Word: ayatullah
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IRAN Free at Last Ayatullah Hussein Ali Montazeri, Iran's most prominent dissident cleric, a man once considered the natural successor to Ayatullah Khomeini, was released from house arrest in the city of Qom. Montazeri, who is in his 80s, was confined in November 1997 after he criticized the authority of Iran's conservative Supreme Leader, Ayatullah Ali Khamenei. Montazeri is a rallying point for those disaffected with the slow pace of reform. On his release, he told his supporters he would "continue to talk about issues and to act." See Also: Islamic Republic in Transition...
...hero, Saleem Sinai, narrates the connected stories of himself and his family and, along the way, the turbulent political history of India between 1915 and 1979. Rushdie had originally written a five-hour screenplay for a bbc mini-series. But his own personal story intruded. In 1989, Iran's Ayatullah Khomeini issued a fatwa against him after declaring his book The Satanic Verses disrespectful to the Koran. The author was forced into hiding for nine years, and the mini-series was doomed. The Indian government deemed it too risky to be filmed in Bombay; Sri Lanka gave permission, then changed...
...moments in Step Across This Line , Salman Rushdie's provocatively named book of essays (Jonathan Cape; 454 pages), comes when the author is invited on stage at a U2 concert in 1993 by his friend Bono. At the time, Rushdie was in hiding from Muslim assassins after Iran's Ayatullah Khomeini issued a fatwa against him for his allegedly blasphemous novel, The Satanic Verses . Bono, ever the good guy, meant the invitation as a gesture of support. To Rushdie, the moment was a revelation. He suddenly felt "what it's like to have 80,000 fans cheering...
...latest crisis by declaring the sentence "inappropriate" and suggesting the matter could be resolved by throwing out the case. But Aghajari, a popular figure who lost a leg in the Iran-Iraq War, refused to appeal his sentence, challenging the judiciary to execute him. Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatullah Ali Khamenei, warned he would unleash "popular forces" - widely assumed to mean the vigilante Basij militia - if reformers and conservatives failed to end their political sparring. The threat was also thought to be directed at the students, but they remained defiant. CYPRUS Annan's Plan The United Nations gave Greek...
Among the few Muslim countries that still condone stoning, Iran uses it most often. Although Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini is said to have discouraged the practice because of the brutal image it gave Islam, conservative judges have inflicted the punishment recently, most likely to embarrass and undermine reformist President Mohammed Khatami. Iran's penal code specifies, "The stoning of an adulterer or adulteress shall be carried out while each is placed in a hole and covered with soil, he up to his waist and she up to a line above her breasts." Court-appointed officials or ordinary citizens then pelt...