Iran gets reformist president Masoud Pezeshkian who wants to relax the headscarf law: 5 points

Reformist Masoud Pezeshkian won the second round of Iran’s presidential elections on Saturday, defeating hardliner Saeed Jalili by a margin of about 2.8 million votes.

The 69-year-old president-elect aims to improve relations with the West and ease the mandatory headscarf law. Although Pezeshkian respects the authority of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and does not seek major changes in Iran’s government, he faces significant challenges – hard-line opposition, the Israel-Hamas conflict and Western concerns about Iran’s nuclear program.

Here are some facts about Masoud Pezeshkian:

1. Masoud Pezeshkian was born on September 29, 1954, in Mahabad, western Azerbaijan, to an Azerbaijani father and a Kurdish mother. He speaks Azeri and focuses on the issues of Iran’s ethnic minority groups. Pezeshkian lost his wife Fatemeh Majidi and one of his daughters in a car accident in 1994. He chose not to remarry and raised his other two sons and daughter alone .

2. He is a cardiac surgeon and served as head of the Tabriz University of Medical Sciences. He became a combatant and medic during the Iran-Iraq War (1980-1988), sending medical teams to the front lines.

3. Masoud Pezeshkian served as Minister of Health, Treatment and Medical Education under the administration of President Mohammad Khatami. He was a member of the Iranian Parliament, representing Tabriz, Azarshahr and Osku for several terms (8 to 12). He served as first vice president from 2016 to 2020.

4. The 69-year-old registered in the 2011 and 2021 presidential elections. He withdrew in 2011 and was disqualified in 2021. In the 2024 presidential race, Pezeshkian campaigned under the slogan “For Iran”, aiming to contrast the his policies with those of his opponent Saeed Jalili.

5. Masoud Pezeshkian has been involved in several controversies. He participated in the 2003 autopsy of Iranian-Canadian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi, who was detained, tortured and died in custody. He cited intracranial hemorrhage as the cause of death, but said there were no signs of bruising or cuts, contradicting the international outcry and demands for an investigation.

In 2017, Pezeshkian admitted that he was one of the first to ban women who did not wear the hijab from entering universities and hospitals in 1978, even before the official introduction of the mandatory hijab policy. In 2022, after the death of Mahsa Amini, he said it was “unacceptable in the Islamic Republic” to arrest a girl for not wearing a hijab and then return her corpse to her family.