Prominent hard-line cleric dies in Iran

A Shiite Muslim cleric heading a powerful religious committee died Monday, paving the way for a potentially divisive succession battle between the clique surrounding conservative President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and more moderate political factions.

Ayatollah Ali Akbar Faiz Meshkini died at the age of 86, state media reported. He headed the Assembly of Experts, a popularly elected but tightly controlled clerical organization that chooses and monitors Iran’s supreme leader, currently Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The 86-member assembly will conduct an internal poll to pick a leader, probably later this summer.

Moderates hope that Ayatollah Hashemi Rafsanjani, a former president, will ascend to the head of the assembly and steer Iran toward more restrained domestic and international policies.

He faces a likely challenge from Ayatollah Mesbah Yazdi, a right-wing cleric who is Ahmadinejad’s spiritual mentor.

Rafsanjani’s rise could moderate Iran’s policies in the long term, though it would probably have little bearing on whether Tehran changed course on its drive toward nuclear technology in the coming months, analysts said.

“There’s definitely a concerted effort by more moderate clerics to combat the more extreme elements around Ahmadinejad,” said Karim Sadjadpour, an Iran expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a Washington think tank. “But I don’t think we should raise our hopes that if Rafsanjani becomes head of the assembly suddenly he’s going to have a major impact on Iran’s foreign policy.”

The Iranian holy city of Qom, home to seminaries where Iran’s top clerics teach, declared five days of mourning in Meshkini’s honor.

The oncoming succession battle highlights the secretive nature of Iran’s political inner circle, dominated by clerics whose ways remain mysterious even to most Iranians.

Meshkini was considered a member of the fundamentalist faction. He was close to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the founder of Iran’s Islamic regime.

Rafsanjani is known to favor a less confrontational approach toward the West than Ahmadinejad. Under Rafsanjani’s presidency in the 1990s, Iran also loosened social restrictions on dress and private relations.

Yazdi, his rival, opposes any softening of the Islamic Republic’s domestic and foreign policies and has in the past said the use of violence was justified to impose Islamic values.

The stakes in the succession battle are potentially high. Khamenei, 68, is said to suffer from prostate cancer, and various factions have begun jousting behind the scenes to promote potential successors.

Rafsanjani favors replacing the position of supreme leader with a council, and perhaps further opening Iran’s political system, Sadjadpour said.

daragahi@latimes.com

Special correspondent Mostaghim reported from Tehran and Times staff writer Daragahi from Cairo.