Iranian candidate urges more openness

TEHRAN, Iran — Iran's leading presidential candidate promised yesterday to open up his homeland to the world, a vision that seems to contradict the goals of the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Khamenei has called on Iranians to elect an anti-Western president, but Hashemi Rafsanjani said yesterday that Iran needs "to think global, since globalization is a reality and not a foreign-made (concept)."

"Iran needs a new form of communication with the world. We have to take the international climate into account and take advantage of it," said Rafsanjani, 70, a former president who is considered the front-runner among the eight candidates in the June 17 election.

Rafsanjani is running under the slogan "Let's work together." It is interpreted as a conciliatory gesture, because he has moved frequently between the hard-line and moderate camps in a country where conservative clerics have maintained control despite strong electoral showings by reformers.

The United States severed relations with Iran shortly after the country's 1979 Islamic revolution and any suggestion of talks with Washington, D.C., is highly sensitive.

Rafsanjani is one of few candidates to focus on Iran's foreign relations.

Mostafa Moin, a reformist and close ally of departing reform President Mohammad Khatami, has promised freedom and democratic reforms. Moin enjoys popularity among Iran's predominantly young population.

Other candidates have focused on job creation and reducing inflation.

Clerical leaders hope for a big election turnout to boost their credibility at a time when Iran remains under intense international pressure over its nuclear program, which Washington, D.C., and others suspect is aimed at developing atomic weapons, a charge that Iran denies.

But private surveys indicate that only about half of Iran's 48 million voters plan to cast ballots.

Rafsanjani, who was president from 1989 to 1997, borrowed many of the same campaign slogans that propelled Khatami to landslide wins in 1997 and 2001. According to official statistics, about two-thirds of Iran's population of more than 67 million are under 25. The minimum voting age is 15.

He holds a commanding lead in opinion polls ahead of the elections, but he gave few details in a 14-point manifesto presented on state television.

"Times have changed ... By adopting new methods, we should establish democracy," Rafsanjani said, stressing that policies from his first two terms as president needed to be updated for modern times.

He is considered the most moderate of the five conservative candidates hoping to replace Khatami, who is barred from standing for a third consecutive term. Three reformists are also running.

Khatami's attempts to create a freer society have repeatedly foundered on opposition from hard-liners who control the courts, armed forces and broadcast media, leading many young voters to turn their back on politics altogether.

"I do not think he [Rafsanjani] is the powerful man he used to be. Under our law, the president has not much power," said Amira, a 24-year-old student.

A midranking cleric who has held most of the top political positions, Rafsanjani also promised women a greater role in Iran's male-dominated society.

"The government should pave the way for women's presence in all fields, where men are already active," he said.

Opinion polls, which are often unreliable, suggest that while Rafsanjani leads closest rival former Police Chief Mohammad Baqer Qalibaf by a wide margin, he lacks the support needed to win outright.

If no candidate gets at least 50 percent of votes, the top two candidates enter a run-off.