Iranian assembly to meet ‘within one day’ to choose new supreme leader

Iran’s assembly of experts will be meeting within a day to choose a new supreme leader.

That’s according to assembly member Ayatollah Mozafari, who has been cited by Iranian media.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in the initial US-Israeli strikes on Iran last weekend.

Iran’s supreme leader has the final say in all matters of state.

The assembly’s 88 members are deciding who assumes the role after Khamenei’s killing.

Under Iran’s system of vilayat-e faqih - guardianship of the Islamic jurist - the supreme leader must be a senior leader with political and religious authority.

A three-person leadership council was formed to govern the country on a temporary basis during the immediate aftermath of the supreme leader’s death.

It included:

• Masoud Pezeshkian, Iran’s reformist president

• Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, hard-line head of the judiciary

• Alireza Arafi, jurist and head of the Basij, a volunteer paramilitary force

Khamenei was never publicly recorded as naming a successor.

Source: Sky News

--Agencies