The Latest from Iran (28 March): Politics Resumes

1800 GMT: Economy Watch. Prominent economist Saeed Leylaz has declared that the main problem of the Iranian economy is domestic mismanagement rather than foreign sanctions, adding that smuggling is $20 billion per year.

1755 GMT: Labour Front. Claimed video of a strike on 19 March at the Bandar Imam Petrochemical Complex in Mahshahr in southwestern Iran:

1745 GMT: Dealing with the Sanctions. German Government and financial sources have reportedly told Zeit Online that the German Central Bank is intervening to help broker a deal in which India can pay for oil imports from Iran.

India's transactions have been complicated and then suspended because of the US-led sanctions on Iran.

1715 GMT: Where's Ali? The Supreme Leader spent today in Bushehr Province in southern Iran with families of war dead and employees of the South Pars oil industry employees. He explained that "all around the country, signs of growth and intellectual growth are obvious" but it is "Bushehr people who are among the most original and best people".

1645 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch (Journalism Edition). Arshama3's Blog has updated its invaluable list of detained and restricted journalists --- 59 are in prison and 72 are out on bail.

1640 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Blogger Ahmad Nourmohamadi Abadchi has been arrested, and his computer and personal items have been confiscated.

Composer and singer Afshin Taheri has been released on $100,000 bail.

0545 GMT: The President's Party. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave his final New Year message for Iranians last night in a ceremony at Tehran's Vahdat Hall. Although he took a swipe at "America and its allies" with their "fighter aircraft, missiles and bombs" amidst "destruction, poverty and humiliation", most of the speech was devoted to a projection of "human hope" and "cooperation" in the New Year.

0510 GMT: May Day Movement? News also comes from the other side of the political divide.

The opposition channel RASA TV focuses on the European Union's call for the release of Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi from house arrest/detention, while a series of posters has emerged for May Day. Possibly in aspiration for protests on the day, they celebrate the unity of workers and teachers and remembering political prisoners like union activist Mansur Osanloo:

0440 GMT: Some Iranian state media are focused this morning on a summary of the Government's New Year ceremonies, joined by five Presidents of countries in the regions, and the familiar charges of the West's transgressions of human rights (though Fars, for some reason, has nothing about President Ahmadinejad's Nowruz display).

IRNA and Press TV feature the news, which we noted yesterday, that Ahmadinejad has given a two-seater airplane to Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, and there is another focus on the region with a story on Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi's meeting with his Turkmen and Armenian counterparts.

Yet, despite this narrow window on celebration and Iran's human rights supremacy, there are signs that Iranian politics is rousing from its New Year's break. Even more striking than an airplane gift was the warning of Guardian Council spokesman Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei to politicians within the system not to associate with "counter-revolutionary" elements; otherwise, the ban on candidacy for next year's Parliament --- already being applied to many reformists --- could be extended to them.

Kadkhodaei's warning was locked in a political two-step with statements by some of those establishment politicians which indicated they were not ready to give up criticism of the Government. Ahmad Tavakoli, leading MP and relative of Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani, was one, predicting increased conflict between Parliament and a Goverment led by a "dictatorial" Ahmadinejad.