Administration to File Lawsuit over Vitriolic Remarks

“President Rouhani should be put to trial over offences including treason, mendacity and his disobedience of the leader,” should Iran stop assuming immunity for the president, Hamid Rouhani said on July 10. More recently, he has gone further to call President Hassan Rouhani a ‘traitor’ and urge the disqualification of Hassan Rouhani and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for the next presidential election, as if to remind us of the simultaneous disqualification of Ahmadinejad’s right hand Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei and former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani in 2013. Hamid Rouhani, a principlist cleric who directs a semiprivate encyclopedia on the history of the Islamic Republic, drew a comparison between sitting President Rouhani and Abolhassan Banisadr, the Islamic Republic’s first president who was impeached in 1981. “The biggest threat for Iran is neither the United States nor the Israel. It is Mr. Rouhani and similar views. He has come to the stage knowingly to eradicate Islamic principles. These men seek to take Iran back to the oppressive kingdom era,” he said. He was addressing a conference in Tabriz, North West of Iran.

A day later, Ahmad Alamolhoda’s vitriolic remarks against Hassan Rouhani, calling him “naïve” for his defense of the nuclear deal during his Friday prayers sermon in Mashhad, North East of the country.

“Is it dignity that an Italian modeling company corrupts your daughters and wives, your youngsters, and turn here [Iran] into a market for its cheap products?” Alamolhoda asked.

 “This naïve man is saying that ‘JCPOA brought us’ dignity,” Alamolhoda said, addressing Rouhani’s recent remarks in defense of the nuclear deal.

Another interim Friday prayers leader, Seyyed Ahmad Khatami who also represents Kerman in the country’s assembly of experts had criticized the nuclear deal on Wednesday, stressing that the life of the people has seen no improvements since the implementation of the deal.

Addressing a ceremony to commemorate martyrs of Kuhbanan County in Kerman Province, Khatami drew on the Supreme Leader’s recent remarks, in which he stressed that talks with the US should not be a solution for Iran, and called those who bring up negotiations with the United States as enemies of the leadership. “The US file is exclusively overseen by the Supreme Leader and no one can intervene,” he added.

Iran’s Vice President for Legal Affairs Hojatoleslam Majid Ansari says evident offences of the kind need no litigation and the attorney general could take the necessary measures in such cases. He told a press conference the president always stresses with magnanimity that the administration should not take legal measures in such cases. However, Ansari said the President’s patience is among the reasons behind such attacks.

As the legal deputy, our duty is to defend the rights of people and we will sue libels and irreverence against the president chosen by the people and the judiciary branch will definitely investigate the lawsuit.

“I have asked the relevant departments to file complaints in the Special Court for Clerics because no one should sense that lawlessness prevails in the country because legal chaos is not becoming of the Islamic Republic,” he added.

Extrajudicial immunity for some media outlets have raised an enormous public outcry after Lasarat, an ultraconservative weekly affiliated with hardliner group Ansar Hezbollah, published photos of Iranian actors and their wives, alongside an offensive headlines. The celebrities had attended the 16th edition of Hafez Awards, annual competition and gala of Iranian cinema which is sponsored by Donya-ye Tasvir film review magazine, was held in Roudaki Hall. Lasarat decorated a photo album of the ceremony with the headline “Who’s a Cuckold?” As a clipping from the weekly went viral, many expected tougher restrictions on the outlet but the weekly continued its pride publication despite a months-old ban the week after. Judiciary officials have now finally came up with promising investigation of the violation of norms in the Hafez gala, and offenders already seem to be going free.

In a year that leads to the presidential campaigns before a race slated next may, similar bans are being lifted one by one from online principlist outlets including Jahan News and Day 9th. Such bans seem to be only binding when a non-principlist outlet is concerned.

ISNA sought comment from reformist Abdollah Nasseri who believes a calculated media strategy has separated the nuclear deal from the establishment, trying to attribute it to the Rouhani administration. The trap, Nasseri says, should have been countered by the administration by providing clarification that the nuclear talks was a governmental case directed ultimately under the direction of the Supreme Leader.

While calling libels against the President as a political offence that could be litigated, Nasseri advised the administration against persecution because “the judiciary is in no position to investigate this and it would be fruitless for the administration to get involved.”