Elections headquarters staff work to register candidates for the June 18 presidential elections at the Interior Ministry in Tehran, Iran, May 11, 2021.
Iranian state television on Tuesday announced that a list with seven candidates has been approved by the country's constitutional watchdog to run for president next month.
Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei, the spokesman of the Guardian Council, quoted by state TV as saying “only seven” had been approved out of some 590 who were registered by the panel of clerics and jurists overseen by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The report didn’t reveal the names of the approved candidates, but rumors have circulated that reformists and moderates competing for presidency may have been banned from running by the Guardian Council.
