The Latest from Iran (23 May): The Net Closes on Ahmadinejad's Inner Circle

1530 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Mousavi campaign activist Reza Safavi has been arrested in a raid of his home by six agents, with his computer and other items confiscated.

1515 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch (cont.). More on the unusual interview in which the President's son-in-law tears apart the President's advisors....

Mehdi Khorshidi says that the leader of "deviant group" --- presumably Presidential Chief of Staff Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai --- never studied theology but dares to comment on religious matters. Indeed, Rahim-Mashai is so arrogant that he challenges Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi, who is esteemed by the Supreme Leader and has 30 years of experience.

Khorshidi continues that Rahim-Mashai has endeavoured to sabotage and eliminate useful people around Ahmadinejad, replacing them with his cronies.

And Khorshidi's reference to the "deviant group" splashing out money on "problematic" people such as actors? Well, in January, Hojatoleslam Mohammad-Taqi Rahbar, the head of the clerical faction in Parliament, noted Rahim-Mashai’s meeting with an Iranian actress, Hedyeh Tehrani, at the Presidential office:

Anyone with a bit of Principlist zeal will not approve of the lowly acts of the Head of the Presidential office. All Principlists especially the President’s true supporters are ashamed that such a character is running the office of the president.....I don’t know what an actress’s [photograph] exhibition has to do with the head of the presidential office that he has to fund it with $80,000 from the Treasury. These loans are handed out by him [Mashai] at a time when many farmers are struggling with repeated droughts and are starving. Yet the government refuses to give them a $1,000 loan.

1355 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. The crisis around the President has come all the way back to his own family....

In an interview with Fars, Ahmadinejad's son-in-law Mehdi Khorshidi attacks Vice President Baghaei --- suspended this weekend for four years for "numerous violations" --- and Presidential Chief of Staff Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai. Khorshidi says the two men lead a deviant group trying to eliminate Ahmadinejad's true confidantes.

Khorshidi asserts that the group has used government funds to establish its own social base and to distribute riches among "problematic" people, especially actors.

1350 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch (Oil Edition). State news agency is now reporting that President Ahmadinejad will not be going to June's meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (see 1230 GMT).

Ahmadinejad has named himself caretaker Minister of Oil, which would have put in the chair of the OPEC discussions as Iran is the rotating President of the group.

1250 GMT: The US Hikers. US citizens Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal, detained since July 2009, have called home for only the third time.

Bauer and Fattal told their families they had staged a 17-day hunger strike after they were stopped from receiving letters.

The trial of the two men, detained with Bauer's fiancee Sarah Shourd while walking along the Iran-Iraq border, was scheduled to resume on 11 May but the defendants were not brought to court.

1240 GMT: Economy Watch. Gholam-Reza Mesbahi-Moghaddam, a leading member of Parliament's Economic Commission, claims that there are no funds available for agricultural and industrial subsidies this year.

1230 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch (Oil Edition). The head of Parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, Alaeddin Boroujerdi, has called for the appointment of a caretaker Minister of Oil before June's meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries.

President Ahmadinejad has declared himself the caretaker Minister, but the move has been criticised by MPs and ruled illegal by the Guardian Council.

The spokesman for the Council repeated today, "According to various articles of the constitution...the President cannot be personally responsible for the supervision of the ministries that do not have a minister."

Iran is the rotating President of OPEC, so its representative will chair the June discussions.

1215 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Tehran University graduate student and Mousavi campaign activist Saeideh Kurdinejad has been sentenced to two years in prison.

Student activist Habib Farzadi has been sentenced to 4 years and 5 months and fined.

1210 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. Senior Presidential advisor Mojtaba Samareh Hashemi has told journalists that the President's trips to the provinces are postponed until further notice.

Samareh Hashemi said Ahmadinejad's tours outside Tehran might resume before Ramadan, which starts in mid-August, but no commitment would be made at this point.

Ahmadinejad has built a political reputation upon his numerous trips throughout Iran to attract popular support, both in election campaigns and as President.

1120 GMT: All-is-Well Alert. The pro-Ahmadinejad news agency IRNA headlines a remark by the head of the paramilitary Basij, Mohammad Reza Naqdi, denying stories in foreign media of hostility by the Basij and Revolutionary Guards towards the Government.

IRNA does not report what Naqdi said about stories in the Iranian media reporting critical comments by military commanders about the Ahmadinejad administration.

1050 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. Just spoke with a well-placed source, who offered the following for consideration....

Two weeks ago, Ayatollah Jannati, the head of the Guardian Council, met the Supreme Leader. Jannati declared that it was time to move against the President, given his threat to the system of velayat-e faqih (clerical supremacy).

The source says this weekend's suspension of Vice President Hamid Baghaei, banned for four years from civil service because of "numerous violations" while head of Iran's Culture and Heritage Organization, is the first step to strip away advisors from Ahmadinejad.

Next will be 1st Vice President Mohammad Reza Rahimi, who has faced sustained allegations of corruption.

And then it will be Ahmadinejad's right-hand man, Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai.

0940 GMT: Sanctions Watch. The Council of the European Union has adopted legislation to strengthen sanctions against Iran over its nuclear programme, including the naming of more individuals and entitites to be subjected to travel restrictions and assets freezes.

Details will be published tomorrow.

0755 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. And what has the President been doing while the political conflict swirls?

Telling an audience of Iranian women that they "are the managers of human society".

0745 GMT: The President's Right-Hand Man. Fars returns to the attack on Presidential Chief of Staff Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai, launched last week, over the handling of a $400 million building project on Kish Island.

0740 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch (CyberWar Edition). Websites supporting President Ahmadinejad are being filtered or are off-line, including Nahal News, Aeen News, and Azadi News.

0720 GMT: Reform Watch. Expect a lot of comment today casting a historical perspective upon contemporary events --- today is 2 Khordad, the 14th anniversary of the election of President Mohammad Khatami. Mardomak summarises, "In Search of Lost Time".

0510 GMT: Another day of increased pressure on President Ahmadinejad, with more verbal attacks and political and legal challenges to his inner circle.

The most prominent warnings this weekend came from the armed forces, with top Revolutionary Guards commanders and the Supreme Leader's chief military advisor talking of the danger of the "deviant current" around Ahmadinejad. 

A reminder of the pressure came with the news that Abbas Amirifar, the leader of prayers in the  Presidential office, had attempted suicide in prison. And last night, there were unconfirmed reports that the former head of the Iranian Abroad Organization, a close ally of Ahmadinejad's right-hand man Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai, had been detained.

And there was a sharp slap in the face for the President himself, as the Foundation organising the annual ceremony for the death of Ayatollah Khomeini announced that Ahmadinejad would not be speaking. Officially, the explanation was that the President had not accepted his invitation by the deadline, but the exclusion was pointed: last year, Ahmadinejad supporters challenged the clergy by shouting down the Ayatollah's grandson, Seyed Hassan Khomeini.