Iran elects a new president in early elections after the death of a hardliner, but voter turnout remains questionable

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iranians voted in early elections on Friday to replace the late hardliner President Ebrahim RaisiThe only reform-minded candidate in the race promised he would seek “friendly relations” with the West to boost his campaign.

The remarks by heart surgeon Masoud Pezeshkian come after he and his allies were the target of a veiled warning from the country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, over their rapprochement with the United States.

Pezeshkian spoke after the vote and apparently wanted to increase voter turnout, as after years of economic problems, mass protests and tensions in the Middle East, a general apathy has broken out in the Islamic Republic.

Voters are faced with a Choice between hardliner candidate and the little-known Pezeshkian who belongs to the Iranian reform movement that wants to change the Shiite theocracy from within. As has been the case since the Islamic Revolution of 1979 Women and those who demand radical change candidacy was prohibited and the election itself will not be subject to control by internationally recognised observers.

The vote comes at a time when tensions in the Middle East are increasing due to the War between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. In April Iran launched its first direct attack on Israel about the war in the Gaza Strip, while Tehran-backed militia groups in the region – such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah and the Houthi rebels in Yemen – have become involved in the fighting and have expanded their attacks.

Meanwhile, Iran continues Enrich uranium to near weapons-grade levels and has a stockpile large enough to build multiple nuclear weapons should the company so desire.

While the 85-year-old Iranian Khamenei Because Iran has the final say in all state affairs, presidents can steer the country’s policy toward confrontation or negotiations with the West. But given record-low voter turnout in the last election, it remains unclear how many Iranians will participate in Friday’s vote.

Pezeshkian, who cast his vote at a hospital near the capital Tehran, seemed to have this in mind as he responded to a journalist’s question about how Iran would interact with the West if he were president.

“God willing, we will try to maintain friendly relations with all countries except Israel,” said the 69-year-old candidate. Israel, long Iran’s regional arch-enemy, faces fierce criticism across the Middle East for its grueling war in the Gaza Strip.

He also responded to a question about renewed action against women because of the headscarf requirement, less than two years after the death of Mahsa Amini in 2022which sparked nationwide demonstrations and violent responses by security forces.

“Our girls, daughters and mothers must not be treated inhumanely or abusively,” he said.

Higher turnout could boost Pezeshkian’s chances, and the candidate may have been counting on his comments to spread on social media, as all the country’s television channels are state-controlled and run by hardliners. But it remains unclear whether he can build the momentum needed to get voters to the polls. There have been calls for a boycott, including from imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi.

There has also been criticism that Pezeshkian is just another government-backed candidate. In a documentary about Pezeshkian that aired on state television, one woman said her generation was moving “towards the same level” of hostility toward the government that Pezeshkian’s generation had in the 1979 revolution.

Analysts describe the race as a three-way battle. There are two hardliners, former nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili and parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf. Shiite cleric Mostafa Pourmohammadi has also remained in the race despite poor poll results.

Pezeshkian stands on the side of figures such as former President Hassan Rohani, under whose government Tehran signed the groundbreaking nuclear deal with world powers in 2015.

Voting began shortly after President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump completed voting. their first televised debate for the US presidential elections, in which Iran was also discussed.

Trump described Iran as “broke” under his administration and emphasized his decision to launch a drone strike in 2020 that Revolutionary Guard General Qassem SoleimaniThe attack was part of a spiral of escalating tensions between America and Iran since Trump unilaterally withdrew the United States from Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers in 2018.

Iranian state media specifically published images of voters queuing near Soleimani’s tomb in the city of Kerman.

Interior Minister Ahmad Vahidi, who is responsible for overseeing the elections, announced that all polling stations opened at 8 a.m. local time. Khamenei cast one of the first votes of the election and called on the population to go to the polls.

“An enthusiastic turnout of the population and a higher number of voters – this is an absolute need for the Islamic Republic,” said Khamenei.

State television later broadcast images of polling stations across the country showing few queues. At many polling stations in Tehran, viewers saw no significant queues, reminiscent of the low turnout in the recent parliamentary elections in March.

More than 61 million Iranians over the age of 18 are eligible to vote, about 18 million of whom are between 18 and 30 years old.

According to Iranian law, a winner must receive more than 50 percent of all votes cast. If this does not happen, a runoff election between the two leading candidates will take place a week later. There has only been one runoff election in Iranian history, in 2005, when hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad defeated former President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani.

Raisi, 63, died in the May 19 helicopter crash that also killed the country’s foreign minister and others. He was considered a protégé of Khamenei and a possible successor as supreme leader, but many knew him for his involvement in Iran’s mass executions in 1988 and his role in the bloody crackdown on dissidents that followed protests against Amini’s death. a young woman arrested by the police because of the allegedly inappropriate wearing of the prescribed headscarf or hijab.

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Karimi reported from Tehran, Iran.