Media Reports on the 'Poor' Health Condition of Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi

Some Iranian media reported on Sunday night, December 23, about the 'deteriorating health condition' of Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, the head of the Expediency Discernment Council, and that he has been 'hospitalized in the intensive care unit.' The Mehr News Agency published this news citing 'some unofficial sources' on its Twitter page, and the Twitter page of Qom News also stated that Hashemi Shahroudi's condition is 'not good' and urged 'faithful and God-seeking people to pray for his recovery.' The Iran newspaper's Twitter page also reported that Ayatollah Hashemi Shahroudi's condition is 'not good.' The ISNA news agency also published a similar report citing 'an informed source' whose identity was not disclosed. Some Hezbollah users on Twitter have also reported his death, but no official source has confirmed this news yet. Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi has not appeared in public since July 2018, and Mohsen Rezai, the secretary of the Expediency Discernment Council, stated that he 'must be cautious in speaking on medical advice.' This senior cleric was introduced as the head of this institution by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on August 14, a few months after the death of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the former head of the council. The presidency of the Expediency Discernment Council has been held by Hashemi Rafsanjani since its official establishment, and after his death, Mohammad Ali Mohammadi-Kermani became the interim head of this council, which has one of its most important responsibilities in resolving disputes between the Islamic Consultative Assembly and the Guardian Council. Mr. Hashemi Shahroudi was hospitalized in a Tehran hospital in May 2017 due to illness, and several officials, including the leader of the Islamic Republic, visited him. Although his illness was described in Iran as a 'relatively common gastrointestinal disease,' a German newspaper reported last December that Mr. Shahroudi was hospitalized at the International Brain and Neuroscience Foundation in Hanover, Germany. After this news was confirmed by several domestic media and a photo of Professor Majid Samii, the head of this center, alongside Mr. Shahroudi was published, the head of the Expediency Discernment Council returned to Iran due to a gathering of some Iranians residing in Germany in front of this clinic and filing a legal complaint against him in one of the German courts. Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi was introduced as the head of the Expediency Discernment Council by the leader of Iran three months after being hospitalized in Tehran. The German prosecutor's office had confirmed that it received complaints against Mr. Shahroudi, and it was reported that his premature return to Iran was due to 'fear of legal prosecution.' Among the evidence presented to the German prosecutor's office for prosecuting Mr. Shahroudi were his role in issuing 'thousands of death sentences' during his tenure in the Iranian judiciary. Shahroudi himself stated that during his treatment in Germany, 'an infection was discovered that had not been identified in Iran before.' In his first public appearance after the controversial trip to Germany, he acknowledged that due to the presence of a tumor in his large intestine, he had undergone surgery three times in Iran, and ultimately, the disagreement among his treating physicians led to his trip to Germany. Previously, Mohammad Reza Bahonar, a member of the Expediency Discernment Council, had reported on Shahroudi's poor health condition and stated that for this reason, he could not participate in council meetings, and after him, Mohsen Rezai became the 'all-in-one' of this institution. Shahroudi was born in Najaf, Iraq, and is currently 69 years old. After the February 1979 revolution, he came to Iran and fought against Saddam Hussein's regime by establishing the 'Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq.' He was considered one of the potential successors to the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic. The Supreme Leader appointed Mahmoud Shahroudi as the head of the judiciary in 1999. He was the fourth head of the judiciary after Mohammad Hosseini Beheshti, Abdul Karim Mousavi Ardebili, and Mohammad Yazdi. When taking over this institution from Yazdi, he stated that he had inherited a 'ruin.' The end of his two terms as head of this judiciary coincided with street protests over the 2009 election results, which led to widespread arrests in Iran, and for this reason, the judiciary was severely criticized.