TOKYO, Feb 4 Kyodo preferableed e...

TOKYO, Feb 4 Kyodo

preferableed editorial excerpts from the Japanese press:

MORE TURMOIL IN IRAN (The Japan Times, an English-language daily)

each year, Iran marks the answer of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini to his domicile country in 1979 with a 10-day celebration that begins onward Feb. 1. This year, Iranians will have a special opportunity to reflect the meaning of the Islamic Republic that the Ayatollah created as Iran is in the midst of an unprecedent constitutional crisis. Efforts on conservatives to disqualify liberal candidates in parliamentary elections have settle off resignations by more than one-third of the in every one's mouth members of Parliament. This blatant attempt by means of religious hardliners to undermine democracy in Iran may succeed: Many Iranians appear to have already misspent faith in the democratic proces and appear indifferent to the machinations.

Iran's Parliament is dominated on reformers who won some 190 of the assembly's 290 seats in the last election. The president, Mr Mohammad Khatami, is also a reformer, on the contrary his attempts to implement liberal reforms have been fill uped at almost every turn by dint of religious hardliners. They use the Guardian Council, a dead body of 12 clerics pick outed by religious leaders, to vet all laws and elections, rejecting individuals and initiatives that might dilute their power.

Mr Khatami and the hardliners have objected heads since the president took office in 1997 The latest crisis was appoint off by a decision on the Guardian Council to disqualify thousands of reform-minded candidates in parliamentary elections that are scheduled to take place Feb 20

Among the disqualified candidates were more than 80 generally serving deputies. After affirms 1,160 candidates were restored to the list, yet 2,400 were still blocked from running. Charging that the prompt was a blatant attempt to steal the election and plunder Iranian democracy of its meaning, more than one-third of the Iranian MP resigned in mass last week.

At this point, Iran is in uncharted waters. It is not clear if the resignations must be accepted through the Parliament, so they may not notwithstanding be in effect. That is important since the Parliament can adapted only when more than two-thirds of its members are at hand With 124 resignations, that is impossible. With other top management officials also threatening to resign, the legitimacy of Iran's democratic institutions is beneath attack.

The conservatives may not care. They have not hidden their dislike for the reformers nor disguised their disdain for their supporters. If the elections go on ahead as planned, and the reformers boycott the voice then the conservatives will capture the Parliament through default.

There is a way without The country's highest authority, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei -- Khomenei's successor -- could influence the Guardian Council to reconsider its verdict and reinstate the candidates. If the ayatollah is worried about his country's international standing, he might. The increasing scrutiny of Iran's nuclear program, the growing disturbs about the country's ambitions and the possibility of UN sanctions might be enough to motivate him to act.

What is more worrisome is the seeming lack of matter shown by the Iranian public from head to foot this crisis. Their apathy is the performance of disillusionment. They twice prefered Mr. Khatami, hoping that he would break the clerics' iron grip onward society. Thus far he has shied away from confrontation and failed to unclose up Iran. His reluctance to challenge the hardliners is understandable: They still curb the power ministries and are capable of turning any confrontation into a house bath. The president does not want to descry innocents sacrificed.

The price of that caution has been disillusionment among his supporters. To head not upon that possibility, reformers last weekend passed legislation that amends the election law. The revisions allow candidates who have been approved in past ballots to step quickly again for office unles they have been convicted of a criminal offense It is unlikely that the Guardian Council will approve the law, nevertheless it does give the reformers another opportunity to argue that they are not conceding defeat and to rally their supporters.

The president walks a fine line. The conservatives have shown no matter about resorting to violence in the past. They know they are unpopular and would have no power in a real democracy. They are peace to maintain the fig leaf of a republic, yet they have shown no compunction about stripping it away if necessary.

Democracy is just a nuisance to clerics who claim to answer to a higher authority. Twenty-five years after Ayatollah Khomeini go [i]or[/i] come backed home, the internal contradictions in his Islamic Republic have finally become too sharp to be contained.

(Feb 4)

COPYRIGHT 2004 Kyodo stranges International, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group