One of the unexpected developments of this week was Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s remarks about Ali Akbar Velayati, the chief advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader and former Iranian Foreign Minister.

Commenting in an interview with Al Arabiya TV on the reaction of the Iranian authorities to the agreements reached on August 8 in Washington between the leaders of the United States, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev said, in particular:

“As for Iran’s official position on recent events, we consider it to be very reasonable and very positive. By “official position,” I mean the position of the president and the foreign minister. There were voices of some former officials, who are now called advisers. I don’t know what kind of advice they give. This position is completely unimportant to us. It has no significance, since our interstate relations are relations between governments, presidents, and foreign ministers. Therefore, we completely ignore these false narratives spread by so-called advisors.” 

Ali Akbar Velayati was one of the key figures in international politics from the late 1980s to the early 2000s, and we have chosen 10 archival photographs from the REUTERS agency to present his activities.

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Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati arrives at the UN in Geneva to resume talks with Iraq on ending their 8 year war, August 28, 1988. 

Photo: Rick Wilking

Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati with Syrian counterpart Farouk Al-Shara in Damascus on October 28, 1989. 

Photo: REUTERS/Ali Jarekji

USSR Foreign Minister Shevardnadze talks with Iranian counterpart Ali Akbar Velayati at the UN. September 29, 1990 

Photo: REUTERS/Nina Berman

Ali Akbar Velayti meets with UN Secretary General Javier Perez de Cuellar, September 26, 1990 

Photo: REUTERS/Nina Berman

Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev holds talks with Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati in Almaty, April 18, 1997.

Photo: REUTERS

Russian Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov greets his Iranian counterpart Ali Akbar Velayati on June 26, 1997

Photo: REUTERS

Iranian President Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani is escorted by Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati upon his arrival in Istanbul June 14, 1997.

Photo: REUTERS

Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal talks with Ali Akbar Velayati, Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's top advisor on international affairs, after a meeting in Damascus August 8, 2010. 

Photo: REUTERS

Iran's Supreme Leader's top advisor Ali Akbar Velayati talks with another attendee behind Lebanon's Hezbollah deputy leader Sheikh Naim Qassem in Beirut May 5, 2016. 

Photo: REUTERS/Aziz Taher

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Iran's Supreme Leader's top advisor Ali Akbar Velayati

In 2018.

Photo: REUTERS