Police used sticks and tear gas to force back thousands of demonstrators gathering in the capital on Saturday, a day after Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said there would be “bloodshed” if street protests continued over the disputed presidential election.

State television reported that two people had been killed and eight wounded when a suicide bomber blew himself up at the Tehran shrine of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in the southern part of the city. The report of the blast could not be confirmed.

Opposition protesters swore to continue pressing their claims of a stolen election against Iran’s embattled clerical leadership. Security forces stood back and urged protesters to go home and avoid bloodshed, while the feared pro-Government militia, the Basij, beat protesters with clubs and electric prods.

In some places, protesters pushed back, rushing the militia in teams of hundreds, pitching at least three basijis from their motorcycles and setting their vehicles on fire.

While there appeared to be tens of thousands of protesters, the number was far smaller than in the mass demonstrations earlier this week. And while the police fired shots, there were no initial reports of any dead. A BBC journalist at Revolution Square, however, reported seeing one person shot by security forces.

In the morning, black-clad security forces lined the streets of two squares in central Tehran as the city braced itself for a violent crackdown, witnesses said. State television reported that Mir Hussein Moussavi had called off the protest, but some of his supporters, posting on social networking sites, urged demonstrators to gather. The website of Mehdi Karroubi said the protests would go on and added that Karroubi, “the brave cleric, will join the rally” along with Moussavi and the former reformist President Mohammad Khatami.

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