From BBC News: DEFIANT CLERIC

Guardian: His political opposition to injustice may represent an important act of defiance. But what Montazeri would wish to be remembered for may be his attempt to change the basis of Shia jurisprudence from protecting the right of the faithful to protecting the right of the citizens. This made him issue a historic statement earlier this year calling for respect for the right of the Baha’i people in Iran as citizens of the country. No other leading theologian has ever dared to issue such fatwa. He expanded the boundaries of Shia jurisprudence into the realm of human rights and wrote a book on the subject.

LISTEN: RFE/RL’s Radio Farda broadcaster Mehrdad Mirdamadi Khouzani speaks about Grand Ayatollah Montazeri’s life and legacy.

LA Times: One of Iran’s most senior clerics, a staunch defender of the nation’s opposition movement as well as a pillar of the Islamic revolution 31 years ago, passed away overnight, supporters told The Times today.

Grand Ayatollah Hussein-Ali Montazeri was 87.Montazeri’s son, Ahmad, told the Iranian Labor News Agency that his father was suffering from an unspecified illness and passed away late Saturday at his home in Qum, the Iranian shrine and seminary city 60 miles south of Tehran.

His death comes as Iranian protesters prepare to take part in emotionally charged and symbolically loaded Muharram ceremonies marking the Seventh Century martyrdom of Imam Hussein, the grandson of the Prophet Mohammad and a highly revered figure within Iran’s majority Shiite Muslim faith.

Burial arrangements have yet to be made, but the anticipated ceremonies around his death could further galvanize a protest movement driven as much, if not more, by raw emotion over perceived injustice as rational political calculation.

“Ayatollah Montazeri will be remembered in the history of Iran as brave, open-minded and willing to say the truth at any time, even when encountering danger,” Fazel Maybodi, a midranking reformist cleric and a disciple of Montazeri, said in a telephone interview from Qum.

Cast out of Iran’s inner circle of power and stripped of his official posts, Montazeri over the last 20 years became outspoken critic of the Islamic Republic, calling for greater democracy and respect for human rights and civil liberties while often kept under surveillance in conditions that resembled house arrest.

BBC News: One of Shia Islam’s most respected figures, he was also a leading critic of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The BBC’s Jon Leyne says the death comes at a crucial time in a standoff between the government and opposition.

Iran’s rulers will now fear the opposition may attempt a big turnout for his funeral on Monday and other ceremonies marking his death, especially in the run-up to the Shia Muslim festival of Ashura on 27 December, our correspondent says.

…he repeatedly accused the country’s rulers of imposing dictatorship in the name of Islam and said the liberation that was supposed to have followed the 1979 revolution never happened.

He had been designated to succeed the Islamic Republic’s founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, but the pair fell out over Iran’s human rights record a few months before Khomeini died of cancer in 1989.

Obituary: Ayatollah Montazeri

Also read Montazeri’s emails with the BBC here and his visit with the BBC here.

Guardian: Montazeri was one of just a few Grand Ayatollahs – the most senior theologians of the Shia Muslim faith.

After he was placed under house arrest, state-run media stopped referring to Montazeri by his religious title, describing him instead as a “simple-minded” cleric. Any talk about Montazeri was strongly discouraged, references to him in schoolbooks were removed and streets named after him were renamed.

Washington Post: He had been named to succeed late revolutionary leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini as Iran’s supreme leader, but quarreled with him in 1989 over the mass execution of prisoners. Instead, the current supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, succeeded Khomeini after he died later the same year.

In August, he described the clerical establishment as a “dictatorship,” saying the authorities’ handling of street unrest following the June presidential poll “could lead to the fall of the regime.”

Montazeri was among the government’s harshest critics in a clerical establishment whose splits have gaped during turmoil triggered by the disputed election six months ago.

MSNBC: Montazeri’s grandson, Nasser Montazeri, said he died in his sleep overnight.

The Web site of Iranian state television cited doctors as saying Montazeri had suffered from asthma and arteriosclerosis.

Several top pro-opposition ayatollahs gathered at Montazeri’s house after his death, the Gooya News Web site reported.

The official IRNA news agency issued a two-line report on Montazeri’s death without mentioning his title and state radio and television broadcasters were equally terse, reflecting the deep tension between the government and its opponents.

Aljazeera: Iran’s opposition leaders have called for a day of mourning following the death of Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, a senior cleric who was a fierce critic of the current government.

Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi, two of the defeated candidates in June’s disputed presidential poll, urged their supporters to attend the funeral on Monday, according to a statement on Mousavi’s Kaleme.org website.

Baqer Moin, an Iranian journalist and author, told Al Jazeera that Montazeri’s absence would be “greatly felt across the country”, among both sides of the political divide.

“He was the most heavyweight among them [the reformists]. He had great popularity because he was a humble man, he was a simple man … and above all he was very courageous.

“He didn’t fear expressing his views, critical of the current supreme leader or the policies of the government.”

AP: In particular, he opened the door to direct condemnation of the ruling clerics, a bold step that energized Iran’s young activists. In August, he decried the “despotic treatment” of protesters at the hands of the ruling theocracy. A month later, he accused the regime of committing “crimes … in name of Islam.”

“I think the current opposition movement has gone way beyond and above what Montazeri was standing for,” Abdulla said.

But his strong denunciations against Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei helped break the taboos against such criticism and pushed the protesters into bolder acts of defiance. In demonstrations earlier this month, students shouted “Death to the dictator!” and burned pictures of Khamenei.

The International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran said one of Montazeri’s followers and a government critic, Ahmad Ghabel, was arrested while driving to Qom with his family to attend the funeral. The New York-based group called on the government not to interfere in the commemorations.

Another prominent critic, filmmaker Mohammad Nourizad, was arrested on a charge of insulting officials, the state news agency IRNA reported Sunday. Nourizad, once a conservative government supporter, wrote a letter of protest to Khamenei in September urging him to apologize to the nation for the postelection crackdown.

But a deep ideological rift soon developed with Khomeini. Montazeri envisioned the Islamic experts as advisers to the government who should not have outright control to rule themselves. He was also among those clerics who believed the power of the supreme leader comes from the people, not from God.

Guardian: Montazeri’s campaign for human rights and, in particular, better treatment of the opponents of the Islamic republic in prisons, brought him into direct conflict with Khomeini. In 1987, thousands of prisoners were executed without proper trial, leading Montazeri to write to the ayatollah that his prison system and his judiciary were worse than that of the Shah. Ultimately, Khomeini sent Montazeri a letter dismissing him from the succession. Nonetheless, his respect for the man he called “the fruit of my life” was evident in the recommendation that as a sublime exponent of jurisprudence, Montazeri should retire to teach in the holy city of Qom.

Montazeri moved to the view that the clergy should act as advisers, representing the electorate but without claiming a divine mission. He also became critical of Ayatollah Khamenei, Khomeini’s successor, for issuing religious decrees. Montazeri saw Khamenei as having more of a political than a religious role – and as having too junior a religious status to be entitled to issue fatwas. This earned Montazeri a period of house arrest (1997-2003) until his freedom to teach again was restored. Montazeri’s courage in expressing his views earned him respect across the political spectrum. He issued many statements supporting those who opposed the election results in June 2009: they looked up to him as the spiritual father of the reform movement.

He was arrested, imprisoned, tortured, and sent into internal exile – a painful period that proved to be very influential in Montazeri’s intellectual development. Prison forced him to experience the tyranny of the state and the abuse of human rights. He also had to live in the same cell and argue with leftwingers and nationalists, and acquire a better understanding of their causes – an opportunity experienced by very few leading ayatollahs.

Khordaad88: One of the final interviews of Ayatollah Montazeri with Radio Zamaneh