Cairo  - Amid continuing tension in Tehran over Friday's elections, Iran's Ministry of Information on Sunday ordered the satellite television news channel al-Arabiya to close its Tehran bureau for a week, the channel reported.

Diya al-Nasseri, the network's Tehran correspondent, announced the ministry's decision on air on Sunday afternoon. He said authorities declined to give any justification for the order, but added that it had come after hours of negotiations over an al-Arabiya report the ministry wanted to see changed.

Alongside the Qatari network al-Jazeera, the Dubai-based network is one of the two leading satellite news channels in the Middle East.

The bureau's closure came as police confirmed the arrest of 50 demonstrators and 10 "organisers" following clashes between riot police and supporters of opposition leader Mir-Hossein Moussavi on Saturday night.

In remarks carried by Iran's official IRNA news agency, deputy police chief Ahmed Radan said more arrests would follow.

Photographs and videos from Tehran showed police beating protesters on Saturday, but a news embargo in the local media made details difficult to come by.

The demonstrators were protesting what they said were fraudulent results from Friday's presidential elections, which showed a landslide victory for President Mahmoud Ahmedinejad. (dpa)