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After 20 years of political silence, on 9 March 2009 Mousavi announced his bid to run in the [[Iranian presidential election, 2009|2009 Iranian presidential election]], which has since been welcomed by many Iranians who still recall his time as Prime Minister.Mousavi is well remembered by many Iranians for managing the country during the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988).During the Iran-Iraq war he served as the Islamic Republic’s prime minister, helping extend the war for 5 long years even though at a point Iran had taken back all its cities from Iraq and the Iraqis were willing to end the war and make huge financial compensations.<ref>http://marzeporgohar.org/en/content/this-a-selection-not-election</ref> He has stated that his main goals are: to institutionalize social justice, equality and fairness, freedom of expression, to root out corruption and to speed up Iran's stagnant process of privatization and thus move Iran away from what he calls "an alms-based economy".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.presstv.com/election2009/detail.aspx?id=88106|title= Moussavi officially joins presidential fray|publisher=[[PressTV]]|date=2009-03-10|accessdate=2009-04-13}}</ref> Mousavi poses a serious pro-reform challenge to the country's hard-line establishment and the current conservative President [[Mahmoud Ahmadinejad]] whom he has often criticized for his alleged economic mismanagement, stating that when Iran "was making profits from the high prices of oil, did he (Ahmadinejad) envisage a situation when the prices would fall?".
After 20 years of political silence, on 9 March 2009 Mousavi announced his bid to run in the [[Iranian presidential election, 2009|2009 Iranian presidential election]], which has since been welcomed by many Iranians who still recall his time as Prime Minister.Mousavi is well remembered by many Iranians for managing the country during the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988).During the Iran-Iraq war he served as the Islamic Republic’s prime minister, helping extend the war for 5 long years even though at a point Iran had taken back all its cities from Iraq and the Iraqis were willing to end the war and make huge financial compensations.<ref>http://marzeporgohar.org/en/content/this-a-selection-not-election</ref> He has stated that his main goals are: to institutionalize social justice, equality and fairness, freedom of expression, to root out corruption and to speed up Iran's stagnant process of privatization and thus move Iran away from what he calls "an alms-based economy".<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.presstv.com/election2009/detail.aspx?id=88106|title= Moussavi officially joins presidential fray|publisher=[[PressTV]]|date=2009-03-10|accessdate=2009-04-13}}</ref> Mousavi poses a serious pro-reform challenge to the country's hard-line establishment and the current conservative President [[Mahmoud Ahmadinejad]] whom he has often criticized for his alleged economic mismanagement, stating that when Iran "was making profits from the high prices of oil, did he (Ahmadinejad) envisage a situation when the prices would fall?".


Iranian reformers, who favour improving Iran's ties with the West and loosening social restrictions at home, view Mousavi as a viable challenge to the current conservative President Mr Mahmoud Ahmadinejad; they believe that the latter has lost popularity even among conservatives because of his perceived mishandling of the economy, his limiting of civil liberties and his perilous steering of Iran's foreign policy; some Iranians believe that his uncompromising anti-US and anti-Israel rhetoric have increased Iran's isolation and damaged Iran's standing in the world.
Iranian reformers, who favour improving Iran's ties with the West and loosening social restrictions at home, view Mousavi as a viable challenge to the current conservative President Mr Mahmoud Ahmadinejad; they believe that the latter has lost popularity even among conservatives because of his perceived mishandling of the economy, his limiting of civil liberties and his perilous steering of Iran's foreign policy; some Iranians believe that his uncompromising anti-US and anti-Israel rhetoric have increased Iran's isolation and damaged Iran's standing in the world. This is while Mousavi him self has been accused of being one of the organizers and founders of Hezbollah.


On March 16, 2009, the former Iranian President [[Mohammad Khatami|Khatami]] withdrew from the election race in support of Mir-Hossein Mousavi.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.payvand.com/news/09/mar/1195.html|title= Khatami will soon withdraw candidacy in favor of Mousavi: source |publisher= payvand|date=2009-03-15|accessdate=2009-04-13}}</ref>
On March 16, 2009, the former Iranian President [[Mohammad Khatami|Khatami]] withdrew from the election race in support of Mir-Hossein Mousavi.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.payvand.com/news/09/mar/1195.html|title= Khatami will soon withdraw candidacy in favor of Mousavi: source |publisher= payvand|date=2009-03-15|accessdate=2009-04-13}}</ref>


===Goals for presidential term===
===Goals for presidential term===
Mousavi has on numerous occasions indicated his wish to change the constitution whereby to remove the existing ban on the private owership of television stations (currently all Iranian television stations are state-owned), as well as transfer the control of the law-enforcement forces to the President (so that they represent the people, since the people directly elect the President through popular vote) from the Supreme Leader.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.presstv.com/election2009/detail.aspx?id=90057|title= Mousavi backs private TV, urges change recognition|publisher= [[PressTV]]|date=2009-03-31|accessdate=2009-04-13}}</ref> He has said that "the issue of non-compliance with the Iranian rules and regulations is the biggest problem that the country is currently faced with" and that he wishes to put in place ways to enforce the laws further,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.presstv.com/election2009/detail.aspx?id=90375|title= Moussavi warns against governmental cover-up|publisher= [[PressTV]]|date=2009-04-03|accessdate=2009-04-13}}</ref> and that it is also important to bring an end to keeping people in the dark about government matters.
Mousavi has on numerous occasions indicated his wish to change the constitution whereby to remove the existing ban on the private owership of television stations (currently all Iranian television stations are state-owned), as well as transfer the control of the law-enforcement forces to the President (so that they represent the people, since the people directly elect the President through popular vote) from the Supreme Leader.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.presstv.com/election2009/detail.aspx?id=90057|title= Mousavi backs private TV, urges change recognition|publisher= [[PressTV]]|date=2009-03-31|accessdate=2009-04-13}}</ref> He has said that "the issue of non-compliance with the Iranian rules and regulations is the biggest problem that the country is currently faced with" and that he wishes to put in place ways to enforce the laws further,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.presstv.com/election2009/detail.aspx?id=90375|title= Moussavi warns against governmental cover-up|publisher= [[PressTV]]|date=2009-04-03|accessdate=2009-04-13}}</ref>


===Outcome of Election===
===Outcome of Election===

Revision as of 07:42, 14 June 2009

Mir-Hossein Mousavi Khameneh
میرحسین موسوی خامنه
Mousavi in 2009.
Prime Minister of Iran
In office
31 October 1981 – 3 August 1989
PresidentAli Khamenei
LeaderRuhollah Khomeini
Ali Khamenei
Preceded byMohammad-Reza Mahdavi Kani (Acting)
Succeeded byPosition abolished
Personal details
Born (1941-09-29) 29 September 1941 (age 82)
Khameneh, Iran
Political partyIndependent
SpouseZahra Rahnavard
Alma materShahid Beheshti University

Mir-Hossein Mousavi Khameneh (میرحسین موسوی خامنه) (born 29 September 1941) is an Iranian reformist politician, painter and architect who served as the fifth and last Prime Minister of the Islamic republic of Iran from 1981 to 1989. Mousavi is currently the president of the Iranian Academy of Arts and was candidate for the 2009 presidential election.

He was the last Prime Minister in Iran before the constitutional changes which removed the post of prime minister. Before that, he was the Minister of Foreign Affairs. He is also a member of the Expediency Discernment Council and the High Council of Cultural Revolution. However, as of 2009, he has not participated in their meetings for a long time which is interpreted by political analysts and commentators as a sign of his disapproval. Mousavi holds a Masters degree in Architecture from Shahid Beheshti University. In the early years of the revolution, Mousavi was the Editor-in-Chief of the official newspaper of the Islamic Republic Party, the Jomhouri-e Eslami (Islamic Republic) newspaper.

Early life and career

Mir-Hossein Mousavi was born on 29 September 1941 in Khameneh, East Azarbaijan, Iran, to Mir-Esma'il Mousavi (Persian: میراسماعیل موسوی), a merchant from Tabriz.

Mir-Hossein Mousavi was a student studying architecture during the Shah's regime at Tehran University. Two years after the revolution (1981), he was nominated as the Prime Minister by Khomeini. He was responsible, as head of the Council of Cultural Revolution, for shutting down the entire university system for four years. Starting in 1988, on the orders of Khomeini, a council was formed, with Mousavi as a member, to revise the regime's constitution to drastically increase the powers of the supreme leader.[1][2]

Mousavi's socialist ideology became very apparent during the 1980s when he initiated Islamic Socialist policies such as subsidized food coupons, oil coupons and converting private enterprises into government controlled entities. Mr. Mousavi was responsible for the mass executions of 80-81 and the dark summer of 1988 where over thirty thousand political prisoners were executed and buried and mass graves.[3] Now after twenty years he has re-emerged as a candidate for the Islamic Republic's presidency.

Additionally, it was during his leadership that Karroubi became infamous for numerous sexual scandals and severe corruption. Due to his differences with other high-ranking clerics, he established a new government-funded party which enabled him to become speaker of parliament and an opponent of Rafsanjani. During the 6th term of the Islamic Republic's Parliament, many controversial events took place, starting with the selection of the so-called "reformist", Mohammad Khatami, as the regime's president. In spite of promises during his campaign for presidency that he would support a free press, Karroubi reneged on his promise and on the orders of Khamene'i prevented the parliament from voting on a bill to ease press restrictions.

Mousavi’s reputation for radicalism was undiminished. When he introduced his cabinet in 1985, he boasted that his interior minister, Ali Akbar Mohtashami, was a religious conservative who’d built his reputation while building Hezbollah, the Party of God, in Lebanon.

Mousavi’s parliamentary followers supported continuing terrorist operations in Lebanon.At the end of the Iran-Iraq war in August 1988, when Ali Rafsanjani, the speaker of Iran’s parliament at the time (and the current head of the powerful Assembly of Experts) suggested that Iran should accept some western help with reconstruction, Mousavi disagreed, claiming the move would betray the ideals of the revolution.

Mousavi consistently favored state controls over the economy rather than free-market policies. Iran’s business class doesn’t like him. He had also opposed ending the Iran-Iraq war, claiming that "a large portion of the masses" were indignant over the cease-fire.[4]

2009 presidential election

Main article: Mir-Hossein Mousavi presidential campaign, 2009
File:Mir Hossein Mousavi in Zanjan by Mardetanha 0814.jpg
Supporters of Mousavi's 2009 presidential campaign

After 20 years of political silence, on 9 March 2009 Mousavi announced his bid to run in the 2009 Iranian presidential election, which has since been welcomed by many Iranians who still recall his time as Prime Minister.Mousavi is well remembered by many Iranians for managing the country during the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988).During the Iran-Iraq war he served as the Islamic Republic’s prime minister, helping extend the war for 5 long years even though at a point Iran had taken back all its cities from Iraq and the Iraqis were willing to end the war and make huge financial compensations.[5] He has stated that his main goals are: to institutionalize social justice, equality and fairness, freedom of expression, to root out corruption and to speed up Iran's stagnant process of privatization and thus move Iran away from what he calls "an alms-based economy".[6] Mousavi poses a serious pro-reform challenge to the country's hard-line establishment and the current conservative President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad whom he has often criticized for his alleged economic mismanagement, stating that when Iran "was making profits from the high prices of oil, did he (Ahmadinejad) envisage a situation when the prices would fall?".

Iranian reformers, who favour improving Iran's ties with the West and loosening social restrictions at home, view Mousavi as a viable challenge to the current conservative President Mr Mahmoud Ahmadinejad; they believe that the latter has lost popularity even among conservatives because of his perceived mishandling of the economy, his limiting of civil liberties and his perilous steering of Iran's foreign policy; some Iranians believe that his uncompromising anti-US and anti-Israel rhetoric have increased Iran's isolation and damaged Iran's standing in the world. This is while Mousavi him self has been accused of being one of the organizers and founders of Hezbollah.

On March 16, 2009, the former Iranian President Khatami withdrew from the election race in support of Mir-Hossein Mousavi.[7]

Goals for presidential term

Mousavi has on numerous occasions indicated his wish to change the constitution whereby to remove the existing ban on the private owership of television stations (currently all Iranian television stations are state-owned), as well as transfer the control of the law-enforcement forces to the President (so that they represent the people, since the people directly elect the President through popular vote) from the Supreme Leader.[8] He has said that "the issue of non-compliance with the Iranian rules and regulations is the biggest problem that the country is currently faced with" and that he wishes to put in place ways to enforce the laws further,[9]

Outcome of Election

The election was held on June 12, 2009. Early results showed Ahmadinejad winning by a landslide, though Mousavi and many others refuse to believe it, suggesting that the Interior Minister, held by Sadegh Mahsouli, an ally of Ahmadinejad, interfered with the election and distorted the votes, to keep Ahmadinejad in power [10]. Mousavi has claimed victory, and called for his supporters to celebrate it. Electoral results must be confirmed by the Guardian Council, a panel of senior Islamic clergymen led by Ali Khamenei [10].

Platform

Mousavi delivering a speech at in Zanjan

Domestic policies

In his first press conference since the start of Iranian New Year in March 2009, Mousavi stated his policies on how he will govern the country.[11] Among his policies are creation of a free environment for the flow of information and corrections to the national budget.[12] He wants to promote the creation of private, non-governmental TV networks[13] and stop the operation of the "Moral Police".[14] He has spoken about his opposition to massive changes in ministries compared to what he claims Ahmadinejad has done. Regarding the Iranian nuclear program, his plan includes reducing the cost by opposing radical approaches while maintaining what he sees as Iran's right.[15]

He has also vowed to review laws that discriminate against women in Iran if he wins the upcoming election. He has stated that he would seek to disband the so called morality police force of Iran and make sure that women in Iran are treated equally, have the ability to attain financial empowerment and highest levels of decision making bodies.[16]This is while he is accused of his previous involvement in mass execution of political prisoners and the shutting down the university system for 4 years in in order to repress any student uprising.

He asked for Khatami's support in his campaign. He also welcomed Karoubi's presence. Mousavi has criticized distributing "free potato" to people by the government, and called it a clear violation of law.

Mousavi denied the claims that his candidacy is per request of Supreme Leader Khamenei, and asserted he had not sought Khamenei's approval beforehand. Some had claimed that his candidacy was a means to stop the other reformist hopeful, former President Mohammad Khatami, from proceeding with his candidacy.

Foreign policies

Back at the time when Mousavi was the Prime Minister -- when this office existed as the actual head of the cabinet in the 1980s - under whose direction Islamic Revolutionary Guards entered Lebanon in huge numbers and laid the framework for today's Lebanese Hezbollah and established the IRI's hold on Lebanon, for the purpose of militarily engaging and destroying Israel.

In 1981 in the magazine Payameh Enghelab Mousavi stated that “We are ready to participate within an armed force to fight Israel… We have repeatedly announced that we are ready to have an actual, real and military presence in Southern Lebanon and on the borders of the occupied Palestinian lands…we believe that with the support of the popular forces in Lebanon we shall be able to gradually find effective and powerful bases in the area for fighting Israel …we believe if the flow of oil in Muslim Lands is in the hands of Muslims and if the ideology of Islam controls the opening or closing of the oil valves we shall be able to bring the World Arrogance to its knees, to strike Israel and to destroy it.”[17]

Now running for the elections, Mousavi has addressed activating foreign policy to boost national interest by reducing tensions with other nations. This includes negotiating with U.S. President Barack Obama if "his actions are in keeping with his words".[12] His other notable assertions were when he called Ahmadinejad's approach to the issue of Holocaust a wrong one. Mousavi condemned the killing of Jews in the Holocaust. In response Ahmadinejad revealed Mousavi's own involvement with previous anti-Israeli movements.[15]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Mir-Hossein Mousavi.

References

  1. ^ http://marzeporgohar.org/en/content/this-a-selection-not-election
  2. ^ http://www.aina.org/news/2009069125620.htm
  3. ^ http://www.mehr.org/massacre_1988.htm
  4. ^ http://www.tehrantimes.com/Index_view.asp?code=195276
  5. ^ http://marzeporgohar.org/en/content/this-a-selection-not-election
  6. ^ "Moussavi officially joins presidential fray". PressTV. 2009-03-10. Retrieved 2009-04-13.
  7. ^ "Khatami will soon withdraw candidacy in favor of Mousavi: source". payvand. 2009-03-15. Retrieved 2009-04-13.
  8. ^ "Mousavi backs private TV, urges change recognition". PressTV. 2009-03-31. Retrieved 2009-04-13.
  9. ^ "Moussavi warns against governmental cover-up". PressTV. 2009-04-03. Retrieved 2009-04-13.
  10. ^ a b "Iran Election In Dispute as 2 Candidates Claim Victory". Washington Post. 2009-06-13.
  11. ^ Etemad Melli Newspaper, no. 887, pp. 1–2, Saturday April 7, 2009 http://www.roozna.com {{citation}}: Check date values in: |year=, |date=, and |year= / |date= mismatch (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
  12. ^ a b "The Answer To Ahmadinejad". Spiegel. 04/27/2009. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  13. ^ "Mousavi backs private TV, urges change recognition". PressTV. 31 March 2009.
  14. ^ "Mousavi: Moral police, provincial visits irrelevant". PressTV. April 09 2009. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  15. ^ a b "Iran's Reform Candidate, Mir Hossein Mousavi, Says Open to U.S. Negotiations". Fox News. April 06 2009. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  16. ^ "Iran candidate Mousavi backs women's rights". BBC News. May 31 2009. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  17. ^ http://marzeporgohar.org/en/content/this-a-selection-not-election

External links



Political offices
Preceded by Prime Minister of Iran
1981 – 1989 		Succeeded by
Position abolished
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