A member of the Moderation and Development Party, he took office in 2013 as the seventh President of Iran. Earlier in his career, he had held a number of other political appointments, including Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council and Head of the Islamic Consultative Assembly's Commission on Defense.
He studied law at both the University of Tehran and the Glasgow Caledonian University. Also a cleric in the Shia Islam faith, he attended the Qom Seminary.
During the 1980s and early 1990s, he held the rank of Commander-in-Chief of the Iranian Air Defense Force.
His marriage to Sahebeh Rouhani (his cousin) produced four children.
He exchanged a 2013 phone call with United States President Barack Obama; this event represented the greatest degree of direct communication between the Iranian and American governments since the late 1970s.
