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Mojtaba Khamenei, the influential son of Iran’s late Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and currently a prominent candidate to succeed his father, faced personal challenges in his private life, according to confidential diplomatic documents. These documents reveal that Mojtaba dealt with “impotency” issues, which affected his ability to start a family.
In the late 2000s, U.S. diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks disclosed that Mojtaba, now 56, sought medical assistance in London at the Wellington and Cromwell Hospitals. This treatment was reportedly aimed at addressing difficulties he and his wife encountered in conceiving a child.
The diplomatic leaks suggest that Mojtaba’s condition necessitated at least four prolonged medical visits, culminating in a final stay lasting two months before his wife successfully became pregnant.
His marriage to the daughter of former Majles Speaker Hadad Adel was preceded by two “temporary marriages”—a practice permitted under Iranian law. The delay in his marriage is attributed to the need for medical intervention to resolve his fertility issues, as outlined in the diplomatic cables.
The cables further note that Mojtaba’s family had high expectations for him to quickly produce heirs. His fourth visit to the UK for medical treatment proved successful, as it resulted in his wife’s pregnancy following a two-month stay.
Eventually, his wife gave birth to a healthy boy back in Iran, according to the resurfaced documents, which were first reported on by the Daily Mail.
It wasn’t immediately clear how many children Mojtaba ended up fathering.
Mojtaba, a largely secretive figure within the Islamic Republic, has long been considered a contender to become the country’s next paramount ruler — even before the US-Israeli strike killed his father and the younger Khamenei’s wife, Zahra Haddad Adel, on Saturday.
In the same diplomatic cable that laid bare his apparent impotency issues, Mojtaba was once referred to as “the power behind the robes.”
He “is widely viewed within the regime as a capable and forceful leader and manager who may someday succeed to at least a share of national leadership; his father may also see him in that light,” the cable read.
In the wake of Saturday’s strike, Mojtaba was initially believed to have been among the 40 top Iranian aides killed alongside his despotic 86-year-old father, who ruled over Iran with an iron grip for decades.
Iranian sources, however, have since said Mojtaba is still alive and in hiding as American and Israeli airstrikes continue to pound Iran.
“He (Mojtaba) is alive … he was not in Tehran when the Supreme Leader was killed,” one of the sources said.
With Post wires