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Iranian conservatives were poised to tighten their grip on power here Friday by winning controversial parliamentary polls and sweeping out a frustrated and largely disqualified reformist majority.
With most reformist candidates barred from standing and public indifference widespread, the only element of suspense was how many of Iran's 46.3 million eligible voters would turn out.
The conservatives were expected to reverse the crushing reformist majority and add parliament to the political and security institutions they already control in the 25-year-old Islamic republic.
On the eve of the vote, the reformist camp also came under renewed pressure with the hard-line judiciary shutting down two newspapers that dared to publish a scathing protest letter from reformist MPs to the country's supreme leader.
"The distribution of such a great number of fake identity cards, undetected by supervisory and executive organisations, would be out of the question," Intelligence Minister Ali Yunesi was quoted as saying by the state news agency IRNA.
The office of Tehran's hard-line public prosecutor closed and sealed off the premises here of pro-reform dailies Shargh and Yas-e No, the latest victims of an unforgiving judicial campaign against the pro-reform press.
They were the only two newspapers who ignored an official ban and carried a letter from incumbent reformist deputies that questioned Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's role in the mass disqualification's.
IRNA said the papers had been shut "until further notice".
Out of the 5,625 candidates who were given the green light to stand, 888 have pulled out. Reformists are only campaigning for 200 of the 290 seats up for grabs, and the main reform parties are boycotting.
Polling stations, set up in schools and mosques, open Friday from 8:00 am to 6:00 pm (0430 GMT to 1430 GMT), but voting may be extended until midnight.
The first results are expected Saturday, with a definitive tally coming several days later. A second round may be required if no candidate in a particular district wins 25 percent of the vote.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2004

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