سخنگوي وزارت امورخارجه آمريكا تلاش شوراي نگهبان براي از پيش تعيين كردن نتيجه انتخابات مجلس شوراي اسلامي را مورد انتقاد قرار داد

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Summary of Iran Stories in Today's BroadcastsBehnam NateghiMonday, January 12, 2004-01-13 US Denounces Disqualification of Election Candidacy Applicants • The US opposes limiting voters' choices, US State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said on Monday in Washington, urging the Islamic government to reverse the Guardian Council's decision to disqualify 80 MPs along with thousands of other applicants for candidacy in the February 20 Majles elections. “We, as a matter of course, support free and fair elections in Iran, and we are therefore opposed to interference in the electoral process,” he said. “We call upon the Iranian government to disavow attempts by the Guardian Council to shape the outcome of the February 20th parliamentary elections. And we would note that a government's handling of the electoral process is one of the fundamental measurements of its credibility, he added. Decisions about who should govern a country are best made by the citizens of that country through an open and transparent process, and the options of a people should not be limited by other institutions so as to prejudge the outcome of an election, he said. Foreign Minister's Condition for US Talks: Recognition of the Regime • Foreign minister Kamal Kharrazi said the Islamic government was ready to start negotiations with the US based on “mutual respect.” The US should discontinue efforts to subvert the regime, he implied. (Bahman Bastani) Conservatives Bar 80 MPs and Thousands of Others from Elections • As 80 reformist MPs continued their sit-in strike at the Majles to protest the Guardians Councils' decision to ban their re-election, the Supreme Leader told the interior minister and 27 provincial governors that he would not interfere to reverse the decision, urging the two sides to uphold the law. An interior ministry official said the governors' threat to resign within a week is a serious. • President Khatami said he will do what he can to get the Guardians' decision reversed. He said the government should provide the grounds for a variety of political opinions and positions to be expressed through the elections. This is a hard days for our generation, the Islamic Revolution generation, vice president for legal and legislative affairs Mohammad-Ali Abtahi writes in his weblog. Today, democracy which was the foundation of our revolutionary values has collapsed, he added, predicting a low voter turnout, even if some of the disqualification decisions were to be reversed later. Speaking at the Majles, Abtahi said he was not optimistic about the outcome of the government's attempts to reverse the Guardians' decisions. (Ardavan Niknam) • The Guardians Council is the main arm for the forces that are afraid of submitting to the people's judgment, columnist Emadeddin Baqi writes in the Tehran reformist daily Shargh. Instead of back room negotiations, this may be a time for President Khatami and Majles speaker Karrubi to turn to people for support, urges reformist daily Aftab-e Yazd. (Ali Sajjadi) • The reformists said they would challenge the Guardians Council decision to disqualify all liberal applicants, including members of the nationalist opposition party the Freedom Movement of Iran and the nationalist-religious coalition members. As most reformist applicants, the Guardians Council rejected the liberals for their lack of empirical commitment to the absolute clerical rule. (Baktash Khamsehpour) • The MPs who have roused a rabble at the Majles are only concerned with their own jobs, editor of several banned reformist newspapers Bijan Safsari tells Radio Farda. Reversing the Guardians Council's ban on these 80 MPs would not solve anything, he adds. They would probably be re-elected to pass bills for the Guardians Council to reject, he adds. The people are frustrated with the reformists, he adds. (Keyvan Hosseini) • Undoubtedly, voter turnout in these elections would be very low, the Paris daily Le Monde writes. After taking over the Majles, the conservatives will take the initiative to restore Iran's relations with the US, Liberation, writes, quoting exiled veteran journalist Safa Haeri. (Mir-Ali Hosseini) • Several of the reformist MPs, who have been approved by the Guardians Council to stand for re-election, said they will not participate in the elections if the bans on their disqualified colleagues were not lifted. (Bahman Bastani) • “Free and fair elections and election processes are therefore a necessary condition for any democracy,” EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said today in Tehran during a joint press conference with foreign minister Kamal Kharrazi. However, he added that the Guardians Council decision to bar reformists from standing for elections was an “internal matter.” (Mahmonir Rahimi) • Majles MPs spent the night at the Majles in their effort to have the Guardians Council's decision to bar them from standing for re-election reversed. However, since their action appears self-serving, it has not been met with widespread support from the public, and reformists outside the regime, such as the students and the nationalists. (Siavash Ardalan) • To protest against the Guardians Council's vetting powers, the association of Islamic student councils (Dafter-e Tahkim-e Vahdat) will not take part in these elections and will not support any of the candidates, the association's secretary Abdollah Momeni tells Radio Farda. Such tactics as barring pro-reform applicants and reformist Majles MPs from the election help to solidify the foundations of dictatorship and tyranny, he adds. The regime's use of legal levers to clamp down on civil society, ethnic and trade organizations would not reinforce democracy, he adds. The mass disqualification of election candidates were neither unexpected nor shocking, since the totalitarian faction aims to take over the Majles and the executive branch, the two organs that have the capacity for democratization. We have repeatedly announced that without structural reforms in the system – meaning ending the Guardians Council veto power on candidacy applicants and Majles legislation -- voting in the elections would not advance democracy. (Mahmonir Rahimi) • “The situation is like a football match in which the referee sends off one team and invites the other side to score,” , London's Daily Telegraph quotes vice president Abtabhi. Superficially, Iran is one of the few functioning democracies in the Middle East. However, under the revolutionary system instituted by Ayatollah Khomeini, and known as velâyat-e faqih , both parliament and government are subordinate to parallel bodies controlled by the clergy, which exercises power in rather the same indirect way that the Communist Party did in the Soviet Union, the Telegraph writes in an editorial. (Shahran Tabari, London) • The Guardians Council is by law limited to four sources of information on election candidacy applicants: the judiciary, intelligence ministry, the police and the records bureau, but they it has based the disqualification of MPs on their speeches at the Majles about the legal boundaries of the Supreme Leader's powers, or the petitions they signed addressed to the Supreme Leader. The Guardians Council argued that these petitions proved the MPs' their lack of commitment to the Supreme Leader's absolute rule, Tehran-based lawyer Mohammad-Hossein Aghasi tells Radio Farda. (Ardavan Niknam) • Unlike the widespread demonstrations that followed the banning of Salam daily in 1998, there was no reaction from the public to the mass disqualification of election candidacy applicants, which shows the growing public apathy, the Financial Times' reporter in Tehran Garret Smith tells Radio Farda. (Shahran Tabari, London) • In a statement issued at the Majles, the striking MPs said their sit-in will continue until they receive guarantees of free and fair elections. (Ali Sajjadi) • The people harbor no illusions about the regime, Los Angeles-based political activist Mohsen Nezhad tells Radio Farda. (Amir Armin) • US-based activists Ramin Ahmadi and Bijan Namvar comment about the mass disqualification of election candidates in interviews with Radio Farda. • Considering the reform resistant nature of the Islamic regime's undemocratic institutions, the Democratic Front boycotted these elections months ago, board member and spokesman Kianoush Sanjari tells Radio Farda. The reformists did not appeal to the people, when they enjoyed some credibility, and now that they are being disqualified by the Guardians Council, again they appealed to the Supreme Leader, instead of the people, he adds. (Farin Asemi) • In the Islamic regime's election system, people can only vote for those who have passed the filters of the Guardians Council and the interior ministry, member of the central council of Daftar-e Tahkim Vahdat, the association of Islamic student councils Mehdi Aminizadeh tells Radio Farda. We do not believe that these elections Economic Impact of Majles Crisis • The political crisis that began with the Guardians' rejection of thousands of election candidacy applicants, including 80 MPs, is having a profound impact on the economy, because it coincides with the crucial discussions of the government's budget for the upcoming fiscal year in various Majles committees, and President Khatami is about to submit the fourth five-year economic development plan to the Majles. The current crisis, combined with tensions in Iran's relations with its neighbors and world powers, has increased risk to foreign investment. (Fereydoun Khavand, Paris) State Bureaucracy Pays One in Three Wage Earners • The number of government employees grew from 550,000 in 1979 to 2.3 million in 2003, according to the management and planning organization's official Masoud Shokrollahi. One in three wage earners in the country work for the government, he added. (Fereydoun Khavand) Women's Party to Struggle for Equality • Without gaining political power, women cannot achieve equality, founder of Iran's first independent women's party Fariba Davoodi-Mohajer tells Radio Farda. The NGO's and social organizations are non-political, whereas we are a political party seeking political stature through elections, Ms. Davoodi-Mohajer, whose party has just received approval from the interior ministry, adds. Our founding members are women who have advanced in their lives and have gained what they have without the help of any man, she says, adding that the party has not yet begun recruiting members. (Mahmonir Rahimi) Secular Republicans' Union Ends Convention in Berlin • More than 700 participants who had come to Berlin from the US, Europe and Iran, wrapped up the three-day convention of the newly formed Union of Secular Republicans (Etehad Jumhurikhahan-e Iran) after electing 50, including 14 women, to its coordinating council. Since the union is made up of members representing a wide spectrum of political opinions, a variety of points of views were expressed during the convention, Shahla Entesari, a founding member of the union, tells Radio Farda. However, speeches and discussions were focused on the democratic movement supported by the majority of people inside Iran, adds Entesari, who was the top vote getter in the union's internal elections. (Shireen Famili, Berlin) • The union tries to mobilize international media in support of the protests going on in Iran against the mass disqualification of election candidacy applicants, activist Bijan Hekmat, who attended the Berlin convention, tells Radio Farda. We want the people of the world to know that there is resistance in Iran to the totalitarian rule, he adds. He suggests widespread strikes in schools and workplaces in support of the disqualified MPs and others. (Fereydoun Zarnegar) • Long years spent in Europe and the US have familiarized the union members with the democratic process, union board member Mehran Barati tells Radio Farda, explaining the calm and orderly atmosphere of the convention, unusual for gatherings of exiled political activists. The wide ranging dialogue using Internet pal-talk sites that preceded the convention, the conventioneers' better understanding of democratic process and their attention to the appropriate time and place for raising issues and differences, contributed to the calm and civilized atmosphere of the convention, board member Hossein Alavi tells Radio Farda. (Shireen Famili, Berlin) Iran Ranks near Bottom in Economic Freedom, Says Heritage Foundation Report • Iran ranked 148th among 155 countries surveyed in the US-based Heritage Foundation's report on economic freedom. The foundation cites heavy government subsidies for food and energy as the reason for persistent low wages, but said the privatization of state enterprises was a move in the right direction. (Arash Qavidel) . دولت آمريكا روز دوشنبه از شوراي نگهبان قانون اساسي جمهوري اسلامي به دليل رد صلاحيت صدهانفر از متقاضيان اصلاح طلب نامزدي در انتخابات مجلس شوراي اسلامي انتقاد كرد. يك سخنگوي وزارت امورخارجه در واشنگتن به خبرنگاران گفت آمريكا از انتخابات آزاد و عادلانه در ايران حمايت مي كند و بنابراين با مداخله در روند راي گيري مخالفت است. وي از دولت ايران خواست كوشش هاي شوراي نگهبان را براي از پيش تعيين كردن نتيجه انتخابات روز 20 فوريه رد كند.