Agents acting on orders from an Islamic revolution court raided the house of Mr. Mohammad Basteh-Negar, a nationalist-religious activist at five in the afternoon and arrested all the men and women who had gathered there to review the situation and evaluate Mr. Khatami’s address to the nation.

Eyewitnesses present at the scene said the agents produced warrant delivered by the Islamic revolution court charging the participants of "fomenting plots against the security of the State and discussing ways of toppling the regime".

Observers said the decision of arresting so many people, among them known and popular personalities such as Mr. Habibollah Peyman, the leader of the Militant Muslim Movement and his wife, several independent journalists like Mr. Taqi Rahmani, Mrs. Fatemeh Govara’i and Ahmad Zeydabadi, who was just released from prison on bail, his father and brother and prominent scholars and clergymen, islamist reformers etc. could not be operated without the prior knowledge and authorisation from the leader.

Mrs. Mahdyeh Mohammad, the wife of Mr. Zeydabadi told the Persian service of the BBC that the arrest was surprising as such meetings were not new, as most of the arrested men and women, all political analysts and experts, used to organise such gathering, discussing and debating current political and social issues.

Same analysts also noted that Mr. Khameneh’i had arranged same kind of humiliation and crisis for the President before his departure to official visits he paid to Italy, France or Germany, aimed at reminding host authorities that he is the boss, the visitor being nothing more than a puppet.

In recent speeches, Mr. Khatami himself has admitted that under the present Constitution, the President has no practical power.

Families of the detainees immediately went to the branch of the Islamic revolution court that had issued the warrant but were turned back, being told that nobody knows were their relatives have been taken to.

Analysts said without having a specific formation, the nationalist-religious current incorporates political formations such as the MMM, the Iran Freedom Movement of the Iran Farda Society of Mr. Ezzatollah Sahabi, the veteran journalist and politician arrested some months ago because of his participation in the controversial Berlin Conference.

"Because of their independence and the fact that they call for modernising Islam and bringing the faith with modernity in the one hand and criticising the shortcomings of the reformists even though that they support the reform process, the nationalist-religious are hated by the conservatives and feared by the reformists" the analyst added.

He said though the nationalist-religious "honours" the Constitution of the Islamic Republic, but at the same time they reject its component of "velayat faqih", or the absolute rule of the leader, in this case Ayatollah Khameneh’i.

Many Khatami supporters were dismayed at the fact that he went to Moscow despite the humiliation and insult he had been subject to by the conservatives.