Detained Opposition Leader Mousavi Undergoes Emergency Heart Procedure

Mir Hossein Mousavi, a former prime minister in the 1980’s, has been under house arrest since February 2011, along with Mehdi Karroubi and Mousavi’s wife, Zahra Rahnavard.

Operation Done without Prior Knowledge or Consent of Family

On Tuesday, April 29, 2014, an emergency heart procedure was carried out on Mir Hossein Mousavi, the opposition leader who has been held under house arrest for three years, without the prior knowledge and consent of his family.

Mousavi’s daughter, Zahra, said her father, who has a history of heart problems and high blood pressure, fell seriously ill on Friday, April 25, but security officials refused to allow him to be transferred to the hospital until four days later, when his condition became critical.

“They took him to the hospital without informing the family. In the hospital they gave him a stress test but he was unable to perform it. The doctors then decided that he had to undergo an angioplasty and eventually it was done without the family being present [in the hospital],” Zahra Mousavi said in an interview with kaleme.com.

Mir Hossein Mousavi, a former prime minister in the 1980’s, has been under house arrest since February 2011, along with Mehdi Karroubi and Mousavi’s wife, Zahra Rahnavard. Mousavi and Karroubi were both candidates in the disputed 2009 presidential election. The popular protests that followed this election became known as the Green Movement.

Neither Mousavi nor Karroubi and their spouses have officially been charged with any crime throughout the three years of their detention.

Zahra Mousavi sharply criticized the continuation of her parents’ house arrest as well as the way their three daughters have been treated.

She said her parents have been in poor health for a long time but that the family had remained silent in the hope that the situation would improve following Hassan Rouhani’s election as president.

“We thought perhaps there were some positive changes in the Intelligence Ministry… But unfortunately this has not been the case,” Zahra Mousavi said.

“[My parents] have been [effective] hostages during this time. We remained silent so that we could visit them once in a while. [The authorities] wanted us to enter their cage and witness the melting and gradual death of our mother and father, and yet they wanted us to remain silent.”