TEHRAN (AFP) –
Iranian hardliners warned Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Wednesday to obey the country's supreme leader, piling further pressure on the embattled president following his disputed re-election and a series of controversial political decisions.
In a rare gesture to Ahmadinejad's opponents, the authorities on Tuesday freed 140 protesters detained in the wave of massive public demonstrations against his return to office in an election the opposition says was rigged.
The hardline president's standing has also been weakened even within his own support base, forcing him into a humiliating climbdown over a political appointment that was blocked by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
"One should not hesitate in implementing the leader's order," hardline cleric and vocal Ahmadinejad critic Ahmad Khatami was quoted as saying by the Resalat newspaper.
Ahmadinejad's post-election troubles stemmed from his choice of a controversial aide as his first deputy and his tardiness in terminating the appointment despite a written order from Khamenei.
He also sacked Intelligence Minister Gholam Hossein Mohseni Ejeie reportedly after a quarrel over the delay in dismissing Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie as first vice president, further irking the powerful conservative wing.
"Mr Ahmadinejad must apologise to people," said the front-page headline of Yalesarat, a hardline weekly newspaper.
"You have preferred to pour your love on someone like Mashaie than the leader. Mr Ahmadinejad, if this attitude continues, we want you to return our votes," it said in an editorial.
Another harsh warning came from prominent conservative group the Islamic Society of Engineers which threatened Ahmadinejad of consequences if he moved "away from the clerics."
"The people's continued support for you depends on your unconditional obedience of the supreme leader and departing from this path will have consequences," it said in a letter to Ahmadinejad published on Tuesday.
"It seems you did not consider your best interests by appointing Mr Mashaie as your chief of staff."
Mashaie, who provoked controversy last year for saying Iran was a friend of the Israeli people, subsequently stood down after Khamenei ordered Ahmadinejad to dismiss him but was immediately appointed as the president's chief of staff.
In another slap in the face for Ahmadinejad, 210 of the country's 290 MPs signed a statement on Tuesday praising Ejeie and saying he had passed a "great test" in defending Khamenei.
But in a rather sarcastic column, the reformist Etemad Melli newspaper said the hardliners must "support and cooperate with the president who you say won the people's vote in a clean and lawful race!"
Khamenei had staunchly defended Ahmadinejad's re-election in the June 12 poll in the face of massive public demonstrations that set off the worst crisis in the 30-year history of the Islamic republic.
About 30 people were killed and many scores wounded in the post-election unrest, while the authorities initially rounded up several thousand protesters, reformists and journalists.
In a gesture to the opposition camp on Tuesday, the authorities on Tuesday freed 140 protestors, while Khamenei ordered the closure of a detention centre holding some protestors amid opposition allegations of prisoner abuse.
Ahmadinejad himself also wrote to judiciary chief Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Sahrudi instructing him to release remaining detainees within the next 10 days, in his first such comments concerning the protesters.
"We want their families to be happy by their release. They should be home for the occasion of the birth anniversary of Imam Mahdi which falls on August 7," he said in a letter to Shahrudi on Tuesday.
Around 200 people remain behind bars, including 50 who are suspected of masterminding riots, according to an MP who visited detainees in the notorious Evin prison on Tuesday.
The authorities, however, have banned the opposition from holding a planned mourning ceremony in Tehran on Thursday for those slain during the riots.
