Hossein-Ali Montazeri
A Grand Ayatollah and architect of the Islamic Republic (1922–2009) once designated Khomeini's successor, but sidelined after criticizing the 1988 executions and becoming a leading dissident.
Read in context →Biography
Hossein-Ali Montazeri (1922–2009) was a Grand Ayatollah and one of the most senior religious authorities of the Islamic Republic, a close student of Khomeini who helped draft the post-revolutionary constitution and championed velayat-e faqih. In November 1985 the Assembly of Experts formally designated him as Khomeini's successor as Supreme Leader. He broke with the leadership over human-rights concerns — most decisively his protest against the 1988 mass execution of political prisoners, which he condemned in letters to Khomeini and to the prosecution commission — and was stripped of his succession role in 1989, the post passing to Khamenei. He spent later years under restrictions, including a period of house arrest, becoming a prominent clerical critic of the state who notably challenged the official results of the 2009 presidential election. He is a contested figure: regarded by reformists and rights advocates as a clerical conscience, and by the establishment as a dissident who departed from the revolution's line.
Quotes & narrations
«The execution of several thousand prisoners in a few days will not reflect well and will not be free of error. (from his 1988 letter to Khomeini)»
Also appears in
Sources
- Encyclopaedia Iranica, "Montazeri, Hossein-Ali"
- Encyclopaedia Britannica, "Hossein-Ali Montazeri"
- PBS Frontline / Tehran Bureau, "Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri: 1922–2009"