Powerful cleric Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani urged Iran’s warring political groups on Saturday to follow the orders of supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for ending the political turmoil.

In his first such statement in direct support of Khamenei since the June 12 election, the former President said “the current situation needs everyone to observe the leader’s decrees and advice”, Iranian news agencies reported.

Rafsanjani was speaking at the start of a meeting of Iran’s top political arbitration body, the Expediency Council, which he heads.

He urged the bitterly divided groups to create “appropriate conditions to act and commit to the constitution... and confront law breakers, whatever their ideological leanings”.

Meanwhile, the man nominated to serve as Iran’s Defence Minister is wanted by Interpol in connection with the 1994 bombing of a Jewish cultural centre in Buenos Aires, confronting Iran with yet another challenge to its international reputation after an electoral dispute undermined its legitimacy at home and abroad.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad nominated Ahmad Vahidi on Wednesday to serve as Defence Minister when he submitted his list of 21 nominees to Parliament.

He was one of five Iranian officials sought by Interpol on Argentine charges of “conceiving, planning, financing and executing” the 1994 attack, which killed 85 people and wounded hundreds, said a statement issued by the Anti-Defamation League condemning the nomination.