Ahmad Azari Qomi

Ahmad Azari-Qomi-Bigdeli
Title	Grand Ayatollah
Born	1925
Died	1999
Era	Modern era
Region	Iran
Religion	Islam
Jurisprudence	Shia Islam

Grand Ayatollah Ahmad Azari-Qomi-Bigdeli (1925–1999) was an Iranian cleric.

Azari was born to a family of Sh'ia clerics in Qom in 1925.

Azari started his studies at Qom in 1941 under Ayatollahs Borujerdi, Mohaqqeq-Damad and Tabatabei. Upon finishing his clerical studies, he emigrated to Tabriz in northwest Iran to work as a religious teacher in a boarding school.

Azari was a founding member of the Society of Seminary Teachers of Qom. Between 1965 and 1979 he was imprisoned several times. He was judge in the Special Clerical Court after the 1979 revolution. He was a member of the Assembly of Experts that originally elected Khamenei as Khomeini’s successor. He also founded the Resalat Foundation, a religious organisation which owns the Resalat newspaper. Azari-Qomi was originally a staunch conservative. He was a member of the Jame'eh-ye Ruhaniyyat-e Mobarez-e Tehran. Allegedly, in the midst of the struggle over the Land Reform which the leftist parliament envisioned in the early 1980s, Azari-Qomi asked for Khomeini's permission to found a conservative newspaper, but Khomeini declined. Azari-Qomi tried again a year later. This time, Khomeini did not react to the request, which Azari-Qomi interpreted as a permission. This was the birth of Resalat Newspaper, together with Keyhan one of the most conservative newspapers in Iran.

Grand Ayatollah Ahmad Azari-Qomi was arrested in November 1997 after having published an open letter outside of Iran (inter alia in the London-based independent weekly newspaper Nimrooz) in which he criticized Supreme Leader Khamenei. In the 34-page open letter, Azari-Qomi blamed Khamenei for having initiated the creation of the Ansar-e Hezbollah that was responsible for threatening a number of liberal academics and writers. He accused Khamenei for having set the stage for widespread "moral corruption" among regime officials and clergymen which has "withered the roots of decency." Azari-Qomi also criticized the Islamic Republic for torturing the sons of Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Shirazi. "Even if he rejects the velayat-e faqih, why torture his children? Security organizations should learn from the shameful fate of the SAVAK," Azari-Qomi wrote. Azari-Qomi also appealed to president Khatami to abolish the Special Clerical Court which had arrested and tortured many followers of Grand Ayatollah Shirazi.

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