{"id":601,"date":"2003-07-14T19:51:44","date_gmt":"2003-07-15T02:51:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/doctorsoroush.com\/english\/?p=601"},"modified":"2012-10-01T19:52:53","modified_gmt":"2012-10-02T02:52:53","slug":"khatami-threatens-resignation-over-power-struggle-with-hard-liners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/khatami-threatens-resignation-over-power-struggle-with-hard-liners\/","title":{"rendered":"Khatami Threatens Resignation Over Power Struggle with Hard-Liners"},"content":{"rendered":"

Khatami<\/span> threatens resignation over power struggle with hard-liners<\/span>
\nMove comes in response to widespread dissatisfaction<\/em><\/p>\n

Government continues crackdown on pro-reform press<\/em><\/p>\n

The Daily Star<\/a>, <\/span>7\/14\/03<\/em><\/p>\n

A university professor whose death sentence provoked nationwide protests until it was lifted by the Supreme Court has been sentenced by an appeals court to nearly four years in jail, his lawyer said.
\nThe Sunday announcement came a day after President Mohammad Khatami said he would resign if Iranians \u00ad dissatisfied over his failure to deliver promised reforms \u00ad want him to leave office, according to\u00a0 press reports.
\nHashem Aghajari, a history professor at <\/span>Tehran\u2019s Teachers Training University, was sentenced to three years, 11 months and 29 days. The verdict also barred him from running for office or occupying government posts for five years and suspended a previous sentence of 74 lashes, lawyer Saleh Nikbakht told The Associated Press.
\nAghajari was sentenced for insulting Islam and questioning clerical rule during a speech in western Iran last June.
\nKhatami\u2019s first-ever offer to resign comes amid continuing attempts by ruling hard-line clerics to stymie his reform agenda and the deepening public discontent over the country\u2019s slow pace toward democratic change.
\n\u201cWe are not masters of people but servants of this nation. If this nation says we don\u2019t want you, we will go,\u201d Khatami was quoted as saying Saturday by the government-owned daily, Iran.
\nHe made the comments in a speech in Karaj, west of the capital, on Thursday, but state-run television and radio censored the part of his speech dealing with a possible resignation.
\nKhatami has repeated in recent years that he has been powerless to stop hard-liners violating the constitution and acting against voted reforms.
\nThe closure of more than 90 pro-democracy publications in the past three years, the arrest of dozens of prominent intellectuals and writers and closed trials without jury were open violations of the constitution, he said.
\nKhatami has said he was responsible under the constitution to stop such violations, but the hard-line judiciary has ignored his warnings.
\nLast November, Aghajari was condemned to death, banned from teaching for 10 years, exiled for eight years to three remote cities and sentenced to receive 74 lashes.
\nIran\u2019s Supreme Court lifted the death sentence in February, saying the charges were inconsistent with Aghajari\u2019s speech, and returned the case to the issuing court for review.
\nNikbakht said the appeals court issued its verdict on April 26 and that he was notified on June 9. He said he did not announce the verdict because it coincided with student-led protests against the ruling Islamic establishment.
\n\u201cI would have been accused by the judiciary of inciting public opinion,\u201d he said.
\nNikbakht criticized the verdict as \u201can insult to justice and the judiciary.\u201d He said the appeals court ruling made new charges against his client, including libel and spreading lies.
\nNikbakht said he had appealed the new sentence earlier this week.
\nIt was not immediately clear whether this would be Aghajari\u2019s last appeal. Aghajari\u2019s sentencing last November provoked the biggest student protests in Iran in three years and highlighted the power struggle between the country\u2019s liberals and hard-liners.
\nHe initially said he would not appeal the death sentence, challenging the judiciary to carry it out. But his lawyer filed an appeal over Aghajari\u2019s objections.
\nBoth the Parliament and Khatami denounced the death sentence. But hard-liners, who dominate government bodies such as the judiciary and police and accuse reformists of undermining the principles of the 1979 Islamic revolution, defended the sentence.
\nAlso Sunday, the editor of the reformist daily Yas-e-Nou said two of the paper\u2019s journalists had been detained.
\nVahid Pourostad and Hossein Bastani were detained Saturday evening, said Mohammad Naimipour, a prominent lawmaker. He gave no further details.
\nRelatives said the two were arrested on charges of \u201cthreatening national security.\u201d
\nProminent student leader Saeed Razavi Faqih was arrested Thursday on similar charges, relatives said. Faqih had organized student protests to condemn Aghajari\u2019s death sentence.
\nKhatami also came under attack from liberals, including prominent philosopher Aldolkarim Soroush, who accused him of failing to push for reforms since his May, 1997, election.
\n\u201cThe peaceful and democratic uprising of the Iranian people against religious dictatorship in May 1997 was a sweet experience,\u201d Soroush said in a letter addressed to Khatami.
\n\u201cBut your failure to keep the vote and your wasting of opportunities put an end to it and disappointed the nation. Now, failures have turned into unrest.\u201d
\nSoroush was referring to last month\u2019s student-led protests against the ruling Islamic establishment and the continuing arrests of student leaders and writers. \u00ad\u00a0Agencies<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Khatami threatens resignation over power struggle with hard-liners Move comes in response to widespread dissatisfaction Government continues crackdown on pro-reform press The Daily Star, 7\/14\/03 A university professor whose death sentence provoked nationwide protests until it was lifted by the Supreme Court has been sentenced by an appeals court to nearly four years in jail, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=601"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/drsoroush.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}