Here's a piece by Tehran correspondent for the ABC (Australian version)
'Sheer intimidation, and it worked'
By Middle East correspondent Ben Knight
ABC Middle East correspondent Ben Knight files a story from Tehran
Middle East correspondent Ben Knight has left Iran after the country tightened its controls on foreign journalists. This is his story of how the election aftermath unfolded.
A few hours ago, the ABC's Middle East cameraman Brant Cumming and I left Iran after a nine-day assignment.
We're now sitting in Doha airport, and I'm feeling a mix of relief and regret.
Iran has been a frightening place to be over the past few days.
After that incredible final week leading up to the election, when people took joyfully to the streets and expressed themselves as never before in Iran, it was as though someone suddenly turned on the house lights at the cinema after the movie had ended and harsh reality snapped back.
It began just hours after the polls closed. We had been told that the main opposition challenger, Mir Hossein Mousavi, was about to hold a press conference.
We would not be allowed in. His minders were concerned about being seen to cosy up to Western journalists, but we could film from outside.
So we went. And we filmed the crowd of supporters outside the campaign office, watching them as the reality dawned on them that the election was gone.
I've done this many times in Australian elections. But never before have the riot police turned up and without warning, charged the party faithful with tear gas, sending them stampeding into each other in panic.
It was utterly unprovoked. All they had been doing was standing on the road. I didn't know it then, but it was the first strike of the government's failed attempt to crush the opposition from the moment the election was over.
A dangerous challenge
I spoke with Iranians who were there and others who had heard about it. They all agreed that this was it - it was over.
No one would dare challenge this result. They all knew too well what would happen if they did.
But that's exactly what we saw the next day.
As we were driving back to the hotel from an interview, we stumbled across the beginnings of the first demonstration, held in front of the Ministry of Information.
We grabbed the camera and the tripod and did what we would normally do - ran towards it to start filming.
But we only got about 100 metres before a motor scooter carrying two men pulled up in front of us.
The man at the back introduced himself as a member of the Iranian secret police, asked for our ID and told us firmly that the area was forbidden.
We decided not to waste time arguing or risk arrest but to head back to the hotel, to shoot the protest from one of the upper floors.
But as we walked back, some of the protesters tried to drag us back to film what was happening. Then another civilian put his hand over the lens.
As we walked into the foyer of the hotel, another secret police officer was waiting for us, demanding to see what we had shot.
Once we'd dealt with that, we went up to the 11th floor to watch. We saw riot police on motorbikes swarming like ants into the crowd.
One officer would control the bike while the other sat on the back, swinging truncheons at whoever they passed. Other police on foot weighed into protesters as well, chasing them down the street.
From there, of course, the violence only got worse - culminating in the death of eight civilians in Tehran on Monday night.
But by then, the protesters had already shifted tactics. Not only were the protests getting bigger, they were also largely peaceful.
The police had changed tactics too, allowing the protests to go ahead without the usual response of violent dispersal.
But at the same time, we were starting to feel more and more uncomfortable.
In the space of 24 hours, we heard three separate references from senior Iranians, from Mahmoud Ahamdinejad down, blaming 'foreign media' for inciting the clashes.
It was bullshit, but it was dangerous bullshit.
Reporters under fire
Unlike other conflicts we've seen (and we've both covered some major conflicts) we felt we were now a target; both of Mr Ahmadinejad's supporters, and the police.
It was confirmed when we found out other reporters had been attacked while out covering the story.
George McLeod from the Toronto Globe and Mail newspaper came back to the hotel with red welts on his throat after being detained by police.
He'd also been stabbed in the stomach with plastic bottles. I tried hard to picture what that meant, but I couldn't.
I figured it wasn't a pleasant experience.
Tim Marshall from Sky TV was hit and knocked into a deep gutter, gashing his leg. He was limping around in hotel slippers when I saw him last.
Then we were told by other reporters that there had been armed police roaming the hotel foyer.
I have no doubt that the authorities were trying to frighten us out of the country. And it was working.
Every time we walked out of the front door of the hotel, carrying our camera and tripod, and standing out like dog's you-know-whats, we felt less and less comfortable.
I felt safer in Beirut in May last year when Hezbollah and the Sunni militia were shooting it out in the streets.
As long as I didn't go chasing the bullets, I felt like no-one was actually aiming at us. We were not part of the conflict.
This was different.
The bureau's cameraman, Brant, has been in far more dangerous places than I; Baghdad, South Ossetia, Afghanistan, and more. But even he was spooked by the sheer sense of menace in the city towards us, which didn't help my mood at all.
We felt like we were dodging secret police, riot police, religious police, regular police, or the Basij militia wherever we went.
Yet everywhere we went, the camera would attract a crowd of a dozen curious locals in the space of 30 seconds.
Forbidden media
We perfected the art of shooting a piece to camera in one take, or squeezing off some interviews with people in minutes, before jumping back in the taxi and moving off again.
Then, on the day after the eight civilians were killed, our Iranian translator took a phone call with a message from the Ministry of Islamic Guidance, which oversees the foreign media in Iran.
All press cards had been cancelled; journalists were banned from covering any unauthorised gatherings; and we were to work only in our offices or hotels.
The message was clear enough. But then this bit was added on the end: 'The police are no longer in charge of the city; it is now under the authority of the Revolutionary Guards.'
It was obviously sheer intimidation. And to be brutally honest, it worked.
I've always felt anger that the warlords of places like Sudan make the place so utterly dangerous that few journalists will go there, giving them freedom to do as they please.
I knew that this was what the Iranian authorities wanted. But with only one day left on the visa, and confined to our hotel room, Brant and I decided it was simply time to go.
As we drove out to the airport at one o'clock in the morning, the streets were quiet. But then we passed another of those motorcycle goon squads, out looking for trouble.
This time, the guys on the back were holding two truncheons - one in each hand.
