Conservative Iranian parliament member Ali Motahhari was physically confronted and prevented from finishing his speech during a session of parliament over statements he made in support of ending the house arrests of the 2009 Green Movement leaders.

During his Jan. 11 speech, Motahhari, who has a history of making controversial comments and has even recently said that he disagrees with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s position on the issue, has in recent months championed the cause of ending the detention of Mehdi Karroubi, Mir Hossein Mousavi and his wife, Zahra Rahnavard, who have been under house arrest for nearly four years for challenging the results of the 2009 presidential elections.

A brief video of the altercation was later published, but according to the complete audio file, when Motahhari said on the parliament floor that the continuation of the house arrests without charge or judicial proceedings is against the law, other members of parliament began to shout him down, chanting “Death to the sedition.” “The sedition” is the term critics use to refer to the Green Movement.

Deputy Speaker Hossein Abutarabi Fard, who was running the parliamentary session, interrupted Motahhari and told him, “You’re aware of the reality of the country, and what happened to these individuals is Islamic mercy.” Other officials have threatened that if the Green Movement leaders were ever tried in court, they would receive the death sentence.