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IRAN: Obama says election turnout shows change is possible

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The sizable turnout in Iran’s elections could mean that change is possible, President Obama said today, adding that the United States will diplomatically engage with whoever wins.

Iranians packed polling stations to choose between President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or his main rival, Mir-Hossein Mousavi, who served as prime minister in the 1980s and has become the surprise face of reform.

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“We are excited to see what appears to be a robust debate taking place in Iran,” Obama said in a televised session from the White House. The president was in the Rose Garden to discuss children and tobacco and had turned to leave the microphones, but returned to answer a question on Iran, shouted out by a reporter.

“Obviously, after the speech that I made in Cairo, we tried to send a clear message that we think there is the possibility of change,” Obama said of his recent visit to Egypt, where he called for a new page in relations with the Muslim world.

“Ultimately, the election is for the Iranians to decide, but just as has been true in Lebanon, what can be true in Iran as well is that you’re seeing people looking at new possibilities,” the president said. “Whoever ends up winning the election in Iran, the fact that there’s been a robust debate hopefully will help advance our ability to engage them in new ways.”

After three decades of increasingly cool diplomatic relations, Obama has offered to talk with Iranian leaders about issues including the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program, which the West fears will include weapons.

More Iran presidential election coverage.

-- Michael Muskal

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