The following links have to do with the current electoral standoff between hardliners and reformists in Iran. The nature of the standoff is discussed here.

This Economist article argues that the hardliners are in trouble:

Indeed, nearly 18 months have passed since President Khatami threw down the gauntlet by insisting on the passage of two bills, one to rein in the conservative judges who had done so much to nullify his reforms, the other to curb the Council of Guardians, the constitutional watchdog that now threatens even greater emasculation of the majlis. Neither bill has been put into effect, yet Mr Khatami has done nothing to precipitate the crisis he seemed to be calling for. It is his brother, a member of the majlis, who appears to be leading the protests. On Tuesday, the president hinted that he might resign, as most of his cabinet and all of Iran's state governors are threatening to do unless the banning of the moderate candidates is overturned. However, on Wednesday, while criticising the bans, Mr Khatami stopped short of reiterating his threat. He also called on the reformist MPs to end their sit-in—a plea they rejected.

So the conservatives may get away with it once more. But they face one short-term danger and one longer-term one. Their immediate worry is that the students will be galvanised by the MPs’ sit-in. Many student leaders have been picked off over the years and are now in jail, but new leaders may well arise in their place. The young particularly resent the bans or restrictions on dancing, movies, videos, alcohol, women’s dress and indeed all social mixing of the sexes. And like most Iranians, they hate being citizens of a country considered by George Bush to be part of the “axis of evil”. They know that in their aspirations for democratic change they have the moral support not just of Americans but of Europeans too—Javier Solana, the EU’s foreign-policy chief, criticised the ban on pro-democracy candidates during a visit to Tehran on Monday. And, thanks to watching illicit satellite broadcasts and to keeping in touch with a huge diaspora of Iranians abroad (about 1m in America alone), they are well informed about events outside their country, including the international opprobrium brought about by their country’s nuclear programme.

The longer-term danger for the clerics also lies in the dissatisfaction of the young, but this discontent is not confined to students. Two-thirds of Iran’s 70m people are under the age of 30, and half are under 20. Religious rule has given them an education and, in the right to vote (at 16), a taste of and for democracy. It has not given them jobs, nor can it do so in sufficient numbers to satisfy all those now leaving school unless it allows economic change—including foreign investment—and, inevitably, political reform too. Whether this week’s row ends in climbdown, compromise or crackdown, it will not have banished the prospect of Iran’s next revolution. On the contrary, it will probably have brought it closer.

By contrast, this article from the Economist says that it is the hardliners who have the upper hand:

IN THE view of Mohsen Mirdamadi, one of Iran's most senior politicians, it smacked of a coup d'état. On January 11th the Council of Guardians, the iron fist of Iran's formidable clerical establishment, let it be known that it was barring some 4,000 candidates, including 82 serving deputies, from standing in parliamentary elections due on February 20th.

Officially, most of the disqualified candidates are being penalised for their supposed indifference to Islam and to the constitution, and for querying the virtually limitless powers enjoyed by the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. No one doubts that they have been chosen because they support the country's reform-minded president, Muhammad Khatami, and his dangerously democratic ideas.

The Council of Guardians may be hoping to dissuade Iranians from voting. Last year's council elections, when the reformists lost power in most big cities, showed that a low turnout favours the conservatives. They hope that their stable 15%-or-so of the vote will win them a disproportionate share of parliament's 290 seats.

Ever since their sweeping victory in the last parliamentary election, in 2000, reform-minded deputies have backed the president in his struggle against Iran's roundly disliked, but immensely powerful, conservative institutions. Denied much of their legislative clout, parliamentarians have been reduced to using the chamber to highlight—but not, alas, to curb—the conservatives' abuses of power.

The Council of Guardians duly avenged itself on the biggest party of whistle-blowers, the Participation Front; just two of its 67 serving deputies were cleared to stand. In Tehran 52% of all candidates were barred. In distant Kurdistan, where ethnic nationalism wears reformist colours, the figure was 59%.

Since rumours of mass disqualifications had circulated long before they were made public, the barred parliamentarians had prepared their response. On January 11th about 80 deputies began a sit-in in the parliament building, to go on “as long as necessary”. If the council refuses to back down, says Reza Khatami, one of parliament's two deputy speakers (and the president's younger brother), the agitation will grow and will “take new forms”.

To the regime's external enemies, these words are a portent—of political implosion, perhaps, foretelling the fatal weakening of the Islamic Republic. In Iran, a different view prevails. Rarely, since President Khatami's triumphant election in 1997, has the establishment seemed so powerful, or its eventual victory so assured.

This article discusses the cracking of the hardline edifice:

Iran's Guardian Council said Tuesday it had reversed only about 5 percent of its bans on candidates for seats in parliament despite a poll boycott threat by reformist President Mohammad Khatami's party.

The 12-man unelected conservative watchdog has barred nearly half of 8,200 candidates from participating in the Feb. 20 election. Allies of Khatami, including 80 of the standing 290 members of parliament, have been most affected.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the last word on all state matters, has urged the Council to review its decisions, but it has been in no apparent rush to lift bans and has until the end of the month to review 3,100 appeals.

"So far ... 200 (disqualified) candidates have been approved," said a statement on the hard-line Council's Web site. The figure represents about five percent of the bans.

And finally, this article reports that some reformers are resigning their government positions to protest the recent activities of the hardliners:

Several ministers and vice presidents in Iran have handed in their resignations to protest the disqualification by the anti-reformist Guardian Council of nearly half of the candidates for Parliament, a senior government official said today.

"A number of ministers and vice presidents have resigned but they are waiting for the outcome" of the revision by the Guardian Council, Muhammad Ali Abtahi, a vice president, told reporters after a cabinet meeting. "All those who have resigned, including the governors and governor generals, are very determined," he said.

The ministers submitted their letters last week, but Mr. Abtahi's remarks marked the first time that the resignations were announced by an Iranian official.

Developing . . .