LONDON: Iranian lawmakers have given President Hassan Rouhani one month to appear before parliament to answer questions on his government’s handling of Iran’s economic struggles, state media reported on Wednesday.
It is the first time parliament has summoned Rouhani, who is under pressure from hard-line rivals to change his cabinet following a deterioration in relations with the United States and Iran’s growing economic difficulties.
Lawmakers want to question Rouhani on topics including the rial’s decline, which has lost more than half its value since April, weak economic growth and rising unemployment, according to semi-official ISNA news agency.
Rouhani, a pragmatist who reduced tensions with the West by striking the nuclear deal in 2015, is facing a growing backlash since US President Donald Trump pulled out from the pact in May and said he will reimpose sanctions that seek to throttle Iran’s economy, including its lifeblood oil exports.
According to ISNA, lawmakers also want to Rouhani to explain why, after more than two years of signing a nuclear deal that curbed Iran’s nuclear program in return for lifting of most international sanctions, Iranian banks still only have limited access to global financial services.
Rouhani’s summons comes amid further shows of public discontent. A number of protests have broken out in Iran since the beginning of the year over high prices, water shortage, power cuts, and alleged corruption in the Islamic Republic.
On Tuesday, protesters hundreds of people rallied in cities across the country, including Isfahan, Karaj, Shiraz and Ahvaz, in protest at high inflation caused in part by the weak rial.
Parliamentary speaker Ali Larijani was quoted as saying by state television that Rouhani will have one month to attend a parliamentary session and address the issues.
Trump said on Monday that he would be willing to meet Rouhani without preconditions to discuss how to improve relations, but senior Iranian officials and military commanders rejected the offer as worthless and “a dream.”
Rouhani appointed a new central bank governor last week and accepted the resignation of the government spokesman on Tuesday, suggesting that he is conceding a need for reshuffling his economic team.
In a separate letter to Rouhani on Wednesday, 193 lawmakers welcomed these changes “as a good starting point” and asked for “maximum shake-up” in the government.
Iran’s parliament summons Rouhani as economy falters under US pressures
Iran’s parliament summons Rouhani as economy falters under US pressures
- Lawmakers want to question Rouhani on topics including the rial’s decline, which has lost more than half its value since April
- A number of protests have broken out in Iran since the beginning of the year over high prices, water shortage, power cuts, and alleged corruption
Top Hamas leader rejects disarmament or ‘foreign rule’
- “As long as there is occupation, there is resistance. Resistance is a right of peoples under occupation” said Meshal
DOHA: A senior Hamas leader said Sunday that the Palestinian Islamist movement would not surrender its weapons nor accept foreign intervention in Gaza, pushing back against US and Israeli demands.
“Criminalizing the resistance, its weapons, and those who carried it out is something we should not accept,” Khaled Meshal said at a conference in Doha.
“As long as there is occupation, there is resistance. Resistance is a right of peoples under occupation ... something nations take pride in,” said Meshal, who previously headed the group.
Hamas, an Islamist movement, has waged an armed struggle against what it sees as Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories. It launched a deadly cross-border raid into Israel from Gaza on October 7, 2023, which triggered the latest war.
A US-brokered ceasefire in Gaza is in its second phase, which foresees that demilitarization of the territory — including the disarmament of Hamas — along with a gradual withdrawal of Israeli forces.
Hamas has repeatedly said that disarmament is a red line, although it has indicated it could consider handing over its weapons to a future Palestinian governing authority.
Israeli officials say that Hamas still has around 20,000 fighters and about 60,000 Kalashnikovs in Gaza.
A Palestinian technocratic committee has been set up with a goal of taking over the day-to-day governance in the battered Gaza Strip, but it remains unclear whether, or how, it will address the issue of demilitarization.
The committee operates under the so-called “Board of Peace,” an initiative launched by US President Donald Trump.
Originally conceived to oversee the Gaza truce and post-war reconstruction, the board’s mandate has since expanded, prompting concerns among critics that it could evolve into a rival to the United Nations.
Trump unveiled the board at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss ski resort of Davos last month, where leaders and officials from nearly two dozen countries joined him in signing its founding charter.
Alongside the Board of Peace, Trump also created a Gaza Executive Board — an advisory panel to the Palestinian technocratic committee — comprising international figures including US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, as well as former British prime minister Tony Blair.
On Sunday, Meshal urged the Board of Peace to adopt what he called a “balanced approach” that would allow for Gaza’s reconstruction and the flow of aid to its roughly 2.2 million residents, while warning that Hamas would “not accept foreign rule” over Palestinian territory.
“We adhere to our national principles and reject the logic of guardianship, external intervention, or the return of a mandate in any form,” Meshal said.
“Palestinians are to govern Palestinians. Gaza belongs to the people of Gaza and to Palestine. We will not accept foreign rule,” he added.
