Iran's Parliament has given votes of confidence to three candidates proposed by President Hassan Rouhani to lead the ministries of sports and youth affairs; culture and Islamic guidance; and education.

After extensive debates during two Parliament sessions on Tuesday, Rouhani’s picks for the three ministries obtained the green light from the Iranian lawmakers.

At the end of the evening session, Reza Salehi Amiri, the proposed nominee for the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, received the vote of confidence with 180 Iranian lawmakers in favor, 89 against and six abstentions.

This as 193 lawmakers also gave their approval to Massoud Soltanifar, as the president’s pick for the Ministry of Sports and Youth Affairs. Some 72 lawmakers opposed him and nine abstained.

Fakhroddin Ahmadi Danesh Ashtiani also won a yes from 157 legislators, while 111 were against him and six abstained, to become the new minister of education.

Soltanifar is the current vice president and the head of the Cultural Heritage, Handcrafts and Tourism Organization of Iran; Salehi Amiri is the current head of the National Library and Archives Organization of Iran; and Danesh Ashtiani is a university professor.

In a letter to Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani on October 23, the president had introduced the candidates for the three vacant ministerial portfolios for votes of confidence.

The president’s move came after the resignation of Ali Jannati, Mahmoud Goudarzi, and Ali Asghar Fani as the ministers of culture and Islamic guidance, sports and youth affairs, and education, respectively, last week. </s> State media reported that Reza Salehi Amiri, Saeed Soltanifar and Fakhredin Ahmadi Danesh-Ashtiani won votes of confidence to take over the ministries of Islamic guidance and culture, sport and youth affairs, and education. Their predecessors resigned after Rouhani criticized them for inefficiency and succumbing to pressures from outside the government.

Rouhani allies won big gains in parliamentary elections in February, short of an outright majority but comfortable enough to pass his legislative plans.

Rouhani is expected to stand for re-election next year but may face a challenge from conservative rivals who believe Iran has conceded too much in a deal with world powers to limit its nuclear program, while failing to benefit as promised from a lifting of international sanctions. </s> Iranian President Hassan Rouhani takes part in a news conference near the United Nations General Assembly in the Manhattan borough of New York, U.S., September 22, 2016. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson/File Photo

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Iranian lawmakers approved three new ministers on Tuesday, signaling support for changes in the cabinet of pragmatist President Hassan Rouhani seven months before a presidential election.

State media reported that Reza Salehi Amiri, Saeed Soltanifar and Fakhredin Ahmadi Danesh-Ashtiani won votes of confidence to take over the ministries of Islamic guidance and culture, sport and youth affairs, and education. Their predecessors resigned after Rouhani criticized them for inefficiency and succumbing to pressures from outside the government.

Rouhani allies won big gains in parliamentary elections in February, short of an outright majority but comfortable enough to pass his legislative plans.

Rouhani is expected to stand for re-election next year but may face a challenge from conservative rivals who believe Iran has conceded too much in a deal with world powers to limit its nuclear program, while failing to benefit as promised from a lifting of international sanctions. </s> On Monday afternoon, Iranian president Hassan Rouhani appointed Seyyed Rahmatollah Akrami as Acting Minister of Economic Affairs and Finance, according to the official website of Iran's presidency 'preisdent.ir'.

Akrami's appointment comes a day after the Iranian parliament sacked Iranian Minister of Economic Affairs and Finance (MEAF) Masoud Karbasian, which in turn came more than two weaks after the impeachment of labor minister Ali Rabiei.

In the Name of Allah, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful

According to Article 135 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran and with regard to your commitment and executive and management experiences, you are being appointed as “Acting Minister of Economic Affairs and Finance”.

I wish you success in carrying out your responsibilities in serving the noble people of Iran and the Islamic Republic through cooperation of all employees of the ministry, upholding the principles of the rule of law, moderation and "Code of Ethics of the Government of Prudence and Hope".

President of the Islamic Republic of Iran </s> Iranian President Hassan Rouhani accepts the resignation of his health minister, Hassan Qazizadeh Hashemi, days after the official announced his decision to leave the cabinet over budget issues.

In a decree on Thursday, Rouhani appointed Saeed Namaki as caretaker of Iran's Ministry of Health and Medical Education.

The president also thanked the outgoing minister for his sincere efforts towards promoting the country's health sector.

Qazizadeh Hashemi stepped down from his post last week due to differences with the administration over health spending cuts in the budget bill submitted to the Iranian Parliament (Majlis). </s> An Iranian panel charged with vetting candidates approved the country’s incumbent president and five challengers but disqualified former hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from running in next month’s presidential election, state television reported Thursday.

The decision by the Guardian Council means that President Hassan Rouhani, a relative moderate, will face off against a field that includes two prominent hard-liners: Ebrahim Raisi, who is considered close to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and Tehran Mayor Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf.

The Guardian Council, a cleric-dominated body that vets candidates, said it had compiled a final list of candidates earlier Thursday and that the Interior Ministry would announce their names by Sunday.

The panel controls elections and must approve all laws passed by parliament. It has never allowed a woman to run for president and routinely rejects political dissidents and others calling for dramatic reform.

Other presidential candidates who made the cut, according to an Interior Ministry statement carried by state TV, include moderate Senior Vice-President Eshaq Jahangiri, former conservative culture minister Mostafa Mirsalim, and former pro-reform vice-president Mostafa Hashemitaba.

Ahmadinejad, who remains a deeply polarizing figure even among Iranian hard-liners, had shocked the country by registering last week. Khamenei had previously urged him not to run.

Ahmadinejad was president from 2005 to 2013, and was best known abroad for his incendiary rhetoric toward Israel, his questioning of the scale of the Holocaust and his efforts to ramp up Iran’s nuclear program.

He said upon registering that he was doing so to support his former Vice-President Hamid Baghaei, who also failed to receive approval to run.

“He was an unwanted guest in the election,” Tehran-based political analyst Soroush Farhadi said of Ahmadinejad’s disqualification. He predicted the former president would nonetheless remain politically active during the campaign to create a “quasi-opposition face for himself” for the future.

Ali Akbar Javanfekr, a close ally of Ahmadinejad, downplayed the two candidates’ exclusion, saying on social media that Ahmadinejad and Baghaei had only registered out of “national, religious and revolutionary duty.”

“Thank god, the Guardian Council removed the duty from their shoulders,” he wrote.

More than 1,600 people registered to run for the May 19 election.

Under Iran’s clerically overseen system, the president is subordinate to Khamenei, who is Iran’s top decision-maker and has the final say on all matters of state. Khamenei appoints half the Guardian Council’s members.

Rouhani, 68, is hoping voters will deliver him a second term to see out his promises of greater personal freedoms at home and openness to the wider world as he works to turn around Iran’s sagging economy — a top priority for many voters.

The election will be in many ways a referendum on his administration’s negotiation of the landmark 2015 nuclear deal with world powers. That agreement gave Iran relief from crippling economic sanctions in exchange for limits to its nuclear program, but has been assailed by hard-liners who believe Iran gave too much away in exchange for too little.

While reliable polling information is not widely available, most political observers see Rouhani as the current front-runner even though he has been unable to significantly turn around Iran’s slumping economy. Every incumbent since Khamenei himself took the presidency in 1981 has won re-election.

Rouhani, though no radical, has the support of many reform-minded Iranians. Khamenei himself also might favour a second term for Rouhani despite his closeness to more hard-line candidates.

“Iranian presidents tend to become much weaker in their second terms, with a key cause being their greater susceptibility to control by the supreme leader and his institutions,” Mehdi Khalaji, an Iran expert at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, wrote this week. “This helps explain Khamenei’s possible abstention from active support for the hard-line candidates.”

Rouhani’s toughest challenge could come from Raisi, 56, a hard-line cleric and professor of Islamic law who has promised to fight poverty and corruption if he’s elected. Many hard-liners have rallied around Raisi, who got a boost last year when Khamenei appointed him head of an Islamic charity that holds extensive business interests in Iran.

He has held several judiciary positions, including serving as attorney general from 2014 to 2016, and is mentioned as a possible successor for Khamenei himself. </s> TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — About 126 prospective candidates submitted their names on the first day of candidate registration for Iran’s May 19 presidential elections, Iranian media reported on Tuesday.

There are six women and seven clerics among the 126 registered people, with ages ranging from 18 to 79.

Registration will remain open until Saturday, and any Iranian national can apply. The applicants will then be vetted by the Guardian Council, a clerical body that will announce a final list of candidates by April 27. The council normally does not approve dissidents or women for the formal candidate list.

A dissident activist Mehdi Khazali, who served several prison terms on security-related charges, said after registration that hostility toward the west would come to an end if he is elected.

“We must seek to remove tension with the entire world. Relations based on mutual positive interaction must be established.” Khazali said.

Mostafa Mirsalim, a former minister of culture in 1990s who represents traditional conservatives, came to register while wearing blue-collar workman’s clothes — part of his campaign theme to create more job opportunities.

“I have come to retrieve your share of the Islamic Revolution and deliver it to you,” Mirsalim told the crowd.

One female registrant, who identified herself only as Mirfattah, pledged to form a half-female Cabinet if she wins.

President Hassan Rouhani, a moderate, is eligible to run for another term. Ebrahim Raisi, a hard-line cleric close to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and Hamid Baghaei, a close ally of former hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have announced plans to run. Both have vowed to fight poverty and corruption.

The coming vote is seen as a referendum on the 2015 nuclear agreement with world powers, under which Iran agreed to curb its uranium enrichment in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions.

The nuclear deal was engineered by the Rouhani administration and went into practice in 2016. Since then Iran has resumed selling oil and signed deals worth billions of dollars for passenger planes to replace its aging fleet.

However critics of the deal complain that these economic benefits have yet to trickle down to average Iranians. </s> The swearing-in ceremony for the reelected President Hassan Rouhani, which is due this Saturday, is to be a more high-profile event than his first, as the level of foreign dignitaries taking part is said to be "unprecedented".

Rouhani will be sworn in for another four years as the chief executive in the parliament in downtown Tehran.

He will receive his endorsement decree from the Leader of Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei in a separate ceremony on Thursday.

The president's Deputy Chief of Staff for Communications and Information Parviz Esmaeili said on Tuesday high-powered delegations from at least 92 countries and organizations are confirmed to attend.

"Present in the event will be 25 delegations from Asia Pacific, 26 from Arab countries and 30 from Europe and Americas," he told IRNA, in addition to 11 delegations from major international entities.

"The number and level of delegations attending such an event is unprecedented," he said.

Among the guests, he said, are eight presidents and 19 parliament speakers, besides dozens of senior government officials and diplomats.

Esmaeili did not elaborate on the states to be represented, but media reports have so far confirmed that Afghanistan, Pakistan, Armenia, Iraq, Oman, Qatar, Palestine, North Korea, Moldavia and Belarus will attend the ceremony.

Officials from four of five permanent members of the UN Security Council, namely Russia, China, the UK and France, plus Germany, are also to attend.

The five, along with the US, negotiated the July 2015 nuclear deal with Iran that went into effect in January 2016 to settle its lingering dispute with western powers over its nuclear activities.

EU's top diplomat, Federica Mogherini, who headed the other side of the Iran deal during two years of talks, is also expected to arrive.

Message to Trump

Lawmaker Alireza Rahimi said on Monday the high-level participation in Rouhani's inauguration conveys an "important message" to the world, at a time when Washington seems to be bent on tightening the screws on Tehran.

In a post on his Telegram channel, Rahimi said the planned presence of Mogherini at the event showed the bloc's resolve to strengthen its ties with Iran and to protect the 2015 deal from the controversial US President Donald Trump who is determined to walk out of the pact to appease his allies Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Hardening the US tone on Iran, Trump has repeatedly hammered the deal and is currently seeking ways to pull out of it.

However, so far, his calls for dismantling the deal or renegotiating the accord have fallen on deaf ears of other signatories to the deal, which are determined to uphold the pact.

Rouhani won the presidential vote in May on a platform of broadening Iran's international engagement and reforming the economy, making pledges to improve the livelihood of ordinary Iranians and curb unemployment by attracting foreign investment and technology.

Over 23 million people, from a total of 41 million voters, cast ballots for him to win an emphatic 57% of votes to defeat his main rival, principlist Ebrahim Raeisi.

Tight Security

The Interior Ministry has made strict security arrangements for the event, a top official said, adding that the level of security at the parliament compounds has been raised for the inauguration day.

Deputy Interior Minister for Security Affairs Hossein Zolfaqari told Tasnim News Agency on Monday the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps is in charge of security of the ceremony, and the Intelligence Ministry, police and air defense force have also been assigned tasks to support it.

The inauguration day has been declared a holiday in the capital.

"All state and public institutions and organizations, except those extending emergency services, will be closed on Saturday to facilitate the movement of dignitaries and ensure the convenience of Tehrani citizens," Cabinet Secretary Mohsen Haji-Mirzaei told IRNA on Monday.

Security in Iran's biggest city is heightened since the self-styled Islamic State terrorist group attacked the parliament and Imam Khomeini Mausoleum early June, the first major terrorist operation in decades, which prompted Iran's first missile strike outside its borders after the Iran-Iraq war (1980-88) against IS positions in eastern Syria.

Rouhani is preparing to propose his nominees for 18 ministerial posts to the parliament for a vote of confidence on the inauguration day.

The president has vowed to pick a "young" and "inclusive" Cabinet, reportedly saying that more than 50% of the incumbent ministers will be replaced. He is also expected to induct women ministers.

After Rouhani announces his list of ministers, the lawmakers have a week to examine their credentials.

Afterwards, the aspirants will appear before the parliament to outline their plans of action for securing confirmation votes. </s> Tehran, Aug 27 (IANS) Iran’s parliament on Sunday voted to impeach the Minister of Economy and Finance for failing to manage the country’s ongoing economic crisis.

Masoud Karbasian’s firing comes in the wake of the latest round of US sanctions against Tehran imposed earlier this month following Washington’s withdrawal from the 2015 nuclear agreement, which has put pressure on the moderate government of President Hassan Rouhani.

Iranian lawmakers were seen forcefully arguing during the impeachment session, with one MP approaching the central podium only to have his mouth physically covered by another MP, Efe reported.

The motion to censure Karbasian passed with 137 votes in favor, 121 against and two abstentions, out of a total of 260 legislators who participated.

Rohani is to address lawmakers on Monday and has up to three months to propose a replacement.

On August 8, Iranian lawmakers also voted to sack the Minister of Labor, Ali Rabiei.
Iranian parliament approves three President Hassan Rouhani's new designated ministers, including Reza Salehi Amiri, Fakhruddin Danesh-Ashtiani and Masoud Soltanifar as culture, education and sports ministers respectively.