Iran's top leader to preside over Friday Prayers on Jan. 17

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will preside over Tehran's Friday Prayers on January 17, Iran's labor news agency (ILNA) reported on Wednesday.

Rare in its kind, Khamenei's Friday sermon comes amid a chain of regional and domestic developments that the Islamic republic has been grappled with over the past weeks.

It would be the first in eight years that Khamenei will sermon in the weekly religious-political event. Khamenei has usually taken over Friday Prayers on the occasions when the country is in special political situation.

Friday Prayer is an Islamic platform for spreading the religious and political messages to the followers. In Iran, senior clergymen are selected by Khamenei to deliver the agenda of Islamic establishment to the community of attendants and to the society.

(CGTN)