The Foundation for Democracy in Iran mourns the passing of Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Husseini Rouhani, who died under mysterious circumstances at his home in Qom on Friday, July 25. His brother, Ayatollah Mehdi Rouhani, who is based in Paris and is a member of the FDI Board, has accused the regime of having poisoned him during a brief visit to the local hospital. On July 30, he wrote to president-elect Mohammad Khatemi, urging him to allow an international team of medical forensic experts to exhume the body and perform an autopsy to determine the true cause of death.
Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Rouhani was 77, and was in good health at the time of his death. Since 1985, he has been placed under house arrest because of his silent opposition to the regime. Although there appeared to have been a respite in the harsh treatment meted out to him in recent months, the authorities marked their continued disapproval of him by refusing to allow him to be buried alongside his father in the Massoumah mausoleum in Qom, or for memorial services to be held in the Borujerdi mosque in Qom. Instead, he was buried on Saturday, July 26, in the husseiniya attached to his own house in Qom.
"My brother has become a martyr for his faith," Mehdi Rouhani said. "All Iran is in mourning for his death. He was standing against a regime that is abusing Shiism for political purposes that have nothing to do with religion. That is why they were afraid of him. They always feared that a supreme religious figure, respected by the people, would condemn them as un-Islamic. Through his silence, that is what my brother did."
Mehdi Rouhani says he was offered proof of a plot to kill his brother two years ago, by a senior member of the regime's security forces who approached him in Paris. "He said he could obtain documents to prove that Khamene'i had approved the plan to eliminate my brother. He offered to intervene to stop the plot, if I would pay him $100,000. Obviously, I couldn't pay such a sum. So I immediately contacted members of my brother's entourage, and warned them to take extra measures to increase his security." Rouhani said regime agents have prevented him from speaking directly to his brother by phone for years.
The allegation of a regime plot could have widespread repercussions inside Iran's Shiite clergy, where Ayatollah Mohammad Rouhani was well-respected as a quietest "who believed the clergy should not get involved in politics," his brother said. "He was totally opposed to the notion of clerical rule (Velayat-e faghih), and wrote this in many books before the Revolution. The regime was aware of that, and knew he had a wide following. They always interpreted his silence as condemnation."
FDI joins Ayatollah Mehdi Rouhani in demanding that the Tehran authorities authorize a team of internationally recognized forensic experts to conduct an autopsy in keeping with Islamic traditions, to determine the true nature of Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Rouhani's death. Indeed, the regime has nothing to lose by approving such a gesture. Not to allow a thorough, credible investigation of Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Rouhani's death will only fuel the fires of suspicion that the regime is continuing its campaign against the traditional Shiite clergy in Iran.
FDI joins Mehdi Rouhani in extending our condolences to Grand Ayatollah Mohammad Rouhani's family.
The Foundation for Democracy in Iran is a private, non-profit corporation registered in the State of Maryland. Contact: Kenneth R. Timmerman, Executive Director. Tel: (301) 946-2918. Fax: (301) 942-5341. FDI materials, including the FDI Newswire, are available free-of-charge via the Internet at http://www.iran.org