http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/27/world/middleeast/iran-ayatollah-ali-khamenei-mahmoud-ahmadinejad.html 2016-09-26 15:45:58 Iran’s Supreme Leader Advises Ahmadinejad Not to Run for President Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said that the former president, known in the West for denying the Holocaust and for threats against Israel, should not be a candidate in May. === TEHRAN — Iran’s most powerful figure ruled out on Monday a return to politics by the former President The decision by Mr. Rouhani, a cleric and relative moderate, is widely expected to run for a second term and, after the supreme leader’s statement, to win it handily, his supporters say. “He will be re-elected for sure,” Mojgan Faraji, a prominent female journalist who supports overhauls, said of Mr. Rouhani. The president, who was elected on a platform of improving relations with the West and escaping crippling economic sanctions, has been seen as vulnerable to a challenge from Iran’s hard-liners, for Tehran denies those accusations, but no European or American bank will finance business with Iran as long as the sanctions remain in effect, unless the United States Treasury specifically certifies the deal, as it did for recent contracts with Airbus and Boeing. Mr. Ahmadinejad’s two presidential terms, from 2005 to 2013, were defined by confrontation with global powers, especially the United States. He is widely admired by the rural poor but is despised by the middle class majority. Corruption Experts say most of the profits from record-high oil prices during Mr. Ahmadinejad’s years were pumped around the state apparatus or were invested in ambitious housing projects that now stand empty in desert plains, without proper utilities or transportation infrastructure. He has been credited, however, with cutting a bloated state subsidy system. Ayatollah Khamenei made the statement about Mr. Ahmadinejad during a lecture for seminary students at his office. He was responding to rumors, circulating in Tehran for weeks, that he had barred Mr. Ahmadinejad from participating in the coming election. “Someone, a man came to me,” he said, presumably of Mr. Ahmadinejad, in the typically elliptical style of Shiite clerics. “I told him not to take part in that certain issue, both for his own and the country’s good.” “I did not tell him not to participate,” the supreme leader continued. “I said I do not find it advisable that you participate.” Technically, under the Constitution, Ayatollah Khamenei can only advise possible candidates, he cannot legally bar them or judge their suitability. The vetting process is officially done by the 12-member Guardian Council. In practice, though, Ayatollah Khamenei’s statement amounts to an edict, and it is almost certainly hopeless for Mr. Ahmadinejad to try to mount a campaign against the supreme leader’s wishes. Nevertheless, a website close to Mr. Ahmadinejad, The chances of his candidacy seem slim. “With these statements, the discussion of Ahmadinejad participating is finished,” a conservative lawmaker, Mohsen Kouhkan,