"Unless the situation returns to the legal framework, Iran's Interior Minister Abdol Vahed Musavi-Lari will not be the organizer of the next parliamentary elections," an Iranian interior ministry spokesman said Sunday.
Since January 12, the parliament's reformist wing (over 100 people) have been conducting a sit-down protest action in the building of the country's legislative body. The reason for this was the decision by the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) (clerical suprastate body supervising the drawing up of election lists) not to register the reformists' candidatures. The IRGC turned down over 33 percent of the candidates from among those who submitted relative documents to the interior ministry. The main reasons of refusing to register them are non-observation on the part of potential candidates of Islamic norms, as well as the absence of loyalty to the theocratic regime in the country.
The present government of the country headed by President Mohammad Khatami supported the reformist deputies. Four vice-presidents, 27 vali (governors) of Iran's provinces as well as 12 reformist ministers threatened to resign.
Reformists won the previous elections, but for the four years President Khatami failed to achieve any serious changes in the country's political and economic life due to desperate resistance of the conservative-minded Shiite clergy headed by spiritual leader of the Islamic Republic, ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
