Iran Snapshot: The Politics of Smog

Earlier this year, the Majlis approved a $2 billion expansion of the Tehran subway system, with extension of the existing services and completion of two new lines , taking the Metro from the centre of Tehran to Imam Khomeini International Airport 25 miles away. 

But the Ahmadinejad Government has refused to allow the allocation. The reason? It is another front in the contest for control between Parliament and the President, but the financing would also hand more power to another rival of Ahmadinejad, Tehran Mayor Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf.

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Iran Guidance: How Should the US Talk with Tehran?

An EA correspondent writes:

Marginalising Ahmadinejad and his stubbornly anti-Western thought is the only way forward for meaningful dialogue with people inside the regime, but even then at the cost of throwing the human rights issue under the train: no regime insider, not even more flexible ones such as Tehran Mayor Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf, will come to terms on that front.

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The Latest from Iran (15 September): Ahmadinejad and His Challenges

1710 GMT: Ahmadinejad's Foreign Policy Move --- A Reminder (see 1310 and 1325 GMT). The Associated Press, for inexplicable reasons, is reporting that the President has "demoted" six aides from "senior envoys" to "advisors" for international affairs.

No, that's not a demotion, that's just another name for Ahmadinejad's staff as they take on foreign policy posts. (And AP might have noted that the President, far from backing down in the face of the Supreme Leader's criticism, has added two envoys-now-advisors to the four he originally named.)

And while we're talking who is trying to claim Iran's foreign policy, let's note a statement from the office of one of Ahmadinejad's Vice Presidents: it was the President who took the final decision on the release of US hiker Sarah Shourd, acting "for humanitarian reasons".

1700 GMT: Oil Squeeze (Subsidy Cut Edition). Tehran has postponed increasing the price of gasoline, despite the subsidy cut plan which was to be implemented next week.

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