Iran OKs 6 candidates for presidential race, but again blocks Ahmadinejad

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Iran’s Guardian Council has approved the country’s hard-line speaker of parliament and five others to run in the country’s June 28 presidential election following a helicopter crash that killed President Ebrahim Raisi and seven others. The council Sunday again barred former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a firebrand populist known for the crackdown that followed his disputed 2009 re-election, from running. The council’s decision represents the starting gun for a shortened, two-week campaign to replace Raisi, a hard-line protege of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei once floated as a possible successor to the 85-year-old cleric.