"The thought, reality and identity of the late Imam Khomeini remain alive and burgeoning," Islamic Revolution Leader, His Eminence Ayatollah Sayed Ali Khamenei said in a historic 2006 speech, urging for preserving and safeguarding thought and ideas of Imam and moving in the path of those ideas.
Ayatollah Khamenei pointed to the tireless and resolute character of the late founder of the Islamic Revolution in the eras of struggle and the Islamic Revolution, adding that Imam Khomeini by relying on a fine and genuine faith and unshaken with difficulties or threats, mightily took the stage and openly introduced religion as the principle element of human life and established a religion-oriented government at time when religion was low-profile in society and yet in individual matters.
Pointing to farsightedness, prudence and perseverance of the late Imam, the IR Leader said that Imam Khomeini laid the foundation of a reality which is now so rooted that big powers despite all their plots and attempts are unable to challenge it.
"The enmity of arrogant powers with the Islamic system is in fact leveled at the thoughts and way of Imam," the Leader said, adding that even 17 years after the departure of the honorable Imam, his noble figure and his reality and identity have still befallen to attacks and malevolence.
Ayatollah Khamenei considered the presence of Imam Khomeini's thoughts and ideas in the world of Islam as token of his immortality, adding that the affections shown by world Muslim population to the Islamic Revolution and the honorable Imam partly manifests during visits of the Iranian high ranking officials to Islamic countries and demonstrates the strategic depth of the Islamic Republic system and the extends of Imam Khomeini's influence.
The IR Leader stressed that words, messages and the will of the honorable Imam contain his clear-cut ideas. Ayatollah Khamenei noted that those who are claiming to follow Imam , must prove their adherence to his principles, adding that they can not pretend to follow Imam and at the same time agree world capitalism or seek personal benefits from any mandate in the Islamic government and treat social justice as a worthless idea.
Ayatollah Khamenei recalled Imam's ideas that religion and ideology must form the basis of politics and government, noting that no one is allowed to chant slogans in support of Imam and at the same time seek to separate ideology from politics and move in the path of American attempts to remove ideology.