'No Mourning Ceremony' For Hanged Iranian Activist

RFE/RL,

The widow of an Iranian activist hanged this week for ties with a banned opposition group says the family has been warned not to hold a mourning ceremony for him, RFE/RL's Radio Farda reports.

Jafar Kazemi and Mohammad Ali Hajaghai were executed on January 24 for ties with the exiled People's Mujahedin of Iran (also known as the Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization, MKO).

The Tehran prosecutor's office said both were involved -- with guidance from a contact in England -- in the unrest following the disputed Iranian presidential elections of 2009.

Kazemi's widow, Rodabe Akbari, told Radio Farda on January 26 that the authorities have forbidden the family from holding a public ceremony in remembrance of her husband.

"They told us not to announce the death of Jafar. Nor could we hold any ceremony in a mosque," she said. "They told us that we are only allowed to mourn in our private homes."

Akbari also said her husband's body had not yet been returned to the family despite repeated requests.

"We applied to the administrative department of verdict procedures, who told us to consult the prosecution, where we were told to wait for the official procedures to be carried out," she said.

Akbari said she was not told what those procedures were.

Mass street protests followed the 2009 election that returned President Mahmud Ahmadinejad to power. Out of the thousands who were detained, more than 80 people have been sentenced to jail terms and a handful have been sentenced to death.