TEHRAN, Iran
The Iranian parliament on Wednesday gave a vote of confidence to the ministerial nominees of newly elected President Masoud Pezeshkian.
All 19 ministers nominated by Pezeshkian received the vote of confidence from the country’s top legislative body, clearing the way for the formation of the new cabinet.
Pezeshkian, a former reformist lawmaker and health minister, defeated his conservative opponent Saeed Jalili in a runoff vote on July 6, marking a significant comeback for the reformist faction.
The 69-year-old president was formally sworn in on July 31, in the presence of top-ranking government officials and dignitaries from at least 70 countries.
Among the approved ministers is Abbas Araghchi, who will serve as a foreign minister.
Araghchi, who served as deputy foreign minister during Hassan Rouhani’s government, will succeed Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, who was killed in a plane crash on May 19.
President Ebrahim Raisi and other senior officials were also killed in the accident.
Pezeshkian had submitted his ministerial nominees to the conservative-dominated parliament 10 days ago, which was followed by intense discussions in which the nominees presented their plans.
The president also appeared before the lawmakers to defend his ministerial picks.
Ahead of the Wednesday’s vote, Pezeshkian made a passionate appeal to lawmakers to approve his nominees, most of them reformists, urging “cohesion and unity.”
He emphasized that all political factions in the country must “join hands” and “set aside past differences,” adding that the current situation is more challenging than Iran’s war with Iraq in the 1980s.
Pezeshkian had pledged to reopen channels of communication with the West, including the United States, to have the sanctions lifted. However, the assassination of Hamas political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh in Iranian capital Tehran last month has reignited tensions between the two sides.
Haniyeh was in Tehran to attend the new president’s inauguration when he was assassinated. Iran has blamed Israel and the US for the attack.
