{"id":347642,"date":"2026-08-29T16:16:01","date_gmt":"2026-08-29T15:16:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ncr-iran.org\/en\/?p=347642"},"modified":"2026-08-29T16:16:01","modified_gmt":"2026-08-29T15:16:01","slug":"mojtaba-orders-irans-factions-to-stop-fighting-as-pezeshkian-uses-economic-crisis-to-press-for-talks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ncr-iran.org\/en\/news\/economy\/mojtaba-orders-irans-factions-to-stop-fighting-as-pezeshkian-uses-economic-crisis-to-press-for-talks\/","title":{"rendered":"Mojtaba Orders Iran\u2019s Factions to Stop Fighting as Pezeshkian Uses Economic Crisis to Press for Talks"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"A
A driver inserts a smart fuel rationing card into the reader at a gas station in Shiraz, southern Iran<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Three-minute read<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Mojtaba Khamenei is trying to prevent the Iranian regime’s factional struggle from becoming a public spectacle. In a message published by the state-aligned Tasnim news agency<\/a> on August 28, 2026, he declared that \u201canything that harms social cohesion is forbidden,\u201d specifically warning against \u201cdiscouraging\u201d statements and polarizing arguments over \u201cwar or negotiation\u201d and \u201ccompromise or warmongering.\u201d<\/p>\n

The irony is that neither Ruhollah Khomeini nor Ali Khamenei ever succeeded in eliminating factional warfare<\/a>; at critical moments they merely forced it back behind closed doors. Mojtaba appears to be attempting the same containment. But his call for \u201csocial cohesion\u201d immediately gave political cover to the very camp under attack from the regime\u2019s harder-line forces: the regime’s president Masoud Pezeshkian, parliament speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, all associated with the push for negotiations. Ghalibaf quickly embraced<\/a> Mojtaba\u2019s statement, declaring that any action damaging cohesion was \u201cnationally and religiously forbidden.\u201d For this camp, the directive is more than a call for discipline: it is a weapon against opponents accusing them of capitulation, allowing them to portray attacks on their negotiating course as defiance of the supreme leader\u2019s own demand for unity.<\/p>\n

Pezeshkian also tried to appropriate that unity message for himself, stressing that consensus has always been his policy. But he is simultaneously reopening the argument Mojtaba wants suppressed. In a televised interview reported by IRNA<\/a> on August 28, Pezeshkian defended the Islamabad understanding as an \u201cexceptional achievement,\u201d insisted Iran had been its winner, and said the third gasoline tier would rise to around 10,000 tomans per liter.<\/p>\n

\n

"State-affiliated media in Iran have recently acknowledged what ordinary Iranians have experienced for years: the country\u2019s #economic<\/a> resilience is weakening," Farid Mahoutchi writes.https:\/\/t.co\/fZKKlfQMkn<\/a><\/p>\n

— NCRI-FAC (@iran_policy) August 27, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n