- Abolhassan Banisadr, Iran’s first president after the country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution who fled Tehran after being impeached for challenging the growing power of clerics as the nation became a theocracy, died.
- He was 88. He was elected president in 1980, Banisadr was impeached 16 months after taking office for challenging the growing power of clerics.
- Banisadr then served as Iran’s minister of economics and foreign affairs and, with the help of the Islamic clergy, became president.
- He faced huge difficulties from the start, including the US embassy hostage crisis and the Iran-Iraq war but, above all, the opposition of fundamentalist clerics.
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