The list, he said, was then passed on to the Guardian Council, the legal supervisor and major obstacle to holding free and competitive elections in recent years. The members of the Guardian Council are appointed directly by the Supreme Leader and were considered to be applying his will. “But”, Khatami said, “the Guardian Council kept neither the Supreme Leader’s nor its own word […] and we were faced with a situation in which we had to choose between holding the election or risking huge unrest […] and so damaging the regime”.