Sadegh Ghotbzadeh (, 24 February 1936 – 15 September 1982) was an Iranian politician who served as a close aide of Ayatollah Khomeini during his 1978 exile in France, and foreign minister (30 November 1979 – August 1980) during the Iran hostage crisis following the Iranian Revolution. In 1982, he was executed for allegedly plotting the assassination of Ayatollah Khomeini and the overthrow of the Islamic Republic. Early life and education Ghotbzadeh was born in Isfahan in 1936. He had a sister and a brother. His father was a wealthy lumber merchant. As a student, he was active in the student branch of the National Front following the toppling of Mohammad Mosaddegh in 1953. He left Iran in 1959 after being detained twice due to his opposition activities to the Shah's regime; he lived in Europe, the US and Canada. Ghotbzadeh was a supporter of the National Front of Iran. In addition he was one of the senior members of the Freedom Movement of Iran led by Mehdi Bazargan in the 1960s. He attended Georgetown University's Walsh School of Foreign Service from 1959 to 1963. He contributed to the Freedom Movement from the US. He was part of the more radical wing of the movement together with Ebrahim Yazdi, Mostafa Chamran and Ali Shariati. However, he was dismissed from the school before graduating due to his skipping studies and exams to lead protests against the government of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, including storming a posh party hosted by the then Iranian ambassador to the United States, the son-in-law of the Shah, Ardeshir Zahedi. Ghotbzadeh left the US when his passport was revoked and moved to Algeria, Egypt, Syria and finally to Iraq, where he met Ayatollah Khomenei in 1963. In December of the same year Ghotbzadeh along with Chamran and Yazdi met the Egyptian authorities to establish an anti-Shah organization in the country, which was later called SAMA, special organization for unity and action. Chamran was chosen as its military head. Ghotbzadeh also developed a close relation with Musa Al Sadr, an Iranian-Lebanese Shia cleric. During his stay in the Middle East, Ghotbzadeh was trained in Lebanon together with Iranian revolutionary militants and Palestinians. In the late 1960s, Ghotbzadeh went to Canada for higher education and graduated from now defunct Notre Dame University College in Nelson, BC, in 1969. Next he settled in Paris using his Syrian passport which he obtained