Iran's Rafsanjani blasts clerics, says report

The remarks by Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani come days after a constitutional watchdog disqualified him from running in the June 14 presidential election. The wording was particularly strong for Rafsanjani, considered a centrist who generally defers to the supremacy of the ruling clerics. He had previously lashed out at authorities after a crackdown on protests following the disputed 2009 elections.

Because of his stance then, Rafsanjani's 2013 candidacy had revitalized reformist hopes. Rafsanjani has not made any direct public statements since his Tuesday disqualification. The quote was not carried on his official website, and the report could not independently verified.

"I think it is not possible to run the country worse than this," he was quoted as saying. He singled out the Guardian Council, the watchdog dominated by clerical hardliners that disqualified him, for condemnation.

"Wisdom suggests letting him_Rafsanjani_run," he said, referring to himself. "You should have let people come to the ballots hopefully. They do not know what they are doing." Rafsanjani said the Council's decision helps foreign enemies of Iran. Iranian leaders are believed to seek a high turnout in elections to show that the Islamic Republic is politically strong.

The ex-president's campaign manager has said that he will not protest the decision. But in the remarks published Wednesday, Rafsanjani said he hoped the Council would reconsider. "I am still hopeful. There is a hope that they take a serious decision and give another chance to us and the people," said Rafsanjani.

Rafsanjani was a main leader of the 1979 Islamic revolution that brought the clerics to power. He was the closest confident of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, spiritual leader of the revolution. His rejection deals a demoralizing blow to pro-reform groups and boosts the chances of a candidate loyal to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei winning the election.

Hassan Khomeini, grandson of the late founder of the Islamic Republic who has joined the reform movement, called Rafsanjani's disqualification "unbelievable." In a letter published in several pro-reform newspapers Thursday, he said Rafsanjani had been a symbol of "hope" for the movement "and will remain so."

Earlier on Wednesday, Zahra Mostafavi, Khomeini's respected daughter, urged Khamenei to reverse the council's decision and reinstate Rafsanjani's candidacy. On the streets, many people expressed surprise over the disqualification.

"I am not sure what it means. Does it mean a founder of the system has no chance to be president in the system, anymore?" said high school teacher Rahim Piri. Another Tehran resident, auto mechanic Mahmoud Rahimi, said: "I wish Rafsanjani could run. He could bring a better economy for ordinary people."

Since Rafsanjani's disqualification, foreign currency has become more expensive and gold prices have risen five percent. Iran is under international and Western sanctions over its disputed nuclear program. The West suspects Tehran seeks to build a weapon, a charge Iran denies.

Iran condemns Boston blast, criticizes US policy

The Islamic Republic of Iran, which follows the logic of Islam, is opposed to any bombings and killings of innocent people no matter if it is in Boston, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq or Syria and condemns it.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told Iranian military leaders he was addressing in Tehran.

Khamenei criticized the U.S. for killing people with drones in Pakistan and Afghanistan and backing forces that kill others in Iraq and Syria. "What kind of logic is this that if children and women are killed by Americans in Afghanistan and Pakistan and by U.S.-backed terrorists in Iraq and Syria is not a problem, but if a bombing happens in the U.S. or another Western country, the whole world should pay the cost?" he asked in his comments, which were posted on his website.

Iran is the chief regional ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad and is considered close to Iraq's Shiite Muslim-dominated government. Khamenei charged that such double standards would lead to the demise of Western civilization.

"Western civilization is on the verge of collapse and downfall because of contradictions, lack of logic, coercions and lack of care for human principles," he said.

Iran releases Ahmadinejad ally linked to deaths

    

Former Tehran prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi, gestures, during a news conference, in Tehran, Iran. Mortazavi, a close ally of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has been arrested, two years after a parliamentary probe found him responsible for deaths by torture of at least three jailed anti-government protesters, state media reported.

Iranian authorities released a close ally of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from custody on Wednesday, a day after the president denounced the arrest and pledged to pursue the case, the official IRNA news agency reported.

The report quoted an unnamed official as saying Saeed Mortazavi, a senior official who once served as Tehran's prosecutor general, has been released. Mortazavi has been at the center of an escalating confrontation between Ahmadinejad and his conservative rivals in parliament ahead of the June presidential election.

His release is seen as a decision to stave off an escalation among the country's senior officials. There was no immediate indication of any charges against Mortazavi, who now heads the state Social Security Fund.

Mortazavi's lawyer Mohammad Aslani confirmed his client's release but did not elaborate, the semi-official ISNA news agency said. A parliament probe two years ago found Mortazavi responsible for deaths by torture of at least three anti-government protesters who were jailed during mass protests in the wake of Ahmadinejad's disputed re-election in 2009.

Mortazavi was taken to prison at midnight Monday, and speculations soared that this was related to the prison deaths. The detention came a day after Ahmadinejad showed parliament a barely audible video showing Fazel Larijani, brother of parliament speaker Ali Larijani, meeting with Mortazavi and allegedly seeking a bribe from the former prosecutor. The bribe allegedly sought was in exchange for getting Ali Larijani to support a business deal involving a company linked to Mortazavi. Ali Larijani denied any links to the video.

Ahmadinejad on Tuesday denounced Mortazavi's arrest, accusing the judiciary of being run as a "family institution" - a reference to the Larijanis, whose brother, Ayatollah Sadeq Larijani, is Iran's judiciary chief - and saying he would pursue the case after his return from an Islamic summit in Cairo.

Iran says ready to lend Egypt much-needed funds

Iran's president says his country is ready to provide a "big credit line" to help revive the distressed economy of Egypt, which saw its foreign currency reserves - already at critically low levels - fall nearly 10 percent last month.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose comments were published in the state-run Al-Ahram newspaper on Wednesday, is on a three-day visit to Egypt, centered around an Islamic summit. It is the first trip by an Iranian leader in more than three decades. The two countries severed relations after the 1979 Islamic revolution, but after fall of Egypt's close U.S. ally Hosni Mubarak and last summer's election of an Islamist president, the two countries have grown closer.

Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, center, attends a press conference with Egyptian Sunni clerics at Al-Azhar headquarters in Cairo, Egypt, Tuesday, Feb. 5, 2013. Egypt's most prominent Muslim cleric, the sheik of al-Azhar, has warned Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad against interfering in Arab Gulf countries or trying to spread Shiite influence. Ahmadinejad, on a landmark visit to Egypt on Tuesday, received an uneasy reception from Ahmed el-Tayeb at al-Azhar, the Sunni Muslim world's foremost Islamic institution.