MOSCOW -- Iranian spiritual leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, in a letter conveyed by a personal envoy Wednesday, praised Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev for instituting reforms and said communism had failed, the Soviet and Iranian news agencies reported.
It marked the first message from Khomeini to a foreign leader since the 1979 revolution in which the Islamic leader overthrew the shah of Iran, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, the Islamic Republic News Agency said in Tehran.
Ayatollah Abdullah Javadi Amoli, a personal representative of Khomeini, arrived in Moscow Tuesday and met Gorbachev Wednesday in the Kremlin, the Soviet news agency Tass said. There are about 30 million Moslems in the Soviet Union.
Gorbachev told Amoli that the Iran-Iraq cease-fire in August had created possibilities to open a dialogue on Soviet-Iranian relations and major problems of global scope, Tass said. Moscow supported Iraq in the eight-year Persian Gulf War.
Soviet television showed Gorbachev and Amoli shaking hands and seated at a conference table.
'They discussed cooperation and the international situation and how to defuse the situation in the Middle East,' the television commentator said, without elaboration.
Tass did not reveal the contents of the letter, but IRNA reported from Tehran that Khomeini told Gorbachev, '... The failure of communism had become evident.'
IRNA quoted Khomeini's son, Hojatoleslam Seyyed Ahmad Khomeini, as saying his father told Gorbachev, 'It was clear to all that, from henceforth, communism should be looked for in the museums of political history.'
Khomeini then told the Soviet leader that his efforts to change Soviet society was praiseworthy, IRNA said. The reference appeared to be to Gorbachev's political and economic reforms, known generally as perestroika.
'In general, the Imam's message that Mr. Gorbachev, after coming to power, had stepped into a new phase of reconsideration and transformation in dealing with the realities of the world and his boldness and vigor was worthy of praise,' IRNA said.
It said Gorbachev had replied that 'Moscow intended to rectify its past mistakes and to create a healthy life for the people, materially and spiritually.'
