According to the official website of the Iranian President, Iran’s new ultra-conservative President Ibrahim Raisy appointed the chairman of a powerful state-owned foundation approved by the United States as his first vice president on Sunday (August 8).
Mohammad Mokhber has long been reported by the local media as the first choice for this position. For many years he has been leading the foundation known as Setad to execute the orders of Imam Khomeini, referring to Ruhola Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic.
Mokbel was appointed to this position by the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in 2007. He previously held a series of official positions in the southwestern province of Khuzestan.
Setad was originally established in the late 1980s to manage property confiscated after the Islamic Revolution in 1979.
Since then, it has become a large conglomerate with shares in various industries including health. Its Barekat Foundation produced Iran’s first local Covid-19 vaccine project.
The vaccine received emergency approval from the health authorities of the worst-hit countries in the Middle East in June.
Setad and Mokhber were blacklisted by the US Treasury Department in January. Washington has stated that Setad “owns shares in almost all sectors of the Iranian economy, including energy, telecommunications and financial services.”
Raisi won the June 18 election with a record abstention, and he succeeded the moderate Hassan Rouhani.
On Thursday, Raisy was sworn in in Parliament, and he must submit a list of ministers to Parliament within two weeks.
As the former head of the judiciary, Raisi has been criticized by the West for his human rights record and has been sanctioned by the United States since 2019.
Raisi also selected Gholamhossein Esmaili, spokesperson for the judiciary, as his chief of staff.
Former prosecutor Esmeli was sanctioned by the European Union.
In 2011, he was blacklisted for the first time as the head of an Iranian prison organization for “serious violations of human rights.”
Raisi’s presidency is due to the conservatives’ consolidation of power after the victory of the 2020 parliamentary elections, which is characterized by the disqualification of thousands of reformist or moderate candidates.
According to the national news agency IRNA, also on Sunday, the ultra-conservative member of Congress and the 2021 presidential candidate Alireza Zakani was elected mayor of Tehran.
It said he won a majority of votes in the conservative-dominated city council, but he could not take over until he resigned from the council.
He succeeded Pirouz Hanachi, a senior civil servant with a background close to the reform camp in urban development.
Zakani served in Parliament from 2004 to 2016 and won a seat again last year.
As a doctor of nuclear medicine, at the age of 55, he withdrew from the June presidential race in favor of Raisi.
