Iran's government threatens to quit

Iran's reformist government threatened to resign amid denunciations today of a hard-line panel's disqualification of general election candidates who are allied with the reformist president.

In a deepening of the nation’s political crisis, Vice President Mohammad Sattarifar said: “If the government feels that it can’t fulfil its responsibilities in protecting legitimate freedoms, such as defending the rights of the nation for a free and fair elections, then it does not believe that there is any reason to stay in power.”

The statement is the strongest yet indicating President Mohammad Khatami’s government may be willing to resign if it cannot ensure free elections. However, Iran’s supreme leader, hard-line Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has promised to intervene if the crisis is not resolved soon.

The Guardian Council, an unelected hard-line constitutional watchdog, has barred over 3,000 of the 8,200 people – including more than 80 sitting MPs – who filed papers to run for a seat in the 290 member parliament. MPs have said all of those who where disqualified were reformists.

State broadcast media controlled by hard-liners have said the candidates were disqualified because they lacked “the necessary legal qualifications.”

Iran’s largest reformist party, the Islamic Iran Participation Front, meanwhile said that disqualifying the reform candidates amounted to treason because it damages Iran’s international credibility and will result in “sham elections.”

“We consider the disqualifications national treason and an attempt to transform the Islamic Republic into a despotic establishment,” the party said in its statement.

”Disqualifications deny the people their constitutional right to choose and be chosen. ... Hard-liners seek to set up a sham parliament through sham elections.”