Saturday, June 18, 2005

Iranian presidential election may be headed for a runoff

Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, a moderate (or so they say) candidate for president of Iran, has a slight lead as ballot counting is taking place there today. A hard liner (Mahmoud Ahmadinejad) and a reformer (Mehdi Karroubi) are in a close race for second.

Since it appears very unlikely Rafsanjani will get a majority of the votes, a runoff election will take place Friday, which will decide who will be the next Iranian president.

Real power, unfortunately, will lie with unelected Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who is a hardliner. The security apparatus and the courts are controlled by hardliners too.

Drop in on the bravest blog on the Internet, Regime Change Iran, for updates and analysis of the Iranian elections.

UPDATE: 8:45 PM CDT: According to the Tehran Times, next week's runoff will be between the so-called moderate , Rafsanjani, and the hardliner, Karroubi.

No comments: