TEHRAN, June 2 (UPI) -- Iranian and Kashmiri officials are preparing for media and other memorial events to mark the 20th anniversary of the death of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
Khomeini, who arrived in Tehran from exile in Paris in 1979 to father the Islamic Revolution, died of heart failure June 3, 1989, at the age of 89 following complications from internal bleeding.
Officials in Iran and Kashmir, his ancestral home, are holding essay competitions on the importance of spreading Islamic awareness and film presentations documenting his life, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reports.
In an IRNA interview, James Thring, a noted American critic with the Ministry of Peace, a London non-governmental organization, said the late Ayatollah deserves praise for his forward thinking on Middle East relations.
"He foresaw the destruction of not only Palestine, but the Arab states generally, well before the devastation of Iraq," he said.
Time Magazine named Khomeini its Person of the Year in 1979. He was succeeded by Grand Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
