The Latest from Iran (26 May): Paving the Way for Dictatorship?

Footage of the blaze at the Abadan oil refinery on Tuesday

2015 GMT: A Fire at the Refinery. Siemens AG, Germany’s largest engineering company, has denied that it supplied compressors for Iran’s Abadan oil refinery, where a blast on Tuesday killed at least four people and wounded at least 25.

An Iranian newspaper had claimed that Siemens supplied the compressor that exploded, causing the blaze.

2010 GMT: Government v. Guards. The Ertebatat Zirsakht telecommunications company,operating under the Ministry of Telecommunications, has issued a warning to Iran’s main telecommunications agency TCI that unless it paid up its debt, the country’s telecommunications with the outside world and even between provinces would be cut off “in the near future".

TCI was privatised in 2009, bought by a consortium of three companies partly-owned by the Revolutionary Guards in September of 2009.

2000 GMT: Sanctions Watch. Back from an extended break to find that Spanish police have detained eight people --- five Spanish businessmen and three Iranian nationals --- over the sale of nine military transport helicopters.

As well as the Bell-212 helicopters, worth $140 million, police also found spare parts for export to Venezuela.

Iran is banned from buying attack helicopters under UN sanctions.

1330 GMT: Reformist Watch. Following the "reconciliation" message of former President Mohammad Khatami, prominent reformist Ali Shakouri Rad has said in an interview that reformists never intended to eliminate opponents and that it was essential to talk to people about the political situation.

Shakouri Rad continued that if reformists did not address people, they could be attracted by opposition or deviant currents. He said, "We were too radical at the end of the reform period."

1325 GMT: A Fire at the Refinery. Arman newspaper explains that Tuesday's explosion at the Abadan oil refinery, which occurred as President Ahmadinejad was visiting, resulted from a combination of sanctions and suspect measures to rush the refinery into operation.

The blast, followed by a fire, affected one of the two main compressors of the refinery. The system, used to liquefy gas, was not ready for operation.

Arman claimed the compressors were purchased from Munich-based Siemens AG, but the company refused to send experts to Iran to operate the machine for the launch, citing sanctions.

The newspaper said Iranian personnel were in charge of operating the compressors and were under pressure to proceed with the project despite concerns about an accident.

1320 GMT: The House Arrests. Hossein Karroubi, denying the reports that his parents Mehdi and Fatemeh Karroubi were temporarily freed while a new house of detention was being arranged (see Wednesday's LiveBlog), says that they are controlled by 20 security agents around the clock.

1200 GMT: Ahmadinejad Watch. Press TV notes the President's defense on Wednesday of his Vice President Hamid Baghaei and Chief of Staff Esfandiar Rahim-Mashaei, accused of using their influence to grant a hotel construction project to a company in which they held shares.

“In all countries, facilities, lands and cheap loans are given for building hotels and infrastructures but unfortunately, in our country license for construction of hotels has turned into a crime," Ahmadinejad declared.The website Alef, which Press TV says "belongs to an Iranian lawmaker" (it's Ahmad Tavakoli, ally and relative of Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani), had also claimed that the Government gave away the land the hotel project to the company linked to Baghaei and Rahim-Mashai.

Alef responded to Ahmadinejad's remarks by saying it does not oppose granting licenses for hotel construction but opposes “the uncalculated and fraudulent granting of major economic projects to a circle of friends".

1150 GMT: "Deviant Current" Watch. Tabnak carries a series of attacks on President Ahmadinejad's advisors. Former Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance Mohammad-Hossein Saffar-Harandi links the "deviant current" to the 2009 post-election "sedition". The website claims that Presidential right-hand man Esfandiar Rahim-Mashai, as head of Iran's Culture and Heritage Organization, gave away $1.2 million in 2007.

And Tabnak accuses Vice President Hamid Baghaei of leading regular meetings to plot the moves of the "deviant current".

1145 GMT: Labour Front. Kashan textile workers have continued a protest in front of the Governor's office, demonstrating over no wages for 30 months. Some have reportedly gone on hunger strike.

1140 GMT: A Fire at the Refinery. MPs, including Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani, have continued to press President Ahmadinejad --- in his claimed role of caretaker Minister of Oil for an explanation for this week's explosion and blaze at the Abadan oil refinery.

The incident, which occurred as Ahmadinejad was about to give a speech opening new construction at the facility, killed at least four people.

1130 GMT: Political Prisoner Watch. Ali Hassan Younesi, the son of the former Minister of Intelligence, has been released on bail.

Younesi, a pro-reform lawyer, was arrested on 20 February during opposition protests to demand the freeing of opposition figures Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi from house arrest. He was reportedly sentenced to a year in prison earlier this month.

His father Ali Younesi was a minister in the Khatami Administration.

1115 GMT: Religion Watch. Back from an extended break to find a report that Iranian authorities have banned the import of Qur'ans from China.

0455 GMT: Currency Watch. Instability and alarms in Iran's currency market, as the Iranian toman is now at 1230 to the US dollar, its weakest point since last autumn.

Traders and members of Parliaments are warning that there is a shortage of dollars, given the demand for the US currency.

0440 GMT: Football and Politics. More details about the funeral of football legend Nasser Hejazi, with the mourning turning into political protest.

The wishes of the Hejazi family to hold the ceremony in central Tehran were blocked by authorties. In recent years, Hejazi had been critical of the Government, tried to stand for President in 2005 --- only to be blocked by the Guardian Council --- and decrying Iran's economic situation just before he died of lung cancer on Monday: "Do they expect me to be indifferent to the pains and sufferings of my people?”

So Hejazi was buried quickly outside Tehran, his family unable to get to the cemetery in time. But 15,000 Iranians went to Iran's national football venue, Azadi Stadium in Tehran, to hear Hejazi’s son Atila challenge the regimea nd to chant protest slogans. At least 15 were reportedly arrested in clashes with security forces.

Seyed Hassan Khomeini, the grandson of Ayatollah Khomeini, was expected to lead the prayers but failed to appear. However, Mohsen Safai Farahani, the former president of the Iran Football Federation, was there --- he has been freed from a six-year prison sentence on medical grounds --- to be greeted by the crowd with “All political prisoners must be free” and “People’s Heroes: Hejazi and Safai”.

(hat tip to Martin Fletcher of The Times of London)

0430 GMT: So who warned last night that the Ahmadinejad Government could be "paving the way for dictatorship"?

The Obama Administration? Israel? The Green Movement? Mir Hossein Mousavi?

Step up, Speaker of Parliament Ali Larijani.

Speaking to a conference in Tehran, Larijani warned of the Government's attempt to control Parliament, concentrating power in the Executive. To make his point clear, he spoke of the mistakes of Mohammad Mossadegh, overthrown in a coup in 1953, and the Islamic Republic's first President, Abolhassan Bani Sadr, threatened with assassination and forced to flee the country in 1981. And he also spoke of the "dictatorship" of the Pahlavi Shahs.