Ahmadinejad grabs security power centers

TEHRAN, Sept. 3 (UPI) -- President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's drive to take over the power centers of Iran's security services got a hefty boost Wednesday when Parliament approved a former Revolutionary Guards chief wanted for the deadly 1994 bombing of a Jewish center in Argentina as minister of defense.

Gen. Ahmad Vahidi received the biggest show of support by any of the Cabinet nominees -- 227 votes among the 286 lawmakers attending the session -- despite strong international condemnation for his alleged involvement in terrorism that followed his nomination by the firebrand president on Aug. 18.

Ahmadinejad's nominees for three other key posts in his 21-member Cabinet -- the ministers of interior, intelligence and oil -- were also approved.

They, like the new defense minister and Ahmadinejad himself, are all veterans of the hard-line Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, or Pasdaran.

The 120,000-strong corps is the most powerful armed force in Iran and a key base of support for the hard-line president. Its political and economic power has mushroomed since Ahmadinejad was first elected in 2005.

At the time of the bombing of the Israel-Argentina Mutual Association, or AMIA, in Buenos Aires on July 18, 1994, Vahidi was commander of the Pasdaran's secretive al-Quds Force.

This elite unit is responsible for the Guard Corps' clandestine operations outside Iran and works closely with the Hezbollah movement in Lebanon, Iran's most notorious proxy.

Argentine authorities allege that the AMIA attack was planned at the highest level in Tehran and carried out by Hezbollah. Tehran and Hezbollah deny any involvement in the atrocity.

Vahidi is one of five prominent Iranians sought by Argentina for involvement in the bombing. Interpol, the Geneva-based international police organization, issued "red notices" for the Iranians and others in 2007.

Argentine state prosecutor Albert Nisman, who headed the AMIA investigation, says Vahidi was accused being "a key participant in the planning" of the attack, the worst on a Jewish target outside Israel.

"It has been demonstrated that Vahidi participated in and approve of the decision to attack AMIA during a meeting in Iran on Aug. 14, 1993. Iran has always protected terrorists, giving them government posts, but I think never one as high as this one."

The nationwide upheaval triggered by Ahmadinejad's disputed re-election for a second four-year term has fractured the political establishment, pitting Ahmadinejad against the clerical elite who have held unelected power since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

This has involved the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who endorsed Ahmadinejad's re-election, but who has been at pains to prevent an open power struggle that could rip the nation apart.

Ahmadinejad has surrounded himself with men whose loyalty he can count on, especially the Pasdaran and its associated militia, the Basij, which has led the violent crackdown against anti-Ahmadinejad protestors since June 12.

The president has already taken control of the Intelligence Ministry after purging it of officials considered too soft on the protest movement or not loyal enough to him.

The former minister, Gholam Hossein Mohsen-Ejel, was sacked on July 26 for opposing the use of "confessions" of protesters supposedly obtained under torture.

The new intelligence minister is Hojjatoleslam Heydar Moslehi, a mid-ranking cleric and a senior figure in the Pasdaran's powerful intelligence apparatus. He served as Khamenei's representative with the paramilitary Basij and is a former presidential adviser.

The interior minister, responsible for crushing any opposition to Ahmadinejad, is Mostafa Mohammad Najjar, who was switched from the defense portfolio.

Najjar is a veteran Pasdaran commander who has a strong relationship with Ahmadinejad -- and indeed with Khamenei, who appoints all military commanders.

In the 1980s he led the Guard Corps' Middle East Directorate, which means he was closely involved in clandestine operations in the Sunni-dominated Arab states that are now aligned against Shiite Iran.

Najjar also headed the Military Industries Organization, flagship of Iran's burgeoning defense industry, which has reportedly stepped up production of long-range Shehab-3 ballistic missiles capable of hitting Israel.

"The president has two priorities in mind: internal and personal security," according to an Aug. 18 assessment by Strategic Forecasting, a private, Texas-based intelligence consultancy.

"The fissures that erupted in the aftermath of the election are worrying for the president, and he apparently feels that Najjar will be effective in quelling dissent at home."