UH Head calls for free and fair "elections" in Iran
AP - World News
Jan 21, 2004
BADEN-BADEN - UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Wednesday called for free and fair elections in Iran as reformists and hard-liners struggled for power ahead of voting set for next month.
“We follow very closely the developments in Iran,” Annan said after talks with German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer.
“I hope they will be able to find a way to resolve their differences, so that one can have free and fair elections with participation of all the parties,” he told reporters.
Annan was in Baden-Baden, an elegant southern German spa town, to receive the German Media Prize - awarded annually by a group of editors to an international personality.
Iran’s Guardian Council, an unelected body controlled by clerical hard-liners, triggered the latest crisis when it disqualified more than a third of the 8,200 people who applied as candidates in the Feb. 20 elections. In protest, reformist lawmakers have been holding sit-ins and fasts.
Earlier on Wednesday, Vice President Mohammad Ali Abtahi said some Iranian Cabinet ministers and vice presidents have submitted their resignations to protest the disqualifications.
http://www.daneshjoo.org/generalnews/article/publish/article_4686.shtml DoctorZin Note: Remember, even if the hardliners permit all the reformist candidates on the ballot Iran will not have a "free and fair" election. The regime will still prohibit candidates that do not support the existing regime to appear on the ballot.
It is a sad commentary on the inneptitude of the UN, when you have to add your own rebuttal to Annan's statement, to refocus the sobering reality.