Word: rafsanjani
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...Khomeini earlier this month put pressure on Iran to make some kind of move to break out of the diplomatic isolation into which it had become sealed during his decade-long xenophobic rule. The main question was which direction Tehran would look in first. Last week Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the powerful Speaker of Iran's parliament, provided the answer. Interrupting his observance of a 40-day period of national mourning for the late Imam, Rafsanjani arrived in Moscow to an elaborate reception. The visit was the beginning of a thaw between neighbors whose relations had been frosty for most...
Though Mikhail Gorbachev initially seemed subdued in welcoming Rafsanjani in the St. George Hall of the Kremlin, the President was soon smiling and bantering with his guest, the highest Iranian official to visit Moscow since the days of the Shah. In two meetings, the two sides signed four agreements providing for, among other things, a new rail link between Soviet Turkmenistan and the northern Iranian city of Mashhad, which would help fulfill a longtime Moscow goal of greater access to the Persian Gulf. There were discussions, but no final accord, on reopening a gas pipeline from Iran to Soviet Transcaucasia...
...world of nations had become apparent just two weeks before the cease-fire decision, when a U.S. frigate mistakenly shot down an Iranian jetliner with 290 people aboard: international response was notably muted. In the following months, leading Iranian politicians such as Parliamentary Speaker Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, 54, attempted to soften their country's radical image. But Khomeini would have none of it. Last February he prompted a worldwide outcry when he demanded the death of Salman Rushdie, the Indian-born, British author of The Satanic Verses, a book many regard as blasphemous to Islam. "It is incumbent...
...forge specific policies. Still, he remained the pivotal figure of Iranian politics, even toward the end, when his various illnesses made it impossible for him to follow events closely. The dismissal of Montazeri, in the opinion of many experts, put increased power in the hands of the pragmatic Rafsanjani, who is also Commander in Chief of the Iranian armed forces. In the final months of Khomeini's life, the spotlight also turned on his son, Ahmed Khomeini, 43, who has lately been increasingly visible in public life. In his zeal and rigid ideology, Ahmed appears to be very much...
Khomeini's son Ahmed, 43, who has been increasingly visible lately. The extent of Ahmed's influence became more apparent last week, when a 110-page memo surfaced in which he accused Montazeri of disloyalty. Khomeini the younger, however, must contend with powerful Parliamentary Speaker Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who last week emerged from a visit with the Ayatullah to declare, "God willing, we will see the Imam for long years, healthier and stronger...