The World - News from Sept. 21, 1988

The Iranian Parliament approved five new ministers nominated by Prime Minister Hussein Moussavi, leaving just one empty post in the 24-member Cabinet. The Iranian news agency IRNA, monitored in Cyprus, said the five include Ali Shamkhani, who replaced Moshen Rafighdost as minister in charge of the Revolutionary Guards. Rafighdost, accused of mismanagement and under fire because of Iran’s battlefield losses in the war with Iraq, was one of three ministers ousted last week in a vote of confidence in Moussavi’s Cabinet. A week earlier, Moussavi--in a power struggle with President Ali Khamenei--offered his resignation, which was rejected by Iran’s supreme leader, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.