Sanctions rattle Iran, spur talk of shake-up

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TEHRAN -- The unanimous passage of U.N. Security Council sanctions against Iran in December has shaken the nation's public and ruling elite, prompting talk of a shake-up of top officials and fears of a U.S. attack.

Even before the sanctions were approved, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had been weakened by his inability to fulfill campaign promises to stem rising inflation and by doubts over the wisdom of his statements questioning the Holocaust and threatening Israel.

Now, suggestions are being raised that Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, is to change several key officials, including Ali Larijani, the head of the National Security Council; Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki; and Ambassador to the United Nations Javad Zarif.

"There is a deep concern and uncertainty on behalf of the Iranian leaders about the consequences of the nuclear program of Ahmadinejad's administration," said Hossein Bastani, the former general secretary of the Association of Iranian Journalists.

"In short ... the passage of such a resolution against the Islamic republic caught them by surprise."

Western officials have also noted rising domestic criticism of Mr. Ahmadinejad since the U.N. Security Council approved the relatively mild sanctions, which had been watered down to win the approval of Russia and China.

"You're starting to see voices in Iran that are concerned about the isolation that Iran's president and Iran's program are bringing," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in a German television interview last week.

And French Ambassador to Washington Jean-David Levitte said in an interview with The Washington Times on Monday: "We have noted in the Iranian media the beginning of a debate about the situation that Iran is in now -- more isolation and confrontation."

A senior diplomat from the region, speaking to The Washington Times last week, said after a visit to Tehran that Iranians were troubled less by the specific economic sanctions than by the lineup of countries that had supported them, including Russia and China.

An alliance of reformists and conservative "realists" has emerged to say the president's actions are leading the country to the brink of war.