• Military

• WMD Menu                           

• Introduction
• Systems
• Facilities
• Agencies
• Operations
• Countries
• Hot Documents
• News
• Reports
• Policy
• Budget
• Congress
• Links

• Intelligence
• Homeland Security
• Space

Rohani, Rafsanjani Leading In Iran's Assembly of Experts Race

February 27, 2016
by RFE/RL

Preliminary results from Iran's vote for the Assembly of Experts show President Hassan Rohani, a self-proclaimed moderate, and his ally, the pragmatic former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani,are leading in Tehran.

The Iranian capital will send 16 candidates to the assembly.

Rafsanjani came first and Rohani second, according to the results issued by the Interior Ministry, which is conducting the elections.

Hard-line cleric Ahmad Jannati, who chairs the powerful Guardian Council, which disqualified scores of candidates from the race, was in 10th position.

Reformists had urged voters to vote for a coalition of pro-reform and relatively moderate candidates to prevent the reelection of Jannati and two other ultraconservative clerics to the assembly.

In a statement issued after the release of the initial results, Rohani said his government would cooperate with anyone elected in the vote.

'The competition is over. It's time to open a new chapter in Iran's economic development based on domestic abilities and international opportunities,' Rohani said in the statement issued by the government news agency IRNA.

For his part, Rafsanjani called for unity and cooperation among different factions.

'The competition is over and the phase of unity has arrived,' Rafsanjani was quoted as saying by the government news agency IRNA.

Interior Ministry officials said the counting of the votes in Tehran and other cities was still not final.

The February 26 vote for the Assembly of Experts, a body tasked with choosing Iran's supreme leader, was held simultaneously with a vote for the 290-seat parliament.

According to initial results from the parliamentary vote in Tehran, reformist backed candidates have won 29 seats out of the 30 seats reserved for the capital.

Mohammad Reza Aref, who served as vice-president to former reformist President Mohammad Khatami, was leading.

Hard-line candidate and former parliament speaker, Gholamali Haddad Adel, was seventh on the list, based on preliminary results issued by domestic media.

Votes are still being counted a day after the elections that pitted moderate allies of Rohani against hard-liners.

The elections are the first since Tehran agreed with major powers to curb its nuclear program.

Preliminary results issued by the semiofficial Fars and Mehr News agencies indicate moderates and independents linked to them were leading so far against hard-liners in several cities, while conservatives appeared to have the upper hand elsewhere.

The semi-official ILNA news agency said five women had been definitely elected to the parliament.

Earlier, Iran's Interior Ministry said 60 percent of eligible voters, about 35 million Iranians, had cast ballots in the twin elections.

At stake is control of the 290-seat parliament and the 88-member Assembly of Experts, the body that has the power to appoint and dismiss the supreme leader.

Like the parliament, the assembly is controlled by hard-liners.

During its next eight-year term it could name the successor to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who is 76 and has been in power since 1989.

Before the vote, reformists had complained that the Guardian Council, which supervises elections, refused to approve many of their most prominent candidates.

Only 40 percent of some 12,000 candidates were approved by the Guardian Council to run.

With reporting by RFE/RL's Radio Farda, Reuters, AP, and AFP, IRNA, Fars, ISNA, Shargh

Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/iran-elections-rohani- rafsanjani-parliament-assembly-experts/27577740.html

Copyright (c) 2016. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.