Just over one month after his contested election, president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has appointed both his vice-president and the chief of Iran’s Atomic Energy Association.

Ahmadinejad appointed his controversial aide Esfandiar Rahim Mashaie as the country's new first vice president, the official IRNA news agency reported on Friday.

Interestingly, Mashaie was severely criticised a year ago by the country's hardliners and even rapped by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei for saying Iran was a "friend of the Israeli people." He returned to the theme again in August, saying he had "no hostility against the Israeli people."

Mashaie’s daughter is married to Ahmadinejad’s son.

Ahmadinejad also announced that Ali Akbar Salehi, Iran's former envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency, will be the country's new atomic chief. Salehi replaces Gholam Reza Aghazadeh who resigned three weeks ago from his post.