Early results of Friday’s parliamentary elections in Iran show fundamentalists critical of president Mahmoud Ahmadi-Nejad in the lead. Analysts, however, are cautious in calling this a major defeat for Iran’s president, and stress his political weight in the next 290-seat parliament remains unclear. In more than 30 constituencies, including the capital Tehran, some candidates failed to attract more than 25 per cent of the vote, the minimum needed to win a race. Second-round elections will be held for each of these seats.  Read More »

Conservative rivals of Iran’s hardline president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, were leading the race for seats in parliament, according to initial results yesterday from Friday’s elections that the reformist movement shunned as a sham. The trend, if confirmed by final official results, will leave the president facing a more hostile house during his remaining 18 months in office. Analysts had predicted a strong showing by Mr Ahmadinejad’s hardline opponents. They are loyal to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has been locked in a power struggle with the unruly president he once championed. Mr Ahmadinejad had hoped a robust performance by his candidates would give him a political lifeline and a say in who succeeds him in the presidential election next year when his second term ends. Read More »

Voting in Iran’s parliamentary election has been extended by two hours because of a high turnout, state media report. It is the first poll since mass opposition protests were sparked by Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s disputed presidential election victory in 2009. The vote is widely viewed as a contest between his supporters and those of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The opposition Green Movement is not taking part. Its leaders have been under house arrest since February 2011. Read More »

Iranians voted Friday in parliamentary elections, the country’s first major ballot since the reelection of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in 2009 led to months of anti-government protests. No disturbances are expected to follow the vote this time around. The key question Friday was how many of the more than 48 million eligible voters would go to the polls to elect 290 new legislators. Late in the day, state TV reported a preliminary turnout of 64.5 percent, and voting was extended by five hours. While it was difficult to verify turnout, with no independent monitors on the ground, several polling stations in Tehran were receiving a constant stream of voters. Results are expected Sunday for larger cities and Monday for rural areas. Read More »

Like many members of Iran’s paramilitary volunteer force, Mohammadreza Baqeri was a supporter of Iran’s conservative president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Nearly three years after Ahmadinejad’s disputed re-election, the 27-year-old blogger says he will not vote for Ahminadejad’s camp in parliamentary elections on Friday. ”I want new faces. I want a vocal parliament that can have an impact in the country,” said Baqeri, a member of the Basij paramilitary force. “I want a parliament with young and ambitious lawmakers.” Read More »

Parliamentary elections this Friday in Iran are far from being free and fair. Well, at least that’s a step beyond those paragons of democracy – the election-free Persian Gulf monarchies. In Iran, this time the problem is there’s no opposition; it’s cons (conservatives) against neo-cons. The Green Movement leaders, Mir Hossein Mousavi and his wife, Dr Zahra Rahnavard, as well as Mehdi Karroubi, have been under house arrest for over a year now; echoing Myanmar’s Aung Suu Kyi, but more vocally, they have repeatedly stressed they will not “repent”. Virtually all key opposition leaders, including university activists, almost 1,000 people, are in jail; not because they’re criminals but because they’re very canny organizers of popular anger. Read More »

Iran’s March 2 parliamentary elections will mark the first time the country has gone to the polls since the disputed 2009 presidential elections in which President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won his second term. There are 290 parliament seats up for grabs and the country’s Guardian Council announced last week that 3,444 candidates had been approved to run for them. Al Jazeera asked Reza Marashi, research director of the National Iranian American Council, and Mehrzad Boroujerdi, professor of political science at Syracuse University, to explain Iran’s complex political process. Read More »

Iran’s hard-liners have been so effective at crushing the opposition, they now are left brawling among themselves. That’s the messy political scramble in this week’s parliamentary elections — the first major voting since the disputed re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June 2009 and the mass protests, chaos and crackdowns that followed. The ballots cast Friday amount to a popularity contest among various conservative factions, which were once united against reformists and are now sniping at each other and picking sides in the power struggle between Ahmadinejad and his opponents within the ruling Islamic theocracy. The outcome, too, could resonate well beyond the 290-seat parliament. Read More »

There’s a Persian saying used to describe an under-the-radar political effort: “Driving at night with the lights off.” Allies of embattled President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad may be doing just that as they campaign in Iran’s hinterlands in hopes of scoring a comeback in next month’s parliamentary elections. The voting March 2 should — momentarily, at least — shift attention from Iran’s international standoffs over its nuclear program back to the country’s internal power plays: The ruling system striking back against perceived runaway ambitions by Ahmadinejad and his inner circle. The battles were Iran’s top political spectator sport just six months ago before being eclipsed by the latest faceoff with the West, including tougher sanctions and widening speculation of a possible Israeli military strike on nuclear facilities. Read More »

More than two years after massive anti-government protests over a disputed election exposed a rift between Iran’s leaders and its urban middle class, their diverging worlds are again set to collide in an upcoming vote for a new parliament. This time, disgruntled opponents of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are unlikely to demonstrate, political analysts said, but they may not vote either, denying Iranian leaders the large turnout they seek to legitimize their rule. Iran said it has made advances in nuclear technology, citing new uranium enrichment centrifuges and domestically made reactor fuel. After crushing the 2009 protests, which erupted when Ahmadinejad claimed a landslide reelection victory, the government has disregarded demands for greater freedom and portrayed the grass-roots opposition as a small band of misguided troublemakers.  Read More »

Campaigning has begun for Iran’s March 2 parliamentary election, the first nationwide vote since the disputed 2009 re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that sparked eight months of unrest and a crushing state response.  3,444 candidates are standing for election to the 290-seat parliament. Officials and state media have called for a big turnout to counter “enemies’ threats” against the regime.  A woman holds election leaflets in central Tehran on Feb. 24, 2012. With a no-show by leading pro-reform groups, loyalists of Iran’s most powerful figure, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and backers of Ahmadinejad, who is not a cleric, will compete for a majority. Read More »