Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (Former President of Iran)

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad born 28 October 1956 is the sixth and current President of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and the main political leader of the Alliance of Builders of Islamic Iran, a coalition of conservative political groups in the country. An engineer and teacher from a poor background, Ahmadinejad joined the Office for Strengthening Unity after the Islamic Revolution. Appointed a provincial governor, he was removed after the election of President Mohammad Khatami and returned to teaching. Tehran's council elected him mayor in 2003. He took a religious hard-line, reversing reforms of previous moderate mayors. His 2005 presidential campaign, supported by the Alliance of Builders of Islamic Iran, garnered 62% of the runoff election votes, and he became President on 3 August 2005. 

Ahmadinejad is a controversial figure both within Iran and internationally. He has been criticized domestically for his economic lapses and disregard for human rights. He launched a gas rationing plan in 2007 to reduce the country's fuel consumption, and cut the interest rates that private and public banking facilities could charge. He supports Iran's nuclear energy program. His election to a second term in 2009 was widely disputed and caused widespread protests domestically and drew significant international criticism. Major opposition parties, traditional clerical circles and influential Iranian politicians questioned the legitimacy of his presidency.

Ahmadinejad is an outspoken critic of the United States, Israel, and United Kingdom. He abides by Iran's long-standing policy of refusing to recognize Israel as a legitimate state

Background:

Ahmadinejad was born near Garmsar in the village of Aradan, in Semnan province, the fourth of seven children. His father, Ahmad, was an ironworker, grocer, barber, blacksmith, and religious Shi'a who taught the Qur'an. His mother, Khanom, was a Seyyede, an honorific title given to those believed to be direct bloodline descendants of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. Ahmadinejad's father changed his name from "Sabourjian" or "Sabaghian" when Ahmadinejad was four years old to avoid discrimination when the family moved to Tehran, as the rural name indicated a lowly social standing. Sabor is Persian for thread painter, a once common occupation within the Semnan carpet industry. Ahmadinejad was chosen as it means from the race of Ahmad, one of the names given to Muhammad.

In 1976, Ahmadinejad took Iran's national university entrance contests. According to his autobiography, he was ranked 132nd out of 400,000 participants that year,and soon enrolled in the Iran University of Science and Technology (IUST) as an undergraduate student of civil engineering. He earned his PhD (1997) in transportation engineering and planning from Iran University of Science and Technology, located at Tehran, when he was the Mayor of Ardabil Province, located at the north-west of the country.

Supporters of Ahmadinejad consider him a "simple man" that leads a "modest" life. As president, he wanted to continue living in the same house in Tehran his family had been living in, until his security advisers insisted that he move. Ahmadinejad had the antique Persian carpets in the Presidential palace sent to a carpet museum, and opted instead to use inexpensive carpets. He is said to have refused the V.I.P. seat on the Presidential plane, and that he eventually replaced it with a cargo plane instead. Also upon gaining Iran's presidency, Ahmadinejad held his first cabinet meeting in the Imam Reza shrine at Mashhad, an act perceived as "pious".

Ahmadinejad is married with two sons and a daughter. One of his sons formerly studied at the Amirkabir University of Technology (Tehran Polytechnic)

Administrative and Academic Career:

Some details of Ahmadinejad's life during the 1980s are not publicly known, but it is known that he held a number of administrative posts in the province of West Azerbaijan, Iran.Many reports say that after Saddam Hussein invaded Iran, Ahmadinejad joined the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution and served in their intelligence and security apparatus, but his advisor Mojtaba Samareh Hashemi says "He has never been a member or an official member of the Revolutionary Guards", having been a Basiji-like volunteer instead.

Ahmadinejad was accepted to a Master of Science program at his alma mater in 1986. He joined the faculty there as a lecturer in 1989,and in 1997 received his doctorate in civil engineering and traffic transportation planning

Early Political Career:

After the Islamic Revolution, Ahmadinejad became a member of the Office for Strengthening Unity, an organization developed to prevent students from sympathizing or allying with the budding Mojahedin-e Khalq.

He first took political office as unelected governor to both Maku and Khoy in West Azarbaijan Province during the 1980s.[10] He eventually became an advisor to the governor general of Kurdistan Province for two years. During his doctoral studies at Tehran, he was appointed governor general of Ardabil Province from 1993 until Mohammad Khatami removed him in 1997 when he returned to teaching.

Presidency: 2005 Campaign: 

Ahmadinejad was not widely known when he entered the presidential election campaign as he had never run for office before, (he had only been mayor of Tehran for two years and had been appointed not elected), although he had already made his mark in Tehran for rolling back earlier reforms. He is a member of the Central Council of the Islamic Society of Engineers, but his key political support is inside the Alliance of Builders of Islamic Iran (Abadgaran or Developers).

Ahmadinejad generally sent mixed signals about his plans for his presidency, perhaps to attract both religious conservatives and the lower economic classes. His campaign slogan was: "It's possible and we can do it".

In the campaign, he took a populist approach. He emphasized his own modest life, and compared himself with Mohammad Ali Rajai, Iran's second president. Ahmadinejad said he planned to create an "exemplary government for the people of the world" in Iran. He was a "principlist", acting politically based on Islamic and revolutionary principles. One of his goals was "putting the petroleum income on people's tables", meaning Iran's oil profits would be distributed among the poor.

Ahmadinejad was the only presidential candidate who spoke out against future relations with the United States. He told Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting the United Nations was "one-sided, stacked against the world of Islam." He opposed the veto power of the UN Security Council's five permanent members: "It is not just for a few states to sit and veto global approvals. Should such a privilege continue to exist, the Muslim world with a population of nearly 1.5 billion should be extended the same privilege." He defended Iran's nuclear program and accused "a few arrogant powers" of trying to limit Iran's industrial and technological development in this and other fields.

In his second round campaign, he said, "We didn't participate in the revolution for turn-by-turn government....This revolution tries to reach a world-wide government." He spoke of an extended program using trade to improve foreign relations, and called for greater ties with Iran's neighbours and ending visa requirements between states in the region, saying that "people should visit anywhere they wish freely. People should have freedom in their pilgrimages and tours."

Ahmadinejad described Ayatollah Mohammad Taghi Mesbah Yazdi, a senior cleric from Qom as his ideological and spiritual mentor. Mesbah founded the Haghani School of thought in Iran. He and his team strongly supported Ahmadinejad's 2005 presidential campaign.

Nuclear Program:

Ahmadinejad has been a vocal supporter of Iran's nuclear program, and has insisted that it is for peaceful purposes. He has repeatedly emphasized that building a nuclear bomb is not the policy of his government. He has said that such a policy is "illegal and against our religion."He also added at a January 2006 conference in Tehran that a nation with "culture, logic and civilization" would not need nuclear weapons, and that countries that seek nuclear weapons are those that want to solve all problems by the use of force. In a 2008 interview Ahmadinejad elaborated that countries striving to obtain nuclear weapons are politically backward nations and those who possess them and continually make new generations of such bombs are "even more backward".

In April 2006, Ahmadinejad announced that Iran had successfully refined uranium to a stage suitable for the nuclear fuel cycle. In a speech to students and academics in Mashhad, he was quoted as saying that Iran's conditions had changed completely as it had become a nuclear state and could talk to other states from that stand. On 13 April 2006, Iranian news agency, IRNA, quoted Ahmadinejad as saying that the peaceful Iranian nuclear technology would not pose a threat to any party because "we want peace and stability and we will not cause injustice to anyone and at the same time we will not submit to injustice." Nevertheless, Iran's nuclear policy under Ahmadinejad's administration has received much criticism, spearheaded by the United States and Israel. The accusations include that Iran is striving to obtain nuclear arms and developing long-range firing capabilities—and that Ahmadinejad issued an order to keep UN inspectors from freely visiting the nation's nuclear facilities and viewing their designs, in defiance of an IAEA resolution.Following a May 2009 test launch of a long-range missile, Ahmadinejad was quoted as telling the crowd that with its nuclear program, Iran was sending the West a message that "the Islamic Republic of Iran is running the show."

Despite Ahmadinejad's vocal support for the program, the office of the Iranian president is not directly responsible for nuclear policy. It is instead set by the Supreme National Security Council. The council includes two representatives appointed by the Supreme Leader, military officials, and members of the executive, judicial, and legislative branches of government, and reports directly to Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who issued a fatwa against nuclear weapons in 2005. Khamenei has criticized Ahmadinejad's "personalization" of the nuclear issue.

Ahmadinejad vowed on February 2008, that Iran will not be held back from developing its peaceful nuclear program and has stated that at least 16 different peaceful uses for nuclear technology have so far been identified. In a 2009 interview, when asked by reporter Ann Curry whether he would rule out an Iranian nuclear bomb in the future, he responded: "We have no need for nuclear weapons." When Curry retorted, "So, may I assume, then, your answer to that question is 'no'?" Ahmadinejad repeated his answer, adding "Without such weapons, we are very much able to defend ourselves." Curry then warned Ahmadinejad that, "People will remark that you did not say no." To which Ahmadinejad responded, "You can take from this whatever you want, madam."

In October 2009 the United States, France and Russia proposed a U.N.-drafted deal with Iran regarding its nuclear program, in an effort to find a compromise between Iran's stated need for a nuclear reactor and the concerns of those who are worried that Iran harbors a secret intent on developing a nuclear weapon. After some delay in responding, on October 29, Ahmadinejad seemed to changed his tone towards the deal. "We welcome fuel exchange, nuclear co-operation, building of power plants and reactors and we are ready to co-operate," he said in a live broadcast on state television. However, he added that Iran would not retreat "one iota" on its right to a sovereign nuclear program.