Iran Feature: Life Goes On in Tehran (Tehran Bureau)

The major shift in power over the last few years has been the rise of Ahamdinejad's faction and its alliance with [Supreme Leader] Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Sepah (the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps) to oust the supporters of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani and sideline the old clerical conservatives. Having weakened their major competitors --- reformists are almost completely shut out now --= and harboring potentially serious ideological and practical policy differences, many people think that there is a good chance the Khamenei and Ahmadinejad factions will face off in the coming year or two.

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Iran Analysis: Former President Khatami's Manoeuvre on Elections (Sahimi)

"Our demands in the past as well as the present are clear, and have been emphasized even in the aftermath of the recent [2009 presidential] election. [Favourable] conditions for broad participation of people [in the elections] and guaranteeing their rights must be provided. In addition, the elections must be held in such a way that there will be minimum hindrance of free voting by the people and maximum conditions for materializing their demands and ideals.

"The minimum conditions for the Reformists' participation in the elections are the release of all the political prisoners, freedom for all political parties and groups and removal of all limitations [on their activity], commitment of all, particularly the officials, to the Constitution and the execution of all of its articles, especially its true spirit and holding free and fair elections."

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Iran Mystery: So How Big Was This Week's Support for Ahmadinejad?

"I went to Ahmadinejad's big rally-and-fire-spitting extravaganza in Karaj today. It was probably the largest gathering he's had, so far as his provincial visits go. There were around 22,000 people present. It was also the first time in two decades Sepah, the Revolutionary Guards, provided security for a government rally in full uniform. There were about 250 officers I could count on the ground. Overall, there were about 3,500 security personnel -- Sepah, NAJA, Basij -- on rooftops, lining the street, at the stadium.

"We heard they had spent $100,000 on billboards and banners the previous week for an event that got cancelled for security reasons. They must have spent the same amount this week. That's a hefty sum in Iran."

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Iran Feature: Subsidy Cuts --- The Product of Ahmadinejad's Genius? (Farokhnia)

UPDATE 1100 GMT: An EA correspondent comments:

The premises of this article are all wrong - the author is attributing to ahmadinejad what is entailed by the subsidy scrap plans devised since the mid Nineties. The issue here is not whether these recipes are good or bad - they are positive, but there are serious doubts as to whether the Ahmadinejad clique is able implement any of them correctly, given its penchant to antagonise, as they proceed, the critical economists.

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Iran Feature: Renewed Claims That Presidential Election Was Manipulated

*From Thursday, 11 June, the Ministry of Communications cut off all links between cell phones of the polling station monitors for Mousavi and another candidate, Mehdi Karroubi, and of the headquarters of the Committee for Protecting People's Votes.

*At 4 p.m. on 12 June, five hours before voting ended, Raja News, linked to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, announced that Ahmadinejad had been reelected with 63% of the vote, the same percentage that the Ministry of Interior and the Guardian Council late on the night of 12 June and over following days.

*Mousavi's and Karroubi's monitors were barred for many hours from the Ministry of Interior building during the evening of 12 June as the counting of votes took place. By the time they were allowed to enter, state television was broadcasting "results", even though the locations where votes were supposedly cast were not showing any numbers.

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Iran Analysis: Why Current US "Smart Sanctions" Aren't Very Smart (Kashani/Sadra)

The goal of sanctions was never, at least explicitly, to target the Iranian people, let alone the Iranian diaspora. The economic sanctions were set up with the understanding that there are approximately one million Iranian Americans residing in the United States, and that regardless of a long-running governmental spat and resultant commercial economic embargoes, the practicalities of life dictate that money will need to be transferred to settle estates or to provide assistance to family members.

Accordingly, our laws allow for remittances involving noncommercial transfers, among family members in the United States and Iran, and undertaken within the banking system. However, this obviously breaks down when there are no banks willing to receive wire transfers from even the nonsanctioned, private Iranian banks.

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Iran Guide: An Introduction to the Issue of Subsidies (Nikou)

The Government's plans to cut subsidies has become one of the most charged issues in Iran, with divisions within the conservative establishment --- and an escalating battle between some key members of Parliament and the President --- over the proposals.

The subsidy cut plan also comes at a time of economic tension, raising concerns that they might contribute to inflation and thus public discontent. The first reductions were supposed to be in place this week, but they have now been delayed to next month.

Writing for Tehran Bureau, Semira Nikou offers a beginner's guide.

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Assessing Ahmadinejad in New York: Reality is a Minority Dwelling Place (Sick)

Ahmadinejad, like some other leaders, has constructed an alternative universe based on a vision of what his own country and the world should be. That vision is attractive to the very many people who are unhappy with the ways things actually are.

So when Ahmadinejad wants to condemn the U.S. military presence in Afghanistan and Iraq, he declares that the original event that set these interventions in motion – the 9/11 attack – was a fraud perpetrated by the Americans on themselves. The fact that Osama Bin Laden has proudly claimed credit for the attack is simply irrelevant. The myth fits into the ideal political universe of Ahmadinejad (and others – not just in Iran) who prefer to see all unpleasantness in the Middle East as the perfidious work of outsiders, especially the West.

This hugely complicates any effort of Ahmadinejad or other members of the Iranian regime to pursue a consistent and pragmatic diplomatic path. However, it preserves their revolutionary image with a broad swath of humanity. It also helps explain why Obama’s offer of an outstretched hand – which does not fit in this alternative universe – was not easily accepted.

In fact-checking Ahmadinejad and others who have their own idealized political agenda, one should never forget that the “reality-based” universe is in fact a minority dwelling place.

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