Iran’s president registers to run in May elections
>> TEHRAN: Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani registered on Friday to run in the upcoming presidential elections in May, saying he will continue to preserve a landmark nuclear deal that his country reached with world powers in 2015.
Mr Rouhani, 68, registered on the fourth day of the allocated period, which ended yesterday. In 2013, he had registered on the first day.
The upcoming vote will be seen, among other things, as a referendum on the nuclear agreement with world powers, under which Iran agreed to curb its uranium enrichment in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions.
Running on the platform “More freedom and peace” Mr Rouhani said: “Freedom should be expanded in both scope and strength in this country.
“Our universities and our youth should feel more lively and delighted.”
Mr Rouhani vowed to remain loyal to the nuclear deal, and encouraged all Iranians to vote.
He also mentioned the giant joint gas field, the North Field, Iran will be developing with Qatar.
On Wednesday former hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his close ally Hamid Baghaei also filed to run for the presidency.
Then on Friday Ebrahim Raisi, a hardline cleric close to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who had earlier announced plans to run promising to fight poverty and corruption, registered to run in the presidential elections.
Iranian hardliners had widely hope Mr Raisi would challenge Mr Rouhani.
Mr Raisi in his first remarks after registering praised the country’s democracy and the necessity of rule of law during the elections and afterward.
Mr Raisi, 56, a professor of Islamic law, has served in the country’s judiciary for decades. He is also a member of Assembly of Experts, an all-cleric body that will rule on the successor for the Supreme Leader. Mr Raisi is also prosecutor of the Special Cleric Court.
Earlier this month Mr Raisi announced his readiness in a statement in which he said the country is suffering from “structural chronic illness and incorrect managerial traditions”.
In 2016, Ayatollah Khamenei appointed Mr Raisi as head of the Imam Reza charity foundation, which owns a massive business conglomerate and endowments in Iran.
Both Mr Rouhani and Mr Raisi on Friday avoided raising controversial issues, acquiescing to a demand by Ayatollah Khamenei who had urged a non-polarised election.
Registration remained open until yesterday, with any Iranian national eligible to apply.
The applicants will then be vetted by the Guardian Council, a clerical body that will the final candidates by April 27.
The nuclear deal was engineered by the Rouhani administration and went into effect in 2016.
Iran has since resumed selling oil and signed billion-dollar deal store place its age ing national commercial airline inventory.