Reformists in Iran set for new clash with conservatives
By Guy Dinmore in Tehran
Financial Times
August 21, 2000
Iran's reformist-dominated parliament on Sunday set the stage for another
confrontation with powerful conservative clerics by voting to press ahead
with a law that would bar all security forces from entering university
premises without approval from the minister of education.
The proposed law, still in its outline stage, was prompted by an attack
a year ago by police and Islamic vigilantes on a Tehran University dormitory
where students were protesting against the closure of a reformist newspaper.
Scores of students were injured in the raid and several people were
reported killed in days of street protests that followed in Tehran and
Tabriz.
Tehran's police chief was charged with responsibility for the raid but
was acquitted last month after a trial denounced by students as a sham.
Reformist supporters of President Mohammad Khatami hold a large majority
in parliament following their decisive election victory six months ago.
But the law would almost certainly be blocked by the Council of Guardians
that vets legislation for its adherence to Islam and the constitution of
the Islamic republic.
The Council last week triggered howls of protest from reformists by
asserting that it had the power to dismiss parliamentarians.
Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, hardline head of the Council, said during Friday
prayers in Tehran that the mandate of MPs was limited.
Mehdi Karubi, speaker of parliament and a close ally of Mr Khatami,
on Sunday retorted that the powers of the Guardians were also limited.
The collision of interests between the new parliament and the clerical
establishment was dramatically illustrated two weeks ago.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran's supreme leader, directly ordered the
assembly to drop its plans to amend a repressive press law passed as one
of its last acts by the previous, conservative-controlled parliament.
His rare and uncompromising intervention, delivered in a letter, has
shocked many Iranians who harbour growing doubts that their popular president
will be able to deliver on his promises of social and economic change.
Mr Khamenei said changing the media law would serve the interests of
the "enemies" of the Islamic system.
The outspoken press had been the most tangible achievement of Mr Khatami's
three years in power, but the conservative-controlled judiciary has closed
down more than 20 reformist publications since April. Nine journalists
and editors are in jail.
One of the latest to be arrested was Ibrahim Nabavi, a popular satirist
who lampooned the clergy.
Hadi Khamenei, a cleric and brother of the supreme leader, is editor
of Hayat-e-No (New Life), one of the few remaining voices on the reformist
left.
In a speech at the weekend he said a state that observed religious principles
but not justice would not survive.
"In our country, under the excuse of supporting a single person,
we trample on thousands of people just to save that person, but such acts
lead to the opposite," he said.
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