“No negotiations have been held with the US,” Qalibaf posted on X on Monday, “and fakenews is used to manipulate the financial and oil markets and escape the quagmire in which the US and Israel are trapped.”
TIME reached out to the White House for comment.
Here’s what to know about the key Iranian figure.
Revolutionary Guard veteran
Born in 1961, Qalibaf, a grocer’s son, grew up near Mashhad in Iran’s northeast. During the Islamic Revolution, he entered activism. Iranian state-owned Press TV reported in 2024 that Qalibaf, as a teenager with his classmates, founded the Islamic Students’ Association, which eventually became a national organization.
At 18, Qalibaf joined the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), then a nascent group that operated alongside the Iranian armed forces but which has since become one of the country’s most feared and influential institutions. Amid the Iran-Iraq war led by Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein in the 1980s, Qalibaf swiftly rose through the ranks, becoming a brigade and division commander after about three years. He played a crucial role in the 1982 recapturing of the Iranian city of Khorramshahr from Hussein’s forces, a victory still celebrated annually in the country. By 1997, Qalibaf was selected to become Commander of the IRGC’s Aerospace Force.
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