TEHRAN -- Dariush Mehrjui, the director of the acclaimed drama “The Cow”, has said that top Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami died because of his Iranian medical team’s negligence.

“I’m angry over this accident that is the outcome of the carelessness and irresponsibility of the surgeons who killed Abbas Kiarostami,” he said during a memorial service for Kiarostami that held at the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults in Tehran on Tuesday.

“The murderers are among us,” noted Mehrjui who was weeping bitterly and asked the country’s judicial authority to bring them to trial.

Talking to the Persian service of ISNA on Tuesday, Ahmad, the elder son of Kiarostami, announced his family’s plan to file a lawsuit against the medical team.  

Kiarostami who was suffering from a severe gastrointestinal disease died at a Paris hospital on July 4.

Kiarostami was hospitalized in mid-March at Tehran’s Jam Hospital and underwent several operations. Although he didn’t recover fully, he left the hospital in late April.  

Meanwhile, some reports published on social networks have accused his surgical team of negligence.  

Due to the repercussions of the operations, he was admitted again to Arad Hospital in Tehran, but on June 27, he decided to leave the hospital to resume his medical treatment at the Paris hospital.  

The Iran Medical Council has assigned a special committee to examine Kiarostami’s medical file in several sessions. The council has also asked Kiarostami’s family doctor to submit the file of Kiarostami’s French medical team to the committee.

The first session was held on Wednesday and the committee is scheduled to its submit comments late next week. 

In addition, the Majlis Health Committee has announced that it is scrutinizing the medical file.

Photo: Director Dariush Mehrjui addresses the audience during a memorial service for Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami at the Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults in Tehran on July 12, 2106. (Mehr/Mahmud Rahimi)

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