Iran Hard-Liners to Reconsider on Bans

Iran’s hard-line Guardian Council on Sunday defended its disqualification of candidates for next month’s parliamentary elections but said it was reviewing the cases.

At a rare news conference, a spokesman for the unelected 12-member body of conservative clerics and Islamic jurists moved to play down the crisis sparked by the Guardian Council’s decision to veto more than a third of the 8,200 candidates hoping to stand in next month’s vote. Reformists believe the move was an attempt to skew the elections in favor of conservatives.

“The Guardian Council won’t back down at all,” spokesman Ebrahim Azizi said. “Lawmakers whose speech or behavior suggest that they have had no loyalty to Islam or the constitution will remain disqualified.”

Nevertheless, he said the council would follow the request of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who last week moved to defuse the political standoff by urging the council to review the cases of those disqualified.

The disqualifications have prompted resignation threats by government officials, a weeklong sit-in at parliament by dozens of lawmakers and a warning by the reformist-run Interior Ministry that it may refuse to hold the election.

Most of those barred are reformists, including about 80 members of parliament. Reformists secured a comfortable majority in the last parliamentary elections in 2000.