The Latest from Iran (14 August): Recovering from an Earthquake

See also The Latest from Iran (13 August): The Political Aftershocks of the Earthquakes

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1739 GMT: The Labour Front. Complaining about no wages for eight months, 600 steel workers protested today in front of the Ministry of Industry.

1722 GMT: The Battle Within. Yesterday we reported:

Iran News Network claims that two former Ministers have asked for a staff from the Executive, legislative, and judicial branches to be organised to manage the country, effectively taking power from the Government.

Radio Farda suggests the two ex-Ministers could be Iran Inspector General and former Minister of Interior Mostafa Pourmohammadi and former Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki.

Today Robert Tait of The Daily Telegraph of London adds a third name and the claim that the appeal was made to Ayatollah Khamenei:

Three of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's former ministers have called on Iran's supreme leader to form an emergency "government of all the talents" that will effectively curb the president's power.

Manouchehr Mottaki, the former foreign minister, Mostafa Pourmohammadi, who served as interior minister, and Davoud Danesh Jafari, the ex-finance minister, have urged the radical move in a letter to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, citing the country's "sensitive and critical situation".

It calls for the establishment of a special cabinet of "wise men" made up of the heads of the executive, legislative and judicial branches, which would then govern Iran for the next year until Mr Ahmadinejad's term ends.

Mr Ahmadinejad would be a member of such a body as head of the executive branch. But his powers would be diluted and prestige drastically reduced....

In an editorial, [pro-Ahmadinejad newspaper] Iran criticised the former ministers' note as an attempt "to portray the country's situation as critical and justify extraordinary approaches outside legal boundaries to resolve an artificial crisis".

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The Latest from Iran (20 December): Gasoline, Bread, and Diplomacy

1754 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Detained attorney Nasrin Sotoudeh has ended her hunger strike.

Sotoudeh's refusal of food and water was her third since she was detained in early September.

1750 GMT: Subsidy Cuts Watch. Fars reports that the "real" price of bread will be posted tomorrow.

1745 GMT: Policing Cyber-Knowledge. Peyke reports that Iranian authorities have blocked the websites of Google Books, 4Shared, and Dehkhoda Encyclopedia.

1615 GMT: Corruption Watch. Iran Prosecutor General Gholam Hossein Mohseni-Ejei has said that 1st Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi will have to stand trial on corruption charges.

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The Latest from Iran (14 November): "Green Movement is Alive"

2120 GMT: CyberWatch. The website of the Feminist School has been filtered for the 19th time by Iranian authorities.

2100 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. HRANA reports that Commander Moghaddam, head of Mir Hossein Mousavi's Isargaran Committee, has been arrested after he and other veterans had a meeting with Mousavi this week.

2055 GMT: Economy Watch. While Iran waits for the implementation of subsidy cuts, Rah-e-Sabz reports that prices for 29 essential foods have risen weekly, with the highest increases for fresh vegetables (10.3%) and legumes (5.6%).

2045 GMT: Free Thinking, Khatami Style. Former President Mohammad Khatami, meeting former academics, has said that criticism of the regime is "due to sympathy". Speaking directly about the suspension of "Western-style" humanities instruction in universities, Khatami declared, "You cannot change the world or humanities with official orders".

The former President added, "If politics is based on free elections, many problems will be solved."

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The Latest from Iran (10 November): Covering Nukes, Remembering Rights

2120 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. A source close to Nasrin Sotoudeh says that the detained attorney has ended her dry hunger strike after almost two weeks.

Sotoudeh, imprisoned since 4 September, was also on hunger strike for four weeks up mid-October. Iranian authorities say she will be tried in court on Monday.

1955 GMT: Women's Rights. Iran has failed to secure election to the executive board of the new UN super-agency on women's rights.

Initially, Iran was guaranteed a seat becasue the Asian region put forth 10 candidates for 10 seats, but East Timor was a late applicant.

Saudi Arabia, whose candidacy was also criticised by rights groups, secured one of the seats.

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The Latest from Iran (26 October): Microbes, Propaganda, and the US Government-Wikileaks Conspiracy

1940 GMT: Subsidy Cuts Watch. The head of the State Inspectorate Organization, Mostafa Pour-Mohammadi, has criticized the Government for not yet implementing the subsidy reform plan, saying even one day of delay causes huge losses to the national economy.

Mehr notes that the Government made support payments in three provinces last Monday but that there has been no developments since then and the lack of information has caused worries among the people.

1935 GMT: The Khamenei Roadshow. It's Day 7 of the Supreme Leader's visit to Qom, and the tension of whether he would meet senior clerics has given way to setpieces with other groups --- today's was a speech to youth and university students.

Still, it may be telling that Ayatollah Khamenei still feels he has to defend an election held more than 16 months ago. He insisted that protesters should have followed legal methods to file their challenges, and he complained about the “lack of insight” by some candidates who claimed the presidential vote was rigged.

The Supreme Leader also denounced the US and its allies, saying atrocities committed by foreign forces in Iraq and Afghanistan show that they are the "enemies of humanity" and the "result of the Western world's distance from divine thought" and the “abuse of power and wealth” by hegemonic powers.

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The Latest from Iran (28 September): Rumbling On

2010 GMT: Rumour of Day. We have listened for days as chatter spread about the killings last week of two Tehran doctors,  Abdolreza Sudbakhsh and Gholamreza Sarabi, by gunmen on motorcycles. 

Iran officials said Dr. Sarabi was killed in revenge over a botched medical case while there were no comments about the case of Dr. Sudbakhsh.

Now Rah-e-Sabz has offered a political link in the case of Dr. Sudbakhsh, who was one of the physicians responsible for inmate health at the Kahrizak detention center, where post-election protesters were abused and killed.

The website claimed that Dr. Sudbakhsh had been ordered by Iranian security officials to give false diagnoses regarding Kahrizak detainees. For example, Mohsen Ruholamini, the son of the campaign manager of conservative presidential candidate Mohsen Rezaei, was initially said to have died from meningitis. Later it was established --- and confirmed in a parliamentary report --- that he died from beatings at Kahrizak.

We're still cautious but the story has now spread to the pages of The New York Times.

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