Asif Mohseni

He was born on 26 April 1935 in the city of Qandahār, Afghanistan.[4][5]

With strong links to Iran,[6][7][8] he was a Shia Pashtun.[9] He studied in seminars of Najaf under Grand Ayatollah Abul Qasim Khoei, Muhsin al-Hakim and Abdul A'la Sabzwari.

In 2009 Mohseni drafted a family law code for Afghanistan's minority Shia population.[10] The Shia Family Law legislation was signed into law by President Hamid Karzai in March 2009 after intense pressure from Shia clerics including Mohseni and some leaders of the Hazara community.[11] It gives Shiite men in Afghanistan wide-ranging powers over their wives. Shiite women must obtain permission from their husbands to leave their houses, “except in extreme circumstances.” The law also grants guardianship of children exclusively to their fathers and grandfathers.[12]

The passing of the law brought international outrage and was condemned by world leaders including US President Barack Obama. A report by the United Nations Development Fund for Women, UNIFEM, warned: "Article 132 legalises the rape of a wife by her husband".[13]

On 15 April 2009, between 200-300 Afghan women protested against the law outside Mohseni's mosque and seminary. They were met by hundreds of his enraged supporters who shouted abuse and, according to many of the demonstrators, threw stones at the women.[11] The night before the demonstration, a television station owned by Mohseni repeatedly broadcast a message advising people to prevent family members attending the protest.[3][4]

The law was eventually amended before implementation in August 2009, such as the modification of some of the rules that were protested against. However some have commented that the law remains repressive.[14]

Mohseni owns Tamadon TV Network, a television station very similar in visual style and religious content to Iranian state-run television channels.[4][15]

In the 1960s Mohseni founded a movement called Subh-i Danish (Dawn of Knowledge), whose political and cultural revival program enjoyed some popularity among the Shia youth of Kabul.[16]

In 1978 he founded the Islamic Movement of Afghanistan (Harakat-I Islami-yi Afghanistan), a Shia anti-Soviet resistance movement and political party combining various smaller group with numerous bases inside and outside the country. Its headquarters was originally in the Iranian city of Qum and Mohseni received support for the group from the Iranian state.[4] The group later played an important role in the 1980 rebellion against the communist regime. Among the anti-communist resistance movements, Harakat espoused a moderate islamist line, which brought it close to the sunni Jamiat Islami faction, that had a similar outlook. Mohseni's movement resisted from different Afghan cities and his forces included mainly Mujahideen.[16][17]

Mohseni died on August 5, 2019 in Kabul.[18][19][1] He was buried on August 6, 2019 in the building of the Hawzah Ilmiyah Khatam al-Nabiyin in Kabul.[20]