Iran Focus: Major General Mohsen Rezai was Commander of Iran’s elite Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) from 1981 to 1997. The IRGC, and in particular its Qods (Jerusalem) Force, are tasked with “liberating Jerusalem through Baghdad” in stark contrast to the country’s regular armed forces which are purely for defending the country against foreign attacks. He currently serves as Secretary of the State Expediency Council. Mohsen Rezai’s life story is one of the most bizarre, and yet typical, cases of extreme make-over among the Islamic regime’s elite.

Iran Focus: Ali Ardeshir Larijani was the head of the Iranian State TV and Radio from 1994 to 2004. Prior to that, Larijani served as the Minister of Culture and Islamic Guidance under President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani taking up the post from current president Mohammad Khatami. At the end of Larijani’s 10-year term as head
of state broadcaster IRIB in May 2004, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei appointed him as his representative in the Supreme National Security Council for a three-year term.

Iran Focus: Mohammad-Baqer Qalibaf is one of the eight hopefuls competing to become president following the June 17 elections. He is also one of five candidates who previously held top Revolutionary Guards posts. Qalibaf, a former commander of the elite Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ Air Force, stepped down as the chief of the paramilitary police force, the State Security Forces, to run in the upcoming elections. He headed the IRGC Air Force until June 2000, when he was selected as police chief.

Iran Focus: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is the appointed Mayor of Tehran, after first getting the job in April 2003.
He is seen to be an ultra-conservative, having also been a top commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, the regime’s ideological army.
Following the 1979 Islamic revolution he became a member of the Office for Strengthening Unity. He belonged to the ultra-conservative faction of the OSU.

Iran Focus: Hojatoleslam Mehdi Mahdavi-Karroubi, a mid-ranking cleric, is currently a member of the State Expediency Council and an adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Karroubi was Majlis (parliament) Speaker from 1989 to 1992. He took up the same post again from 2000 to 2004 replacing a leading conservative, Ali Akbar Nateq Nuri, who was instead appointed an adviser to Khamenei.