Via the NYT: Ahmadinejad Urges Prosecution of Political Rivals
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad lashed out at his chief political rivals on Friday, calling on judiciary officials to “decisively” and “mercilessly” prosecute them for challenging the legitimacy of his electoral victory and tarnishing the image of the state.
[...]
“We must deal with those who led these events,” Mr. Ahmadinejad said. “Those who organized, incited and pursued the plans of the enemies must be dealt with decisively.”
This is striking and may signal a shift in the situation in Iran, as up and until now it seemed as if the Ahmadinejad/Khamanei faction was not willing or able to directly confront the Moussavi/Rafsanjani faction. Although if I am reading press reports accurately (and if said reports themselves are, in fact, accurate), no one was specifically named in the Ahmadenijad’s statements (although their target is pretty clear).
The following from the article would seem to sum up the situation:
“What has been remarkable about the last two months is that the tent of insiders has narrowed to such a small faction,” said Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran expert with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington. “The outsiders are the vast majority of the country.”
The question remains as to whether this ever-narrowing inner circle is also also growing in strength or in desperation and what it is both willing and and able to do vis-à-vis the outsiders.
September 6th, 2024 at 2:54 pm
[...] he was not dissuaded by Ahmadenijad’s recent statements. addthis_url = ‘http%3A%2F%2Fpoliblogger.com%2F%3Fp%3D16764′; addthis_title = [...]