Iran's parliamentary security committee has approved removing a longstanding requirement that the country's intelligence minister be a qualified Islamic jurist, potentially allowing a non-cleric to lead the ministry for the first time.
Amir Hayat Moghadam, deputy chairman of parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, said Saturday that the proposed change would allow qualified security professionals to become intelligence minister regardless of whether they were clerics. The amendment still requires approval by the full parliament and the powerful clerical Guardian Council before it can become law.
Since the Intelligence Ministry began operating in 1984, all its permanent ministers have been clerics, beginning with Mohammad Mohammadi Reyshahri. A 1983 law required the minister to possess the religious qualification of ijtihad, the authority to independently interpret Islamic law.
Hayat Moghadam said the requirement was established by ordinary legislation rather than Iran's constitution and had restricted the pool of qualified candidates. He expressed hope that lawmakers would approve the amendment to allow specialists without clerical backgrounds to lead the ministry.
The ministry has been headed by an acting minister whose identity has not been publicly disclosed since former minister Esmail Khatib was killed in March during the war.
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