March 4 (Reuters) - Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's son Mojtaba has emerged as frontrunner to succeed his late father as Iran's supreme leader after years spent forging close ties with the elite Revolutionary Guards and building influence in the clerical establishment.
Mojtaba Khamenei, 56, has survived the U.S.-Israeli air war on Iran and is seen by Iran's establishment as a potential successor to his father, who was killed in an airstrike on Saturday, two Iranian sources said on Wednesday.
A powerful mid-ranking cleric, Mojtaba has opposed reformers seeking to engage with the West as it tries to curb Iran's nuclear programme, and has long greater freedoms.
His close ties with the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) give him added leverage across Iran's political and security apparatus and he has built up influence behind the scenes as his father's "gatekeeper", sources familiar with the matter said.
"He has strong constituency and support within the IRGC, in particular amongst the younger radical generations," said Kasra Aarabi, head of researching the IRGC at United Against Nuclear Iran, a U.S.-based policy organisation.
"So if Mojtaba is alive, there is a high chance that he will succeed (his father)," he said, describing Mojtaba as already operating as a "mini supreme leader".
DECISION ON SUPREME LEADER EXPECTED SOON
The Assembly of Experts that will select the new leader is "close to a conclusion" and will announce its decision soon, Assembly member Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami told state TV on Wednesday, without naming the candidates.
The supreme leader has the final say on matters of state, including foreign policy and Iran's nuclear programme. Western powers want to prevent Tehran developing nuclear arms. Iran says its nuclear programme is for civilian purposes only.
If elected, Mojtaba will face pressure from U.S. sanctions that have hammered the economy and could face opposition from Iranians who have shown they are ready to stage mass protests to press their demands for greater freedoms despite bloody crackdowns by the authorities.
Mojtaba was born in 1969 in the city of Mashhad and grew up as his father was helping lead the opposition to the Shah. As a young man, he served in the Iran-Iraq war.
Mojtaba studied under religious conservatives in the seminaries of Qom, Iran's center of Shi'ite theological learning, and has the clerical rank of Hojjatoleslam.
He has never held a formal position in the Islamic Republic's government, despite being widely seen as the gatekeeper to his father. He has appeared at loyalist rallies, but has rarely spoken in public.
His role has long been a source of controversy in Iran, with critics rejecting any hint of dynastic politics in a country that overthrew a U.S.-backed monarch in 1979.
US SANCTIONS
The U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions on Mojtaba in 2019, saying he represented the supreme leader in "an official capacity despite never being elected or appointed to a government position" aside from working in his father's office.
Its website said Khamenei had delegated some of his responsibilities to Mojtaba, whom it said had worked closely with the commander of the IRGC's Quds Force and the Basij, a religious militia affiliated with the Guards, "to advance his father's destabilising regional ambitions and oppressive domestic objectives".
Mojtaba was a particular target for criticism by protesters during unrest over the death of a young woman in police custody in 2022, after she was arrested for allegedly breaching the Islamic Republic's strict dress codes.
In 2024, a video was widely shared in which he announced the suspension of Islamic jurisprudence classes he was teaching at Qom, fuelling speculation about the reasons.
Mojtaba bears a strong resemblance to his father, and wears the black turban of a sayyed, indicating his family traces its lineage to the Prophet Mohammad.
Critics say Mojtaba lacks the clerical credentials to be supreme leader - Hojjatoleslam is a notch below the rank of Ayatollah, the position held by his father and Ruhollah Khomeini, who founded the Islamic Republic.
But he has remained in the frame, particularly after another leading candidate for the role - the former President Ebrahim Raisi - died in a helicopter crash in 2024.
A U.S. diplomatic cable written in 2007 and published by WikiLeaks cited three Iranian sources describing Mojtaba as an avenue to reach Khamenei.
Mojtaba was widely believed to have been behind the sudden rise of hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was elected president in 2005.
Mojtaba backed Ahmadinejad in 2009 when he won a second term in a disputed election which resulted in anti-government protests that were violently suppressed by the Basij and other security forces.
Mehdi Karroubi, a moderate cleric who ran in the election, wrote a letter to Khamenei at the time objecting to what he alleged was Mojtaba's role in supporting Ahmadinejad. Khamenei rejected the accusation.
Mojtaba's wife, who was killed in Saturday's airstrikes, was the daughter of a prominent hardliner, the former parliament speaker Gholamali Haddadadel.
(Writing by Tom Perry and Michael Georgy and Parisa Hafezi, Editing by Timothy Heritage)
