Iran opposition figure plans a new political group

Defeated presidential candidate Mir-Hossein Mousavi says he hopes to 'lay the groundwork for a large-scale social movement.'

By Borzou Daragahi 11:14 AM PDT, July 22, 2009

In comments during a meeting with media professionals and scholars, Mousavi praised the protests, saying they could set the stage for future change in Iran. Before Mousavi spoke, some analysts and supporters worried his anticipated announcement of a political organization would amount to a disavowal of a peaceful civil disobedience campaign unlike any Iran has experienced since the Islamic Revolution in the late 1970s. "Power is always inclined to become absolute and only people's movements can put a hold on this inclination," Mousavi said in comments reported by the semiofficial Iranian Labor News Agency and several websites. "The only way out of the current conditions is to pay attention to people's wills. That, along with the inclination for civil protests, can set the stage for political prosperity in the future." The rift within Iran's political establishment over the election results continued to tear the nation's political class asunder. Pro-Ahmadinejad lawmakers today demanded that the minister of intelligence and security begin releasing, and state television begin airing, prison confessions extracted from detained opposition figures while in the solitary confinement wing of Evin Prison.

Among those in detention are Mohammad Aliabati, a former vice president, and Saeed Laylaz, a former deputy minister of interior. Mousavi's latest comments amounted to open defiance of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the top-ranking cleric who warned the country's political establishment Monday to end a campaign against Ahmadinejad. Mousavi has emerged as the figurehead of a grass-roots political movement outraged over what it calls forged election results and a subsequent crackdown in which dozens of Iranians were killed and hundreds imprisoned. The soft-spoken former prime minister did not challenge Iran's Islamic system, saying its constitution allows for enough leeway to accommodate public demands. Rather, he criticized Ahmadinejad's ruling faction. "The government's level of tolerance has sharply dipped," Mousavi said. "We are facing a government unwilling to recruit our elites to use their experience. In the meantime, our elites have no desire to cooperate with this government. It means lack of legitimacy and efficiency." Mousavi urged followers of his movement to maintain unity above all by avoiding divisive slogans. "Consensus is doubtlessly our main objective," he said. Other reformists have directed sharper barbs at Khamenei. Abdullah Nouri, a former interior minister, compared Khamenei at a meeting with families of political prisoners Tuesday night to Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, who was overthrown in the revolution that established the Islamic Republic. "In the 1970s, nobody imagined that limited struggles would drive the shah out of the country," he said, according to a reformist website. Aftab News, a newspaper close to moderate cleric Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, has dropped the word "supreme" in its references to Khamenei, describing him as just the leader. Meanwhile, two high-ranking clerics declared support for the protest movement and openly challenged Khamenei's leadership and gave tacit permission for government officials and clergy to boycott Ahmadinejad's inauguration, scheduled for early August. "The supreme leader's confirmation of a president born out of a rigged election could not grant him any legitimacy," said Ayatollah Asadollah Bayat Zanjani in a religious edict. "Both the supreme leader's confirmation and the president's swearing-in are acceptable if and only if the president is elected in a clean vote." Another cleric, Ayatollah Mohammad-Ali Dastgheib Shirazi, called on other top clergy to support those protesting the election results. "Using firearms and crude weapons against people and incarceration of the revolutionaries would never help safeguard Islam and the establishment," he said, according to several websites. Rafsanjani, whose Friday prayer sermon last week buoyed the opposition after security crackdowns on protests, posted an excerpt on his website from his memoirs about his imprisonment during the time of the shah. In the piece, he quotes a report about him by the SAVAK, the shah's notorious secret police. "Jail has failed to calm Rafsanjani and it has even encouraged him to increase his activities," the report said. "We should think of another solution." daragahi@latimes.com