Word: ayatullah
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...most powerful man in Iraq doesn't go out much. As an estimated 100,000 of his followers poured into the streets of Baghdad last week to demand direct elections in Iraq, Grand Ayatullah Ali Sistani stayed out of sight, holed up in the same nondescript white-walled compound on an alley off the Street of the Messenger in Najaf where he was kept under house arrest during the rule of Saddam Hussein. A crowd of followers seeking his counsel gathered outside. Some were allowed to enter; others were told by the guards to submit their questions in writing...
...Iran to a family of clerics, Sistani started memorizing the Koran at age 5, according to his official biography. In the early 1950s, he moved to the Iraqi city of Najaf, the site of one of the holiest shrines in Shi'ism. He later became a student of Grand Ayatullah Abul Khoei, who would turn out to be Iraq's leading cleric. As Saddam ruthlessly suppressed clerical activism, Khoei advocated "quietism," the belief that the clergy should mainly serve spiritual and social needs, and not focus on matters of state. Sistani quickly distinguished himself as a brilliant theologian, adept...
...speak out against the U.S. caucus plan was motivated not by political ambition but by his perception that the Governing Council was not defending the rights of Iraqis and by a desire to protect the interests of Iraqi Shi'ites. In an interview with TIME in Qum, Grand Ayatullah Hossein Ali Montazeri, who has spent 15 years under house arrest for criticizing Iran's ruling mullahs for abuse of office, said that Sistani is acting for the good of Iraq. "If there should be a stable government, it is best that it is a government elected by the people," Montazeri...
...insisted it can't comply with demands from Iraq's top Shi'ite cleric, Grand Ayatullah Ali al-Sistani, that the first post-Saddam government be established via nationwide direct elections. U.S. officials say that would be too difficult to pull off before the June 30 deadline for the transfer of power. Instead, the U.S. wants the new government to be chosen by local caucuses. Ahead of meetings in New York City this week with U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Paul Bremer, the U.S. civilian chief in Iraq, said, "We have doubts, as does the Secretary-General, that elections...
With his country on the Bush Administration's "Axis Of Evil" list and under international scrutiny for its suspected nuclear-weapons program, the last thing Iran's supreme leader, Ayatullah Ali Khamenei, needs right now is another diplomatic and political contretemps. So when he met with the hard-line clerics of the powerful Guardian Council last week, he first thanked his "dear brothers" for their hard work--and then asked his underlings to reconsider their Jan. 11 decision to bar hundreds of candidates, including 80 incumbent M.P.s, from parliamentary elections next month. Otherwise, he warned, Iran might dissolve...