Ahmadinajad says to retire after 2013

Iranian president tells German newspaper he will quit politics, return to science after second term

AFP|Published: 06.16.12 , 15:02

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said in an interview with the German media on Saturday that he would retire from politics after his second term in 2013 and was planning "to return to science ".

"Eight years is enough," he said in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung published Sunday and excerpts of which were released Saturday. "I plan to return to science," he added while the Iranian constitution does not allow him to run for a third term next year.

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He also ruled out a future return to politics as Russian President Vladimir Putin who is starting a third term after the 2000 to 2008.

"Maybe I will engage myself politically in a university, but I will not set up a party or group," he said.

Presenting himself as a defender of the poor and devotee of Islam, the ultraconservative was reelected in 2009 after coming to power in 2005 surprised.

Before beginning his political career, he earned a doctorate in urban transport management.

Ahmadinejad has been known as a hardliner vis-à-vis the West, saying last month that he did not expect talks with the six world powers in Moscow on Iran's nuclear program to yield any major breakthroughs.

"We are not fools. We are not expecting miracles at the next meeting," Ahmadinejad said in an interview with France 24 television. "There will be areas of work that will go in the right direction and we will work towards them so that we reach a constructive accord."

He said Tehran had "good proposals" to make, but that it would only announce them when the time was right, and both sides had to work hand in hand to restore confidence.