12/06/2009 19:30 TEHRAN, June 12 (AFP)
Ahmadinejad wins Iran presidential election: IRNA

Iranian state news agency IRNA announced that incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had won reelection on Friday.

"Doctor Ahmadinejad, by getting a majority of the votes, has become the definite winner of the 10th presidential election," IRNA said.

The report came only minutes after reformist challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi claimed that he had won a landslide, with an aide to the former premier putting the figure at 65 percent.

UPDATE 1-Mousavi says he "definite winner" in Iran election
Fri Jun 12, 2009 8:22pm BST

(Adds quotes)

TEHRAN, June 12 ((Reuters) - Former prime minister Mirhossein Mousavi said he was the "definite winner" in Iran's election on Friday, claiming victory over President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

"We see ourselves as the definite winner," Mousavi told a news conference in Tehran.

Mousavi complained about irregularities in the voting, saying: "We are waiting for the counting of votes to officially end and explanations of these irregularities be given".

He said that many voters had not been able to cast their ballots even after voting was extended by four hours.

"There are still many people behind closed doors who cannot cast their votes. We had centres that, despite the fact the election was extended, were told to close down," he said.

"We were faced with a delay (in receiving) ballot papers. There was a lack of ballot papers in many places, such as (the cities of) Tabriz, Shiraz, Isfahan etc," he said.

(Tehran newsroom)

June 13

Reuters - Hard-liner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad defeated moderate challenger Mirhossein Mousavi by a surprisingly wide margin in Iran's presidential election, official results showed on Saturday. Mousavi derided the tally as a "dangerous charade."

Here are some analysts' views on the outcome of Friday's vote:

KARIM SADJAPOUR, ANALYST AT CARNEGIE ENDOWMENT FOR INTERNATIONAL PEACE:

"I don't think anyone anticipated this level of fraudulence. This was a selection, not an election. At least authoritarian regimes like Syria and Egypt have no democratic pretences. In retrospect it appears this entire campaign was a show: (Supreme Leader) Ayatollah (Ali) Khamenei wasn't ever going to let Ahmadinejad lose."

ALIREZA NADER, RAND CORPORATION:

"Ahmadinejad has of course won the election. What is surprising is his share of the vote -- 64 percent according to some estimates. The opposition in Iran may protest this election as being fraudulent. Mousavi's supporters were hopeful that he had a great chance of winning and that his presidency would lead to much needed reforms. Their enthusiasm may turn into frustration, and perhaps even active opposition against the government. Although the president is not the chief decision-maker, Ahmadinejad's win is a sign that Iranian politics is in stage of flux.

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“The absence of any US-Iran bilateral channel...may have the perverse effect of reinforcing Iranian interest in progressing in the nuclear realm so that the US will be forced to take it seriously and engage it directly." ~ Richard Haass

Sue Pleming | Washington D.C. | June 12

Reuters - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's re-election victory on Friday complicates the Obama administration's engagement plans but experts said there could be no reversal of the new U.S. policy toward Tehran.

Preliminary official results on Saturday showed hard-liner Ahmadinejad had an unbeatable lead over moderate rival Mirhossein Mousavi, who claimed election irregularities.

A senior State Department official insisted the U.S. president's decision to engage Iran was not based on any particular electoral outcome and the path ahead was hard no matter who won.

"There are a lot of different factions and mixed views on the idea of engaging the Great Satan (Washington)," said the official, speaking before the official results came out.

"We are going to engage the Iranian government whether it is led by one faction or the other," he added.

But analysts predicted a second term by Ahmadinejad would make it tougher for President Barack Obama to change the current caustic tone in U.S.-Iranian relations while a win by former prime minister Mousavi could have helped.

"This is a significant setback for the hopes of finding an Iran which is more open to engagement," said former CIA analyst Bruce Riedel.

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“The absence of any US-Iran bilateral channel...may have the perverse effect of reinforcing Iranian interest in progressing in the nuclear realm so that the US will be forced to take it seriously and engage it directly." ~ Richard Haass

Robert F. Worth | Teheran | June 13

NYT - President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won Iran’s presidential election in a landslide, officials of Iran’s election commission said Saturday morning. But his main rival, Mir Hussein Moussavi, had already announced defiantly just two hours after the polls closed on Friday night that he had won and charged that there had been voting “irregularities.”

“I am the absolute winner of the election by a very large margin,” Mr. Moussavi said during a news conference with reporters just after 11 p.m. Friday, adding: “It is our duty to defend people’s votes. There is no turning back.”

A statement posted on Mr. Moussavi’s Web site on Saturday morning urged his supporters to resist a "governance of lie and dictatorship," according to The Associated Press.

"I’m warning that I won’t surrender to this manipulation," the statement said, adding that the election outcome “is nothing but shaking the pillars of the Islamic Republic of Iran sacred system and governance of lie and dictatorship."

He warned "people won’t respect those who take power through fraud" and said the decision to declare Mr. Ahmadinejad the winner was a "treason to the votes of the people."

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“The absence of any US-Iran bilateral channel...may have the perverse effect of reinforcing Iranian interest in progressing in the nuclear realm so that the US will be forced to take it seriously and engage it directly." ~ Richard Haass

with video LA Times

Djavad Salehi-Isfahani, Nonresident Guest Scholar, Global Economy and Development, Wolfensohn Center for Development, Middle East Youth Initiative

The Brookings Institution
June 10, 2009 —

This Friday, over 30 million Iranian voters are expected to decide if Mr. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should get four more years. Not since 1997, when the reform movement scored its first and most decisive victory against the conservative establishment, has an election mattered or generated as much excitement as this one. Televised presidential debates, a novelty in Iran, have been sharp and engaging—drawing millions of viewers and lasting until midnight. Young volunteers have been filling the streets wearing their favorite candidate’s colored ribbons and bringing traffic to a halt in busy intersections.

What are the Stakes? Who are the Voters?

The stakes for both reformers and conservatives have never been so high:

First, Iranian leaders are facing an extended hand from President Obama just as Iran’s increasing fear of the Taliban and growing support of Iraq’s Maliki government converge with those concerns of the United States. The elected winner will get to shape this critical round of diplomacy which will then determine the direction of Iran’s foreign policy in the future.

Second, Iran’s middle class,[1] twice as large in number as they were in 1997 and now accounting for about half of all voters, are asserting themselves for the first time. Their challenge is reflected most visibly in their criticism of the “charity economy” that opposition candidates accuse Mr. Ahmadinejad of having created.

Third, the children of the 1979 revolution—today’s youth—have come of age in 2009 and are challenging the revolution’s architects, who are in near retirement. Voters under 30 account for 40 percent of the voting age population, the same proportions as in 1997 but more sophisticated and more frustrated. They are more sophisticated because they are better educated, and by overcoming poor internet infrastructure and censorship, they have succeeded in placing Iran fifth in the world in terms of the number of bloggers. They are more frustrated because, despite a growing economy and an oil boom, their unemployment rate is twice as high as it was in 1997. Unemployment rates for 20-24 year olds increased from 15 to 22 percent for men and from 23 to 44 percent for women.

......

All candidates hope to win over the youth vote, which could easily reach 50 percent of all votes cast if their disappointment with Mr. Ahmadinejad brings them out in force on June 12. For example, as a candidate, in 2005, Mr. Ahmadinejad had promised to focus on the “real” problems of youth, questioning the government’s obsession with youth attire. However, as president, he did the exact opposite by signing an order to increase street surveillance of youth by the morality police. Mr. Mousavi’s emphasis on social issues that mainly concern urban youth appears to have attracted a strong youth following. In a clever but subtle move, his campaign posters show him holding hands with his wife.

The Anticipated Run-Off

The goal of the reformists for Friday is to take the election to the second round, where they think they have a good chance of defeating Mr. Ahmadinejad. Odds are good that this will happen, but by no means will it be easy. First, Mr. Ahmadinejad is a formidable campaigner and enjoys the implicit support of the Supreme Leader as well as large sections of the lower classes. Second, in the last two years he has been busy redistributing income to the lower strata and evidence shows that this may have succeeded in creating greater support. Finally, no president of the Islamic Republic has served just one term throughout Iran’s history.

Still, the conservatives seem quite fearful of the second round and are expected to pull all stops to win in the first. The Iran Daily, which supports Mr. Ahmadinejad, sounded an optimistic note last week when it claimed that polls show Mr. Ahmadinejad has increased his share of votes from 51 to 63 percent. However, polls in Iran are highly inaccurate and often contradict each other.

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Exiled group says race on in Iran to build bomb

13 Jun 2009 16:23:09 GMT
Source: Reuters
By Crispian Balmer

PARIS, June 13 (Reuters) - Iran will redouble efforts to build an atomic bomb following Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's victory in a presidential election but could still be deterred by tough sanctions, the head of an exiled Iranian group said on Saturday.

Maryam Rajavi, leader of the French-based National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), told Reuters that Western powers had to abandon a "policy of appeasement" if they wanted to thwart Ahmadinejad's nuclear ambitions.

"Sadly Iran will get the bomb if the West continues with its strategy of negotiations. This is just giving the mullahs more time to play with," she said in a telephone interview.

"Lots of sources say they will get the bomb in 1-1/2 years, but Ahmadinejad will now speed things up and he will have the bomb in one year maximum."

The NCRI has thousands of followers in Europe and the United States and was the first group to expose Iran's covert nuclear programme in 2002. It claims to have huge backing within Iran although analysts say its support is very hard to gauge.

Iran's interior minister said on Saturday that hardliner Ahmadinejad swept Friday's presidential election with 62.6 percent of the vote. Turnout was put at a record 85 percent.

Rajavi called the election "a charade" and said most Iranians had shunned the ballot boxes.

"Around 85 percent of people boycotted this election. It is not true there was a massive turnout," she said, adding there was growing public anger over the vote.

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Posted: 14 June 2009 0533 hrs
AFP

Related News
• Ahmadinejad says Iran election a 'great victory'
• US monitoring reports of irregularities in Iran vote
• Iran protests mount as Ahmadinejad wins landslide
• Ahmadinejad wins 63% of votes in most of Iran

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's defeated presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi urged his supporters to avoid violence after they launched mass protests in Tehran on Saturday against his loss in the election.

Mousavi, who lost to incumbent hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said "the violations in the election are very serious and you are right to be deeply hurt."

"But I firmly call on you not to subject any individual or groups to hurt. Do not lose your calm and restraint. Everybody should draw a line between themselves and any violent behaviour," Mousavi said in a statement posted on his campaign website.

He said he hoped the police understood why his supporters were protesting and would "treat them as their own."

Thousands of Mousavi supporters took to Tehran's streets on Saturday to protest against the victory of Ahmadinejad who recorded a landslide win to secure a second term in office.

Talking to Iran will make it "easier to sell" war on Iran, says man responsible for talking to Iran

By ALI AKBAR DAREINI and ANNA JOHNSON

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has accused the foreign media of coverage that harms the Iranian people after authorities claimed he was re-elected in a bitterly disputed vote.

He called on the public to respect the vote on Friday, after his main pro-reform challenger rejected the results and accused authorities of election fraud.

"This is a great victory at a time when the ... propaganda facilities outside Iran and sometimes inside Iran were totally mobilized against our people," Ahmadinejad said, according to an English translation of his victory speech carried on state television.

"The heaviest pressure and psychological warfare was organized against the people of Iran. A large number of foreign media ... organized a full-fledged fight against our people."

Juan Cole

Gary Sick

NIAC

Grace of The Cable. All together now class, "Thank you Cable!
Jeez. This has to happen on the one weekend I've been planning on taking off in the past 3 months.~ JPD

“The absence of any US-Iran bilateral channel...may have the perverse effect of reinforcing Iranian interest in progressing in the nuclear realm so that the US will be forced to take it seriously and engage it directly." ~ Richard Haass