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Iran top official: Iran,US will renew ties one day

Saturday, January 17, 2004 -
©2003 IranMania.com
PARIS, Jan 16 (AFP)

One of Iran's most senior leaders, Hassan Rowhani, has said in a newspaper interview that Tehran and Washington will re-establish ties one day and the task is for Iran to choose the right moment.

"We have to be realistic. One day ties will have to be re-established," Rowhani, secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council, told French newspaper Le Figaro in an interview due to appear on Saturday.

"Our skill, I would say our artistry, will be to choose the right moment," he told Le Figaro during a visit to Paris.

The United States severed ties with Iran -- accused by US President George W. Bush of belonging to an "axis of evil" -- in 1980, after Islamic revolutionaries stormed its embassy in Tehran.

But the Islamic republic's recent decision to allow international inspection of its nuclear facilities and US aid to victims of the earthquake in Iran in December, which killed more than 41,000 people, has led to speculation there might be a slight thaw in their relations.

"The end of a presidential mandate could be the best moment to take such a decision," Rowhani continued, without making clear whether he was referring to Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, whose term of office expires in 2006, or Bush, who faces an election in November 2004.

"By intervening in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Americans have become our neighbours. They realised they really needed us and that the crises in the region can't be resolved without the Iranians," he added.

Rowhani said US aid to victims of the earthquake in Bam, southeastern Iran, "isn't enough to get rid of the bottleneck preventing the renewal of ties between us (but) has produced a glimmer of hope".

On the question of Iran's nuclear power programme -- which Washington alleges is a cover for the development of nuclear weapons -- Rowhani said: "We want to prove to the world that we are not seeking to procure nuclear weapons. We want to create confidence. In return we are asking the industrialised countries to provide us with nuclear technology for civilian uses."

But he added: "If Israel's arsenal of weapons of mass destruction is not destroyed at some point, the countries of the region will be encouraged to start an arms race."

Rowhani's visit to France, essentially to discuss Tehran's nuclear programme, coincided with furious protests back at home by reformists who have been barred in large numbers from standing in key elections next month.

Rowhani, who is believed to be close to the conservatives, said he believed a solution could be found now that supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei had intervened. On Wednesday, Khamenei ordered the 12 members of the Guardians Council -- an unelected watchdog which screens all laws and candidates for public office -- to be less stringent in weeding out candidates, particularly when it came to incumbent members of parliament.

"The outgoing members of parliament (most of them reformers) should be considered at the outset as having the right qualifications to stand," he said.

http://www.iranmania.com/News/ArticleView/Default.asp?NewsCode=21692&NewsKind=Current%20Affairs

"Iran political crisis stalling diplomatic ties"

Saturday, January 17, 2004 - ©2003 IranMania.com

CAIRO, Jan 16 (AFP) -- Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher admitted that a political crisis in Iran was stalling efforts to repair their diplomatic relations.

"I believe that what's happening on the Iranian scene has delayed a decision on resuming relations," Maher was quoted as saying by the state MENA news agency.

"Egypt had contacts and meetings were held (with Iranian officials), there was an understanding and things were going well," he said.

The countries appeared earlier this month to be on the verge of resuming ties after nearly 25 years. Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak has notably been invited to an economic summit in Iran at the end of February.

However, a major political crisis has erupted in Iran after a large numbers of reformists were blacklisted by a conservative oversight body from contesting next month's key parliamentary elections.

For six days, furious pro-reform MPs have been staging a sit-in at the Iranian parliament, while reformist President Mohammad Khatami threatened to lead a mass resignation of ministers, MPs and provincial governors.

Diplomatic ties between Cairo and Tehran were severed in 1979, the year that Egypt signed a peace treaty with Israel and gave asylum to shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi who was deposed by the Islamic revolution.

http://www.iranmania.com/News/ArticleView/Default.asp?NewsCode=21690&NewsKind=Current%20Affairs

List will be revised, says Iranian leader

TEHRAN, Jan 16: A senior Iranian conservative leader said on Friday that a controversial electoral blacklist barring large numbers of reformists from contesting next month's key parliamentary elections would be carefully revised.

In his Friday prayer sermon at Tehran University, Ayatollah Mohammad Emami-Kashani nonetheless stood by the right of the Guardians Council. "Everywhere around the world there are boundaries, and in our constitution there are restrictions on anyone who wants to be elected," he said.

Ayatollah is a former member of the Guardians Council and he currently sits on the Expediency Council - Iran's top political arbitration body which like the Guardians Council is also controlled by conservatives.

On Sunday, the Councils drew allegations that it was trying to rig the Feb 20 parliament elections after it disqualified almost half of the 8,000 people seeking to stand for the Majlis.

Most on the blacklist were reformists, among them some 83 incumbent MPs and some of the movement's most prominent figures. For six days, furious pro-reform MPs have been staging a sit-in parliament, while reformist President Mohammad Khatami threatened to lead a mass resignation of ministers, MPs and provincial governors.

On Wednesday Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei intervened, ordering the 12 members of the Guardians Council to review their blacklist and be less stringent, notably in the case of those currently in parliament.

"The Leader gave us some comments," Ayatollah Kashani told worshippers here. "This is an aid to incumbent deputies in the Majlis, and it is a correct aid. The Guardians Council is obliged to act according to the comments of the Supreme Leader."

The Guardians Council is due to make a final ruling on the disqualifications at the end of the month, and a definitive list of candidates is due to be released around Feb 12.

And according to the student news agency ISNA, another dispute between reformists and conservatives was also brewing over vote counting. The reformist-run interior ministry, which is charged with running elections, is trying to introduce computerised vote counting, but Tehran's governor, Ali Owsat Hashemi, said this had been rejected by the Guardians Council.

"The Guardians Council said although they have not seen the software for the computerised counting of the votes, they noted a few faults to the plan," he said, but added that "since the law gives us this option, we will not follow what they have asked us." But this could yet pose a serious problem, given that the Council also has the responsibility of validating the election result.-AFP

http://www.dawn.com/2004/01/17/top19.htm

Iran's Election Chief Threatens to Quit
Greg LaMotte
Cairo
17 Jan 2004, 12:54 UTC

The head of elections in Iran is threatening to quit unless candidates barred from next month's parliamentary elections are reinstated.

The deputy interior minister in charge of elections in Iran, Morteza Mobalegh, said Saturday he will resign unless he is assured that next month's parliamentary elections are free and legal.

The right-wing conservative Guardian Council created a political storm in Iran last Sunday by barring almost half of the more than 8,000 mostly reformist parliamentary candidates.

While saying the Interior Ministry doesn't have the authority to postpone the elections, Mr. Mobalegh said unless the February 20 vote is open to all candidates he will step down, forcing senior Iranian officials to appoint a new body to oversee the vote.

He said the Interior Ministry, which is under the direct authority of reform-minded President Mohammad Khatami, wants to restore the rights of the barred candidates.

The Guardian Council has the authority to screen all potential candidates, but it has been ordered to re-examine its decision by Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Among the candidates disqualified from the election were more than 80 current members of parliament, including the deputy speaker who is the younger brother of Iran's president.

In the meantime, a sit-in protest by dozens of reformist members of parliament continued Saturday with some of the strikers pledging to abstain from food and water during daylight hours.

Several members of parliament, vice presidents and provincial governors have threatened to resign unless the council reverses its ban.

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Ebadi Calls on Khatami to Make Good on Promise to Step Down ...

January 17, 2004
Radio Free Europe
RFE/RL

Tehran -- The head of Iran's election committee said today that next month's parliamentary poll will go ahead as planned but he hinted he would personally resign unless the disqualification of more than 3,000 pro-reform candidates is rescinded.

Election committee head Morteza Mobalagh, who is also the country's deputy interior minister, said he was striving to organize a fair and lawful poll. Hinting at the conservative Guardians Council's decision to ban nearly half of the 8,000 candidates from running, Mobalagh said that if a fair ballot was not permitted, he would be forced to resign.

Meantime, Iranian human rights activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi said today that Iranian President Mohammad Khatami should make good on an earlier promise and step down if hard-liners continue to stall his reforms.

But Ebadi, speaking in Bombay, said she was optimistic that, in time, popular will would triumph against the hard-liners.

http://www.rferl.org/features/features_article.aspx?id=13bdcf71-df23-4e85-a6b9-90e062f490f7&y=2004&m=01