Iran hardliners criticize Khatami's "insulting" speech

Former Iranian President and President of the Foundation for Dialogue Among Civilisations Mohammad Khatami gestures before the signing and presentation of the Declaration of Montserrat at Montserrat Monastery near Barcelona in this April 10, 2008 file photo.

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian hardliners have criticized moderate former President Mohammad Khatami for a speech they deemed insulting to Iran's late revolutionary leader, newspapers reported on Wednesday.

Etemad-e Melli newspaper said 77 lawmakers would ask Intelligence Minister Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei "to confront" Khatami over the remarks they say insulted the founder of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

A hardline daily said Khatami was being unpatriotic.

The row reflects a political divide between those in Iran, like President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, seeking a return to hardline policies of the early revolutionary days, and pro-reform figures, like Khatami, who seek political and social change.

In a speech on Friday, Khatami questioned the meaning of "exporting the revolution", a phrase coined when Khomeini led the country as supreme leader. Khomeini, who died in 1989, remains a figure much revered by all political factions.

Nearby Arab states in the Gulf and others took fright at the phrase at the time, seeing it as a bid by Iran to stir up revolt in their countries. Khatami's presidency was characterized by attempts to improve Iran's relations with Arabs and the West.

"What did Imam Khomeini mean by exporting the revolution?" Khatami asked in his speech, newspapers reported.

"Did Imam Khomeini mean that we take up arms, that we blow up places in other nations and we create groups to carry out sabotage in other countries? He was vehemently against such measures and was confronting it," Khatami said.

Those remarks were taken by hardliners to suggest Khatami was giving credence to charges often leveled by the United States and other Western countries that Iran is fuelling unrest in Iraq and elsewhere. Tehran denies such accusations.

Khatami denied this in a statement e-mailed to Reuters, saying: "I believe the Islamic Republic does not need physical interference in other countries' state matters and it has never been part of our policy and will not be in the future."

He said that accusations by Iran's "enemies" -- a reference to the United States -- that it was interfering in other states were an attempt to "divert attention from their mistakes".

Newspapers had said the 77 lawmakers planned to make a formal complaint to the Intelligence Ministry but a reformist official said they may not go ahead with an official letter.

"Obviously Khatami should be held responsible for his unpatriotic comments," Kayhan newspaper, a flag-bearer for hardliners, said in a commentary.

"Its consequence has been to tarnish the shining reputation of the system and confirm the baseless accusations of the arrogant powers," it said, employing a term Iranian officials use to refer to the United States and its allies.

(Writing by Edmund Blair; Editing by Giles Elgood)