The move has frequently been demanded by conservative figures who are angry at Kha-tami’s support for the opposition in the 2009 presidential elections and who assert that he is one of those behind the street protests that rejected the ballot count.
Mahmud Abbaszadeh-Meshkini, the director of the Interior Ministry’s political branch, said the Baran Foundation had failed to go through the proper legal procedures required for licensing.
He said the Baran Foundation was created as Khatami left office in 2005 and was registered and licensed in haste without completing all the required steps. He was not specific about what steps had been ignored.
Meshkini complained that at the end of Khatami’s term, members of the reform movement “quickly tried to create a number of organizations to further its agenda.”
