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Abolhassan Banisadr
1st President of the Islamic Republic of Iran
In office 4 February 1980 – 21 June 1981
Leader	Ruhollah Khomeini
Preceded by	Office Created
Succeeded by	Mohammad-Ali Rajai
Interm Minister of Foreign Affairs
In office 12 November 1979 – 29 November 1979
Preceded by	Ebrahim Yazdi
Succeeded by	Sadegh Ghotbzadeh
Born	March 22, 1933 (1933-03-22) (age 74) Tehran, Iran
Political party	Association of Combatant Clerics
Religion	Shia Islam

Abol-hassan Banisadr (Persian: ابوالحسن بنی‌صدر; born 22 March 1933) was the first President of Iran, following the 1979 Iranian Revolution and the abolition of the monarchy.

Banisadr had participated in the anti-Shah student movement during the early 1960s, was imprisoned twice, and was wounded during an uprising in 1963. He then fled to France and joined the Iranian resistance group led by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Banisadr returned to Iran together with Khomeini as the revolution was beginning in February 1979. He was the deputy economy and finance minister and acting foreign minister briefly during 1979, and the finance minister from 1979 to 1980.

He was elected to a four year term as President on January 25, 1980, receiving 70 percent of the vote in a competitive election against Ahmad Madani, Hassan Habibi, Sadegh Tabatabaee, Dariush Forouhar, Sadegh Ghotbzadeh, Kazem Sami, Mohammad Makri, Hassan Ghafourifard, and Hassan Ayat, and inaugurated on February 4. The Ayatollah Khomeini remained the Supreme Leader of Iran, with the constitutional authority to dismiss the President. The inaugural ceremonies were held at the hospital where Khomeini was recovering from a heart ailment. ^[1]

Banisadr was not an Islamic cleric. The Ayatollah had insisted that clerics should not run for positions in the government. In August and September, 1980, Banisadr survived two helicopter crashes near the Iranian border with Iraq.

Banisadr soon fell out with Ayatollah Khomeini. So, accusing^{[citation needed]} Banisadr of a weak performance in leading Iranian troops in the Iran-Iraq War, Khomeini reclaimed the power of Commander-in-Chief on June 10, 1981 that he had delegated to Banisadr.

Banisadr was impeached on June 21, 1981 by the Majlis (the Iranian Parliament), allegedly because of his moves against the clerics in power, most specifically Mohammad Beheshti, the head of the judicial system at the time. Ayatollah Khomeini appears to have instigated the impeachment, which he signed the next day on June 22. Even before Ayatollah Khomeini had signed the impeachment papers, the Pasdaran had seized the Presidential buildings and gardens and imprisoned newspaper writers who worked for a newspaper closely tied to Banisadr. In the next few days, they also executed several of his closest friends, including Hossein Navab, Rashid Sadrolhefazi, and Manouchehr Massoudi. It was revealed later that the group of guards who were assigned to capture Banisadr were told to finish him off rather than get him to jail^{[citation needed]}. Banisadr remained in hiding for the next six weeks. On July 10, 1981, he shaved his moustache, donned an Iranian Air Force uniform, and boarded a Boeing 707 piloted by Colonel Behzad Moezi. The plane followed a route close to the Turkish border before veering into Turkish airspace, where Iranian jets could not pursue. Banisadr then flew from Turkey to Cachan, Paris, France, along with Massoud Rajavi, former leader of the Mojahedin, where (as of 2005) he still lives and has published many articles about Iran.

v • d • e Presidents of Iran
Abolhassan Banisadr (1980–81) • Mohammad-Ali Rajai (1981) • Ali Khamenei (1981–89) • Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani (1989–97) • Mohammad Khatami (1997–2005) • Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (2005–present)

• Abolhassan Banisadr's Persian website