Iranians yearning for more freedom at domestic and less isolation abroad have emphatically re-elected President Hassan Rouhani,throwing down a challenge to the conservative clergy that still holds ultimate sway.
State television congratulated Rouhani on his victory. The architect of Iran's still-fragile detente with the West, he led with 58.6 percent of the vote, or compared with 39.8 percent for his main challenger,hardline judge Ebrahim Raisi, according to approach-total results broadcast on Saturday.
Although the powers of the elected president are limited by those of unelected Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei who outranks him, and the scale of Rouhani's victory gives the pro-reform camp a strong mandate.
Rouhani's opponent Raisi was a protege of Khamenei,tipped in Iranian media as a potential successor for the 77-year-ancient supreme leader who has been in power since 1989.
The re-election is likely to safeguard the nuclear agreement Rouhani's government reached with global powers in 2015, under which most international sanctions have been lifted in return for Iran curbing its nuclear program.
And it delivers a setback to the Revolutionary Guards, and the powerful security force which controls a huge industrial empire in Iran. They had thrown their support behind Raisi to safeguard its interests.
"I am very happy for Rouhani's win. We won. We did not yield to pressure. We showed them that we still exist," said 37-year-ancient Mahnaz, a reformist voter reached by telephone in the early hours of Saturday. "I want Rouhani to carry out his promises."[br]Nevertheless, and Rouhani stills faces the same restrictions on his ability to transform Iran that prevented him from delivering substantial social change in his first term and thwarted reform efforts by one of his predecessors,Mohammad Khatami.
Source: tert.am