Mousavi's wife allowed to visit dead father

By: Jabbar Fazeli, MD

The green movement news site, Kaleme (3), reported today that Sadegh Kazemi, the father of Zahra Rahnavard died of pneumonia in a Tehran hospital this morning. 

Mr. Kazemi was 93 years old and suffered from Alzheimer's disease.  According to Kaleme, Rahnavard was allowed a 15 minute visit to the hospital, under guard, after her father's death. The less reliable Fars news reported that she was at bedside when her father died (4).

Zahra Rahnavard is Mr. Mousavi's wife and holds a masters degree in arts, a Ph.D. in political science, and was an adviser to former President Mohammad Khatami. She was the first president of the al-Zahra Women's College in Tehran, a writer, and women rights activists, advocating the elimination of the "morality police" and an end to the  discrimination against women in Iran. Not sure how far her views on women freedoms go given that she is also the author of essays titled  "The Beauty of the Veil, and the Veil of Beauty" and " The Colonial Motives for the Unveiling of Women" (1,2). 

The Rahnavard and Mousavi families received open condolence letters from various organizations and political figures, but the likely "reformist" candidates for president (Khatami and Rafsanjani) have not done so yet. Ayatollah Sanei and the Beheshti family were the top names to issue condolence letters (5).

Photo credit: wn.com

References:

(1)https://www.facebook.com/zrahnavard/info

(2)http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/may/05/iran-zahra-rahnavard-presidential-election

(3)http://www.kaleme.com/1391/10/10/klm-126730/

(4)http://www.farsnews.com/newstext.php?nn=13911009001074

(5)http://www.rahesabz.net/story/64100/