Iranian factions asked to follow Khamenei

TEHRAN (AFP) - Powerful cleric Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani urged Irans warring political groups on Saturday to follow the orders of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for ending the present political turmoil.
In his first such statement in direct support of Khamenei since the June 12 election, the former president said, The current situation needs everyone to observe the leaders decrees and advice, Iranian news agencies reported.
Rafsanjani was speaking at the start of a meeting of Irans top political arbitration body, the Expediency Council, which he heads.
He urged the bitterly divided groups to create appropriate conditions to act and commit to the constitution ... and confront lawbreakers, whatever their ideological leanings.
A supporter of the Opposition, Rafsanjani distanced himself from Khamenei in a Friday prayers sermon last month and said the election had triggered a crisis in the country.
Rafsanjani called for the current excited and emotional atmosphere to be replaced by a wise one.
He said authorities must follow Khameneis advice also on the issue of political detainees jailed in the aftermath of the election.
The way out of the current situation is commitment to the leaders advice on detainees of recent events and retrieving the rights of those whose rights have been violated, he said.
Rafsanjani also reiterated a previous call for the media to avoid fuelling disunity in society.
Meanwhile, Irans conservative clerics have objected to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejads decision to include three women in his new cabinet, a report said on Saturday, dealing a blow to his bid to secure parliaments nod for his ministerial line-up.
Ahmadinejad named Sousan Keshvaraz, Marzieh Vahid Dastjerdi and Fatemeh Ajorlou as his ministers respectively of education, health, and welfare and social security in his 21-member cabinet.
Although it is a new idea to choose women as ministers, there are religious doubts over the abilities of women when it comes to management. This should be considered by the government, Mohammad Taghi Rahbar, the head of the clerics faction in the 290-member conservative-dominated Iranian parliament was quoted as saying by the conservative daily Tehran Emrouz.
He said the faction, whose view has yet to be officially declared, will seek the opinion of the countrys supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on the issue.
Rahbar said leading Iranian clerics such as Grand Ayatollah Nasser Makarem Shirazi and Grand Ayatollah Lotfollah Safi Golpayghani were of the same opinion and wanted Ahmadinejad to reconsider his decision regarding the three women.
Defending his decision in a television address on Thursday, Ahmadinejad said the three women were chosen after close examination.
Irans audit court, meanwhile, has banned a controversial aide to President Ahmadinejad from public office for two months over a breach of administrative rules, newspapers reported on Saturday. The Supreme Audit Court has sentenced Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie to a two-month suspension from service for continuing to grant illegal financial authority to an employee, leading economic daily Sarmayeh said.
It said the offence was committed when Mashaie was a vice-president in charge of the Tourism and Cultural Heritage Organisation during the first term of Ahmadinejad. He is currently Ahmadinejads chief of staff. Mashaie confirmed the ruling but has objected to it, insisting the ban has nothing to do with financial offences, the report said.