Ayatollah Montazeri

The jailed son of Ayatollah Montazeri, one-time heir to Iran’s former supreme leader Ayatollah Khomeini, has been granted a conditional release, a news agency linked to the judiciary said Saturday.

The Saturday report said the six-year prison term of Ahmad Montazeri, son of Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, was suspended after approval by the country’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei following a request by a top cleric.

The report did not identify the cleric who made the request

A court had sentenced Ahmad Montazeri to prison in November for publishing a tape recording of his father that condemns the execution of thousands of prisoners in 1988. He began serving his prison term in February but was soon released.

The late Montazeri, who died in 2009, was an outspoken critic of the country’s ruling establishment.

Mizanonline reported Ahmad Montazeri had agreed not to “take action against the regime,” failing which he would return to prison.

An appeals court ruled that the cleric, whose late father had originally been lined up to replace Khomeini before being sidelined, should serve a six-year term rather than 21 years as ordered by a religious court, Mizanonline reported last month.

He was also convicted of spreading “lies about the founder of the Islamic republic,” Khomeini.

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