Word: ayatullahs
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Barack Obama's Persian New Year message to the leaders and people of Iran appears to have had a significant impact in Tehran. That much was clear by the speed with which Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatullah Ali Khamenei, responded. Obama's call for a "new beginning" was released early Friday morning, and Khamenei answered, unusually quickly, in a live televised address on Saturday that offered the most detailed response yet from Iran's leader to a series of rhetorical gestures from the new U.S. Administration. The essence of Khamenei's answer was that it would take more than "changes...
...practice," he said. "We are observing, watching and judging. If you change, we will also change our behavior. If you do not change, we will be the same nation as 30 years ago [when Iranians overthrew the U.S.-backed Shah]." (See pictures of the long shadow of the Ayatullah Khomeini...
...Moussavi's appeal lies in the fact that was a popular Prime Minister during the Iran-Iraq war, and is credited with having done a good job managing the nation through some of its most trying economic times. During his tenure, the current Supreme Leader, Ayatullah Ali Khamenei, had been president, and when the two men disagreed, Moussavi is said to have often won the support of then Supreme Leader Ayatullah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founding father of the Islamic Republic. Arriving to deliver his first speech as a presidential candidate on Saturday in the south of Tehran, Moussavi was greeted...
...time for one final, bold stroke: an announcement that the Dalai Lama is willing to return without any preconditions. Though Beijing has said it would accept him back on those terms, it is possible that the Chinese leadership--mindful of the return of exiles like the Ayatullah Khomeini to Iran--will try to block his path or refuse to live up to its promise to allow the Dalai Lama to go back to Tibet. But such a result would only broaden support and sympathy for the Tibetan cause...
...election, in fact, does not even decide who ultimately rules Iran: executive power rests not with the President but with the clerical Supreme Leader, Ayatullah Ali Khamenei. Since his personal clout won't be affected by the elections, the best time to start talking is now, the argument goes. And speedy talks would also allow Obama to use some of the political capital from his election (or at least what remains after the tug-of-war over the stimulus package) to persuade the American public that a rapprochement with Iran is a good idea...