Reformist hopes for breakthrough as Iran votes

Iranians cast their ballots Friday in a presidential election marked by a lone reformist's bid to break through against a divided conservative field.

Around 61 million Iranians are eligible to vote in the election called after the death of ultraconservative president Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter crash last month.

The ballot comes against a backdrop of heightened regional tensions over the Gaza war and discontent over the state of Iran's sanctions-hit economy.

The contenders approved by the Guardian Council, which vets all candidates, include conservative parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf and ultraconservative former nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili. Also running are the sole reformist, Masoud Pezeshkian, and a fourth candidate, cleric Mostafa Pourmohammadi.

Two ultraconservatives -- Tehran mayor Alireza Zakani and Raisi's former vice president Amir-Hossein Ghazizadeh-Hashemi -- dropped out on the eve of the election.

Voting was underway nationwide at more than 58,000 polling stations, mostly in schools and mosques.

Iran's interior ministry later said the voting period had been extended by two hours to 20:00 local time (16:00 GMT).

Calling it "a day of joy and happiness," supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei voted shortly after the polls opened.

"We encourage our dear people to take the issue of voting seriously and participate," said Khamenei, who holds ultimate political power in the Islamic republic.

At the last poll in 2021, turnout was just under 49 percent. Voters opted to stay away after the Guardian Council disqualified many reformists and moderates.

 Cautious hopes 

 Ahead of this election, some voters expressed concerns about the mounting effects of soaring inflation and the decline of the rial against the dollar.

"We indeed have problems, everything is expensive, but we hope that with the arrival of a new president these problems will be solved," said Ghezelbash, a retired employee from the public sector, who only gave his last name.

"We are Iranians and make our own decisions about the country's issues."

Another voter, Mohammad Reza Hadi, 37, a student in Tehran, said: "We are taking part in the election to determine the political fate and governance of our country ourselves."

Khamenei insisted this week that "the most qualified candidate" must be "the one who truly believes in the principles of the Islamic Revolution" of 1979 that overthrew the US-backed monarchy.

The next president, he said, must allow Iran "to move forward without being dependent on foreign countries", although he added Iran should not "cut its relations with the world".

The candidacy of Pezeshkian, until recently a relative unknown, has revived cautious hopes for Iran's reformist wing after years of dominance by the conservative and ultraconservative camps.

Iran's last reformist president, Mohammad Khatami, praised him as "honest, fair and caring".

Khatami, who served from 1997 to 2005, had also endorsed the moderate Hassan Rouhani, who won the presidency and sealed Iran's nuclear deal in 2015 with Western powers before it was derailed three years later.

The Iranian opposition, particularly in the diaspora, has called for a boycott of the vote which they see as not credible.

Iranian opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi did not cast a ballot, even though he could have despite the more than 13 years he has spent under house arrest, without charge.

An unsuccessful reformist presidential candidate in 2009, Mousavi alleged large-scale fraud in favour of the hardline incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, leading to mass protests.

 Debate over hijab 

 During campaign debates, Jalili criticised the moderates for having signed the 2015 accord which promised Iran sanctions relief in return for curbs on its nuclear programme.

Jalili said the deal, which the United States withdrew from in 2018 under then-president Donald Trump, "did not benefit Iran at all".

Jalili led Iran's nuclear programme negotiations between 2007 and 2013.

Pezeshkian has urged efforts to salvage the agreement and lift crippling sanctions.

"Are we supposed to be eternally hostile to America, or do we aspire to resolve our problems with this country?" he asked.

On the eve of the ballot, the United States on Thursday announced sanctions against shipping companies, based in the United Arab Emirates, for transporting Iranian oil, saying it was a response to "escalations" in Iran's nuclear programme.

The contentious issue of the compulsory head covering for women also emerged during the campaign, almost two years since a vast protest movement swept the country after the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, 22.

An Iranian Kurd, Amini had been arrested for an alleged violation of the dress code.

In televised debates, all candidates distanced themselves from the sometimes heavy-handed police arrests of women refusing to wear the hijab head covering in public.

Pourmohammadi, the only clerical candidate, said that "under no circumstances should we treat Iranian women with such cruelty".

Early projections of the results are expected by Saturday morning and official results by Sunday.

If no candidate wins 50 percent of the vote, a second round will be held on July 5, for only the second time in Iranian electoral history after the 2005 vote went to a runoff.