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Iran leader orders VP sacked in snub to Ahmadinejad
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Iran leader orders VP sacked in snub to Ahmadinejad
AFP - Saturday, July 25
TEHRAN (AFP) - - Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has ordered the dismissal of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's pick for first vice president in the first snub to the hardline incumbent since his controversial re-election last month, state television reported.
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Khamenei said that the appointment of close Ahmadinejad aide and in-law Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie, who made waves last year by saying Iran was a "friend of the Israeli people," was against the nation's interests and a blow to the president's own supporters.
"The appointment of Mr Rahim Mashaie as a deputy to the president is against your best interest and the governments interest, and it will cause division and frustration among your supporters," state TV quoted Khamenei as saying in a letter about the controversial appointment.
"It is necessary that the appointment be cancelled," he added, the channel said without giving a date for the correspondence.
Ahmadinejad's naming of Rahim Mashaie as his first deputy last week had sparked a chorus of opposition in Iran, even among the incumbent's own hardline supporters.
"We support the president ... but we never said that he has no flaws," Ahmad Khatami told worshippers in his sermon at the main weekly Muslim prayers which was broadcast live on state radio.
"We wish it had never gone this far so that the leader (Khamenei) comments on it. We conscientiously told you (before) to revise the appointment of first vice president," he added.
Iran's main political arbitration body, the Expediency Council, too joined the groundswell of opinion against Rahim Mashaie, calling on Ahmadinejad not to cause discord in his administration by persisting with his appointment.
"We ask Mr. Ahmadinejad ... to avoid using individuals about whom the elite, people and caring officials are sensitive and those who cause a rift in integrity of the government," the clerical body, led by former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, was quoted as saying by the state television website.
A group of students meanwhile held a demonstration in Tehran to make a similar call.
"Obey the leadership! This is the nation's slogan," chanted the students, the ISNA news agency reported, as they asked Ahmadinejad for the "removal of Mashaie."
Representatives of students at eight leading Tehran academic institutions warned the president that they were ready to take to the streets, like his reformist opponents in the weeks since his disputed re-election, to make their voices heard.
"Voting for you was not for you as an individual, it was a big no to cronyism," the Fars news agency quoted the student leaders as saying.
"If Mr Mashaie is not dismissed by Sunday, the representatives of the 24 million votes (Ahmadinejads tally in the June 12 election) will hold a sit-in," the Islamist-leaning Justice-Seeking Student Movement warned.
Iran is already seen as facing its biggest crisis since the 1979 Islamic revolution. Widespread protests after last month's election left at least 20 people dead.
The crisis has ricocheted all the way up the state structure, with Khamenei denouncing protesters who charge the vote was rigged, giving unconditional support to Ahmadinejad and declaring the poll legal.
But the powerful Rafsanjani sees the Islamic regime as having lost the trust of the people.
And the Association of Combatant Clergy led by another former president, reformist Mohammad Khatami, has urged that a referendum be held as a way to end the political crisis.
Rahim Mashaie, whose daughter is married to Ahmadinejad's son, is an outspoken figure who last year earned the wrath of many, including Khamenei, for saying Iran was a "friend of the Israeli people."
A defiant Ahmadinejad has so far shown no sign of reversing his decision to appoint his friend, despite growing calls to do so from hardline clerics, politicians and Islamist students, some of them his own supporters.
"I like Rahim Mashaie for 1,000 reasons. One of the biggest honours of my life and one of the biggest favours from God to me is knowing Rahim Mashaie," the president said on Wednesday.
"He is like a pure source of water," Ahmadinejad added. "He is like a transparent mirror. Unfortunately not many people know him."
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Enlarge Photo
This April 2009 picture shows Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (R) and his controversial first vice president Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie in Tehran. Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has ordered the dismissal of Ahmadinejad's pick for first vice president in the first snub to the hardline incumbent since his controversial re-election last month, state television reported.
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