my father."
Montazeri said that after the attack he saw several wounded people. "The huge crowds in the funeral kept them from taking over," he said...
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