Posted on 12/01/2002 2:38:15 PM PST by knighthawk
TEHRAN: Iran's powerful former president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani has called on members of the hardline Basij militia to stay on alert to foil enemy plots, the official news agency IRNA said Sunday.
"The current social circumstances mean that we need a strong Basij to counter threats against the system," Rafsanjani was quoted as saying, telling the volunteer army to "always be ready to foil enemy plots."
His comments, which come amid heightened political tensions between Iran's religious hardliners and moderates, were made during discussions between Rafsanjani and university professors and Basij members.
Iran's universities were the scene of student protests last month following the hardline judiciary's sentencing to death for blasphemy of pro-reform academic Hashem Aghajari.
Rafsanjani said the Basij presence at universities was "an invaluable asset (which) can contribute to resolving the country's problems."
He also denounced "venomous propaganda" with which the "enemies try to push university students against the system", and singled out "certain local and foreign media who have taken advantage of Iran's open political atmosphere to instigate the masses, and in particular the youth, against officials and the system, but to no avail."
Rafsanjani was Iran's president from 1989 to 1997, and now heads the Expediency Council, Iran's key arbitration body. He is also a close advisor to supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
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