US President Donald Trump said talks with Iran were underway, briefly raising hopes of a diplomatic opening to end the conflict. US outlets reported that Egypt, Pakistan and Turkey had acted as intermediaries and had tried to arrange a phone call with Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, speaker of Iran’s parliament, and his advisers. Iranian officials denied the reports; Qalibaf dismissed them as “fake news,” saying they were meant to manipulate financial and oil markets. Separately, The Wall Street Journal reported that thousands of US Marines would be sent to the Middle East to help secure the Strait of Hormuz.
A former IRGC commander and career security official
Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, 64, rose from service in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) to become one of Iran’s most visible conservative politicians. A trained pilot with a doctorate in political geography, his academic work examined the relationships between space, state power and security policy. Qalibaf fought in the Iran–Iraq war (1980–1988) and climbed IRGC ranks after the conflict, later leading Khatam al-Anbiya, the guard’s engineering and reconstruction arm that has grown into a major economic conglomerate with extensive contractors and subsidiaries.
In 1997 Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei appointed him commander of the IRGC air force. Qalibaf played a role in quelling the 1999 student protests; he and the late Qassem Soleimani jointly warned then-president Mohammad Khatami, and Qalibaf has given interviews in which he recounted confronting demonstrators. In 2000 he was named Iran’s national police chief.
Political career and ambitions
Qalibaf has repeatedly sought the presidency. He ran in 2005 — losing to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad — and shortly afterward became mayor of Tehran, a post he held from 2005 to 2017. He again stood in the 2013 presidential race but was defeated by Hassan Rouhani; in 2017 he withdrew and supported another conservative candidate. In recent years he moved into parliamentary politics and has served as speaker of Iran’s parliament, positioning himself as a senior, pragmatic figure within the conservative establishment.
Corruption allegations and family scrutiny
Throughout his time as mayor, journalists reported irregularities in city land and property sales, alleging that state-owned assets were sold well below market value to buyers that included officials and relatives. Critics also accuse Qalibaf of diverting large sums from the municipal treasury to his wife’s foundation, which provides support to single mothers and female heads of households; the foundation’s finances have been described as opaque. Those who exposed or investigated these issues have faced legal pressure, and critics say probes were limited in part because of Qalibaf’s ties to the supreme leader.
Qalibaf’s family has attracted public attention too. His son, Eshaq, reportedly applied for permanent residency in Canada and sued Canadian authorities over processing delays; the application was ultimately denied. In 2022, photographs of Qalibaf’s daughter returning from Turkey with “newborn baby kits” stirred criticism, particularly given Iran’s economic problems and high inflation.
Enduring influence and speculation about his role
Despite controversies, Qalibaf remains a powerful figure within the IRGC’s networks and Iran’s political system. He has not been targeted in recent US or Israeli strikes on Iranian interests, a fact that has fed speculation about his standing and possible future responsibilities. Whether the recent reports of back-channel contact were accurate or not, Qalibaf’s blend of security credentials, administrative experience and political ambition make him a central figure to watch in any discussion about Iran’s domestic politics and how Tehran might engage with outside interlocutors.
This piece was originally published in German and has been adapted into English.