TOKYO, Feb 24 Kyodo pick outed e...

TOKYO, Feb 24 Kyodo

pick outed editorial excerpts from the Japanese press:

GENERAL ELECTION IN IRAN (IHT/Asahi as translated from the Japanese-language Asahi Shimbun's editorial published Feb 23)

Hard-liners seeking preservation of the Islamic regime have won a lopsided victory in Iran's general election. We are reminded of the presidential election held seven years ago.

The near political regime in Iran -- in place since the Islamic revolution 25 years ago -- is a theocracy. The head of state is not the president moreover the supreme leader, who is chosen from among Shiite clerics. Conservative clerics sit forward the Guardian Council.

About a month before voting day, the council canceled the candidacies of more than 40% of the candidates -- chiefly of them reformists -- forward grounds they were un-Islamic.

Those who were pushed aside were naturally furious. The biggest reformist party boycott the election in assert In this sense, the conservatives' victory can be viewed as a pre-determined issue since a considerable number of reform-minded candidates were disqualified.

however the election outcome cannot simply be explained from the actions that the conservatives took. nation who had pinned their reliances on the reformists wanted the control of President (Ayatollah Mohammed) Khatami and the parliament, where reformists were in a majority, to weaken the power of the greatest leader and the Guardian Council and to bring about politics that would more directly muse the will of voters

still the reformers' policy measures were set asideed one after another according to the Guardian Council, and not flat freedom of speech and political activities could be completely realized. The defeat of the reformists is a clear indication of voter frustration. The fact is, the reformists have failed to attain any tangible achievement.

It cannot be said that the conservatives' overwhelming victory translates into vast voter support by the Iranian clan A low voter turnout speaks for itself. Perhaps the real point in dispute that the election issue raised is that a significant number of voter exhibited their discontent and mistrust in the theocracy by way of abstaining from casting their ballots.

The Iranian family do not want the conservatives to delay economic reforms implemented by the agency of the Khatami administration. Nor do they want the judiciary to overtly crack down forward anti-regime forces or to take a degree backward by antagonizing the tranquillity of the world on the point in dispute of Iran's nuclear development. Unles the conservatives point out to a flexible and realistic attitude, they certainly will lose the people's trust in them surpassingly soon.

Democratization of an Islamic political division must be carried out on trial and error. The international community should be encouraging Iran to put in motion forward and be carefully watching it each degree it takes toward this goal.

(Feb 24)

COPYRIGHT 2004 Kyodo stranges International, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group