The Latest from Iran (12 September): The Nuclear Front

2105 GMT: The Battle Within. Yasaman Baji offers an overview of the political tensions as conservative and principlist factions vie for position:

Intense competition among different wings of forces claiming absolute loyalty to the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei, has created a muddled political environment, making it difficult to speculate about the direction of the country after the term of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad expires in 2013.

The March elections to the Majlis could be a bellwether. In the past, parliamentary elections held right before the president's second term is over have been significant in hinting the future direction the country under the next president.

Today, increasingly acrimonious competition among devoted supporters of the Islamic Republic, known as Principlists, has the country wondering about whether there are plans to continue the country's hard-line direction without Ahmadinejad or whether instead the more- moderate conservative elements within the Principlist camp will take the reins and steer the country in a more centrist direction.

1745 GMT: Strike Watch. Ali Askari, the head of the Tax Revenue Organization, has remained defiant despite the strike fabric merchants at the Tehran Bazaar since last month. Askari announced that the merchants have until 22 September to register for payment of the controversial Value-Added Tax.

Askari said Parliament’s Presiding Board and Economic Commission had requested a month’s extension, but this was declined because the deadline for registration had already been extended three times.

VAT is currently set at four percent, but fabric merchants say poor economic conditions have made it difficult for them to charge and pay the tax. They are calling for a five-year delay in implementation.

1740 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. HRANA reports that 14 Gonabadi Dervishes, detained after clashes with security forces in southeast Iran, have been released on bail from Adelabad Prison in Shiraz.

The dervishes, a sect of Sufi Islam, have faced suppression of their activities by the Iranian authorities.

1610 GMT: Shutting Down the Lawyers. Amnesty International has called for the immediate release of one of Iran’s most prominent human rights lawyers, Abdolfattah Soltani, who was arrested on Saturday.

Soltani, a co-founder of the Center for Human Rights Defenders was arrested at a Prosecutor’s Office in Tehran. Four security officials then escorted him to his home, where they confiscated computers and documents before taking him away.

“Abdolfattah Soltani is one of the bravest human rights defenders in Iran. He has represented defendants in some of the most controversial human rights cases for over a decade, refusing to bow to pressure from the Iranian authorities,” said Malcolm Smart, Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Director. “Now he is again paying the price for that commitment”.

Soltani has been arrested on a number of occasions in the past. In 2005, he spent seven months behind bars, but was eventually acquitted of all charges. He also spent two months in detention after the 2009 Presidential election.

Soltani joins other detained defence attorneys, including Mohammad Seifzadeh, Nasrin Sotoudeh, Houton Kian, and Mostafa Daneshjoo. Others, including CHRD co-founder Mohammad Ali Dadkhah, are under threat of summons to serve lengthy sentences, while still others such as Shirin Ebadi and Mohammad Mostafaei are in exile.

1440 GMT: Warning of the Day. In a video interview, Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami tells politicians, "Don't sacrifice the system for your goals."

But which politicians is he warning?

1410 GMT: Elections Watch (House Arrest Edition). Fereshteh Ghazi provides an English summary of Mir Hossein Mousavi's statement, made during a rare outing during his seven months of strict house arrest, "in view of the continuation of current conditions [in Iran], there is no hope for participating in the upcoming Majlis [Parliamentary] elections" in March.

Mousavi made the declaration as he and his wife, Zahra Rahnavard, who is also detained, visited their three daughters, the first time they had seen all three together since their house arrest was imposed in February.

Last week, opposition figure Mehdi Karroubi, also under strict house arrest, told his son, “There is no place for reformists in the next parliamentary elections, where only principlists will be competing.”

1405 GMT: I Guess This Rules Out Baywatch Repeats. The Deputy Director of Broadcasting at Iran's State broadcaster IRIB has sent a memorandum to executives forbidding the presentation of "love triangles" and "half-naked men" in the channel's programmes.

0920 GMT: Reformist Watch. The reformist newspaper Etemaad reports that leading conservative Ali Akbar Nategh-Nouri --- former Speaker of Parliament, former Minister of Interior, advisor to the Supreme Leader --- has met with former President Mohammad Khatami to discuss the current political situation.

Khatami, after calling for "reconciliation" this spring, has been distancing himself from participation in next March's Parliamentary elections. Nategh Nouri has been seeking to bring reformists back into the process, in the face of Khatami's conditions of free operation of political parties, free and fair elections, adherence to the Constitution, and freedom for political prisoners.

0620 GMT: Clerical Intervention. Ayatollah Mousavi Tabrizi has declared that the house arrests of Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, held since mid-February, are illegal and against Sharia.

0610 GMT: Corruption Watch. Minister of Intelligence Heydar Moslehi has said that steps have been taken to prevent the further embezzlement of funds from Iran's Bank Saderat.

Carrying the news, State news agency IRNA tries to soften the blow --- it does not mention the $2.6 billion amount of the alleged embezzlement and fraud and that several Iranian banks have been affected.

0600 GMT: We begin this morning with the news that Saeed Jalili, the Secretary of the National Security Council and Iran's lead nuclear negotiator, has written to the European Union's foreign affairs representative, Catherine Ashton, expressing Tehran's readiness for fresh discussions.

"A few days ago, Mr. Jalili's letter was sent to Ms. Catherine Ashton...saying Iran is prepared for talks...to reach bilateral agreements," Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi said in a news conference.

A spokesman for Ashton said, "We have received the letter, and we will study it carefully."

Since November 2009, when Iran and the 5+1 Powers (US, UK, Germany, France, China, and Russia) came closest to a deal on Tehran's uranium enrichment, there has only been a brief meeting last February in Geneva.

In May, the EU rejected a similar letter from Iran requesting nuclear talks, saying it contained nothing new that would justify a further round of meetings.

There have been other foreign affairs to take attention away from internal matters. Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Gilani is in Tehran on an official visit, and the Deputy Head of Parliament's National Security Commission, Esmail Kowsari, has used the weekend protest in Egypt in front of the Israeli Embassy to praise the capture of the "Zionist spy nest".