Many boycott as Ahmadinejad takes oath

Los Angeles Times

BEIRUT, Lebanon - Dogged by allegations of election fraud and battered by some within his own conservative camp, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad limped defiantly into his second term as Iran's president yesterday, vowing to strive for "national greatness."

As he was sworn in, the empty seats of reformist and moderate politicians boycotting the ceremony gaped from the gallery inside the parliament building in Tehran while police fired tear gas and swung truncheons to quell a demonstration outside. Both highlighted the domestic challenges Ahmadinejad faces in attempting to consolidate power and implement his hard-line agenda.

Ahmadinejad, 52, told lawmakers and dignitaries he would dedicate himself to serving the Iranian people and to taking bold steps on the world stage.

"It is not important who voted for whom. What we need is national greatness," he said in a speech broadcast live on television after he was sworn in by the judiciary chief, Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi. "We are representing a great nation. It needs great decisions and great deeds. We need to take great steps."

But Ahmadinejad might find achieving greatness a long, hard road, analysts said. He has built his political base on populist economic giveaways and a defiant foreign policy that have won him the fealty of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, but might be difficult to maintain. His unyielding drive has led to significant clashes with his own hard-line camp, some of whom skipped yesterday's ceremony.

"He is facing problems and disputes even among his own . . . faction let alone a widening gap with the people outside the government," said Ahmad Shirzad, a political analyst and physicist.

The Obama administration has said it would recognize Ahmadinejad as Iran's leader, although Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton praised the opposition yesterday during an appearance in Africa.

"We take the reality that the person who was inaugurated today will be considered the president," Clinton told reporters in Nairobi, Kenya. "But we appreciate and we admire the continuing resistance and ongoing efforts by the reformers to make the changes that the Iranian people deserve."

Iran's detention last week of three Americans who strayed across the border while hiking in northern Iraq has added a new point of friction in relations with Washington.

Governments in the United States, Britain, France, and Germany have said they would not send him a customary note of congratulations.

"No one in Iran is waiting for your congratulations," Ahmadinejad said. "We do not value your congratulations, and we don't value your smiles."

Despite such bluster, Ahmadinejad faces an emboldened, savvy opposition camp unlike anything Iran has experienced in recent years. The unpredictable and loosely organized protest movement continues to defy authorities.

During the inauguration ceremony, amateur video showed thousands gathering around the parliament before they were forcefully dispersed by as many as 6,000 security personnel wielding truncheons and tear gas.

A woman carried a banner warning Iran's leaders to listen to the people's demands or face the same fate as Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who was toppled in the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi and other reformist politicians, emerging as leaders of the movement, continue to question the election results and the government's legitimacy.

"Neither Mousavi nor I have stood back," Mahdi Karroubi, longtime former parliamentary speaker who boycotted the inauguration, said in comments quoted by several Persian-language news Web sites. "We will continue our protests."

Ahmadinejad also faces challenges from his conservative rivals, including parliamentary speaker Ali Larijani, who presided over yesterday's ceremony, as well as Tehran Mayor Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf and former Revolutionary Guard chief Mohsen Rezaei, who both skipped it.