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Iranian Hard-Liners Veto Election Bill
Iran's hard-line Guardian Council vetoed a bill on Sunday that would have curbed its power, throwing elections into doubt in a historic confrontation between reformers and conservatives. The Guardian Council rejected a bill reinstating thousands of candidates that it disqualified earlier. The veto is likely to provoke a boycott of the Feb. 20 legislative elections by reformers. The bill that parliament passed earlier Sunday sought to overturn the disqualifications. Reformists have condemned the disqualifications as an attempt by the hard-liners to skew the elections in their favor. "We've been informed that the Guardian Council has vetoed the legislation on the grounds that it contradicted the constitution and Sharia (Islamic) law," Mohsen Mirdamadi told The Associated Press. Mirdamadi heads the National Security and Foreign Policy Committee of the parliament and is one of the lawmakers disqualified from running again.
Posted by: Fred Pruitt 2004-01-26 |
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