In his first public response to days of protests, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has defended Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as the rightful winner of last week’s presidential election. Addressing thousands of people at Tehran University, the ayatollah appealed for calm and called for an end to the protests calling for a new election. Khamenei’s comments come after six days of massive street demonstrations organized by backers of presidential challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi. On Thursday, hundreds of thousands of Mousavi supporters rallied in Tehran to mourn those killed over the past week. Meanwhile, the Iranian human rights attorney and Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi has called for new elections under the watch of international monitors.

Shirin Ebadi: “I think that if new elections are organized without international observers, no matter what the outcome of these elections are, they could be protested or rejected by one or the other parties.”