Most of Iran’s Cabinet Resigns

Most of Iran’s six vice presidents and 24 government ministers have submitted their resignations to protest the barring of thousands of would-be candidates from upcoming elections, a government spokesman said Wednesday.

Vice President Mohammed Ali Abtahi warned that unless the candidates were reinstated, the country would “face many problems, both at home and abroad.”

“Such disqualifications of prospective candidates is against democracy ... and turn elections into sham elections,” Abtahi said after a Cabinet meeting.

Government spokesman Abdullah Ramezanzadeh did not identify the vice presidents and ministers who handed letters of resignation to President Mohammad Khatami.

Khatami, a leading reformist, would have to approve the resignations for them to take effect.

The reformists accuse conservatives of trying to skew the Feb. 20 parliamentary elections in their favor. Hard-liners control the Guardian Council, the powerful appointed body that disqualified more than a third of the 8,200 would-be candidates.

State media, controlled by hard-liners, say those disqualified failed to meet the legal criteria for candidacy. They include 80 liberal members of parliament, who have been holding sit-ins and dawn-to-dusk fasts to protest the decision.

The council on Tuesday reinstated 200 of the disqualified candidates and said it would reconsider the rest.

But reformists said the reinstatements were not enough. Interior Minister Abdul Vahed Musavi-Lari presented a report during the Cabinet session Wednesday saying the hard-liners want to secure at least 180 seats in the 290-seat parliament.

“A number of Cabinet ministers and a number of vice presidents have resigned,” Abtahi said. “Naturally, they are waiting to see how things go. The Cabinet ministers are very serious in their resignation.”

Khatami had threatened to resign if the disqualifications were not reversed. On Wednesday, however, he said it was his duty to continue in his job.