action regions of northwest and western Iran, and at that time Mr. Ahmadinejad was only involved at the civil construction work in the governing offices of Maku and the province". At the same time, the allegation has been echoed by a spokesman for the People's Mujahedin of Iran, an opposition group in exile. Reuters has mentioned that information [Pilz] received from an "extraordinarily credible" informer, an Iranian journalist living in France who Pilz calls only "witness D". [...] Witness D's information came from one of the alleged gunmen, who contacted Witness D in 2001 but later drowned, Pilz said. Supporters of Ahmadinejad have questioned the credibility of such information, have mentioned that Pilz is a Jew, and have called the media reporting these to be "Zionist media." Hamid Reza Asefi, the spokesman of the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has said that, "The charges are so self-evidently false they are not worthy of response. […] We advise the Europeans not to fall into the trap of the Zionist media and to separate their interests from America and the Zionist entity (referring to the state of Israel)." Alleged election fraud During the Iranian presidential election of 2005, some people, including Mehdi Karroubi, a reformist candidate who ranked third in the election, alleged that a network of mosques, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, and Basij militia forces, have been illegally used to generate and mobilize support for Ahmadinejad. Karroubi has explicitly alleged that Mojtaba Khamenei, a son of the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei, is involved. Ahmadinejad's supporters consider these to be false allegations. Furthermore, Khamenei has written to Karroubi stating that his allegations are "below his dignity" and "will result in a crisis"; in Iran, which he will not allow. As a reply, Karroubi resigned from all his political posts, including his positions as an adviser to the Supreme Leader and as a member of the Expediency Discernment Council, both of which he had been appointed to directly by Khamenei. Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, Ahmadinejad's rival in the second round, has also pointed to what he claims are "organized and unjust" interventions conducted by "guiding" the votes, and has supported Karroubi's complaint. Rafsanjani also alleged a "dirty tricks" campaign had "illegally" propelled Ahmadinejad into the presidency, an allegation which he strongly denies. In the same statement, Rafsanjani stated that he would only appeal the election results to "God", and recommended accepting the results