Iran Hard-Liners Defend Disqualification

Associated Press ^ | Jan 18, 2004 | ALI AKBAR DAREINI

[optimistically_conservative]

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's hard-line Guardian Council on Sunday defended its disqualification of prospective candidates for next month's parliamentary elections, further deepening a political crisis.

The Guardian Council, an unelected body controlled by hard-liners, has disqualified more than a third of the 8,200 people who applied to run in the Feb. 20 elections.

Reformists believe the move was an attempt to skew the elections in favor of conservatives.

"The Guardian Council won't back down at all," Guardian Council spokesman Ebrahim Azizi told a press conference. "Lawmakers whose speech or behavior suggest that they have had no loyalty to Islam or the constitution will remain disqualified."

The comments dashed hopes of a breakthrough after Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ordered the Guardian Council on Wednesday to reconsider the disqualifications and laid down criteria that appeared to be easier to meet.

On Saturday, reformist Deputy Interior Minister Morteza Moballegh, who is Iran's chief of elections, warned he would not allow next month's legislative elections to proceed unless hard-liners backed down.

About 80 reformist lawmakers have been holding sit-in demonstrations for a week. They took their protest a step further Saturday by starting dawn-to-dusk fasts.

President Mohammad Khatami (news - web sites) condemned the disqualifications and warned he might resign if they were not reversed. And the European Union (news - web sites) and the United States said the elections would lose credibility unless the Guardian Council's decision was overturned.

Iran's 27 provincial governors have vowed to resign by Monday unless the disqualifications are reversed.

[San Jacinto]

Too bad the Iranians can't or won't take back their country. It looks like they fall into two caregories-- the radical extremeists who rule and the wimps who let them.

[CzarNicky]

IO said it before and will again. There is nothing, about this Guardian Council thing, that cannot be cleared up with 12 good ropes fashioned into nooses.

[CzarNicky]

I said it before and will again. There is nothing, about this Guardian Council thing, that cannot be cleared up with 12 good ropes fashioned into nooses.

[nuconvert]

"Lawmakers whose speech or behavior suggest that they have had no loyalty to Islam or the constitution will remain disqualified."

Not surprised........to be continued.
They still have a few more weeks to play games.........

[nuconvert]

And you DID say it again

[CzarNicky]

LOL I guess I did. If the moderator wants to remove one go ahead.

[Taylor42]

A buddy of mine who is Iranian and keeps me up on what's going on at home, has told me that the mullahs have imported a large number of foreign "bodyguards" to help keep the peace. These people do not care who they hit, hurt or beat. All they want is to be paid.

At some point the people will take back their country.

[nuconvert]

Yep. They hired Arabs, Egyptians.....they don't feel they can trust the police any more.

"At some point the people will take back their country"

Yes, they will. I just hope it's soon.

[Eala]

ping

[jveritas]

It may be sooner than we all think that the terrorist Islamic regime in Iran will be destroyed. I hope that President Bush administration is working very hard to make this occurs very soon. The destruction of the Islamic regime in Iran will be a great victory for the Iranian people but it is also a great victory for us.