THE TELEGRAPH: It has been a long time coming, but unmistakable cracks are beginning to appear in the edifice of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's autocratic regime.
Ever since the ayatollahs overthrew the Shah and seized control of the country in the bloody revolution of 1979, the government of the Islamic Republic has owed its survival to a combination of brutal repression and a highly effective security infrastructure controlled by the Revolutionary Guards.
Most of the country's professional and middle classes were wiped out after Khomeini's takeover, and subsequent attempts by more moderate elements to tone down the revolutionary rhetoric have been repressed. A campaign by the Iranian Reform Movement in 2000 to make the country more democratic and the government more accountable collapsed when its leader was shot in the face by a young religious fanatic.
More recently, Mr Ahmadinejad, a former commander in the Revolutionary Guards, has quashed any hint of dissent, closing newspapers and censoring access to the internet.
Which all makes the recent riots over the introduction of petrol rationing most heartening. Here we have a country that is awash with oil - Iran produces 4.3 million barrels a day and possesses the world's second largest known oil reserves - and yet it cannot provide sufficient quantities of refined material to meet the needs of its 65 million people. Iranian banks feel the heat (more) By Con Coughlin
Mark Alexander
